Robert E. Howard

Best-known as the author of sword sorcery stories set in his fictive Hyborian age, Robert E. Howard also wrote a number of straight horror stories, some under the influence of H. P. Lovecraft. It's a bit hard to say which of Howard's stories should be considered "Mythos," since most of his major story cycles intersect with the Mythos at some point, and so could be considered part of the extended Mythos universe. For my purposes, I have considered all of Howard's following story cycles to be "Mythos": anything relating to Von Junzt's Nameless Cults, the Conrad and Kirowan tales, and the Little People cycle.

Nameless Cults: The Cthulhu Mythos Fiction of Robert E. Howard (Used)

Sadly out of print (as of this writing), but still available on Amazon as a used item. Includes: The Abbey (completed by C. J. Henderson), The Black Bear Bites, Black Eons (completed by Robert M. Price), The Black Stone, The Challenge From Beyond (with C. L. Moore, A. Merritt, H. P. Lovecraft, and Frank Belknap Long), The Children of the Night, Dig Me No Grave, The Door to the World, The Fire of Asshurbanipal, The Gods of Bal-Sagoth, The Hoofed Thing, The House in the Oaks (completed by August Derleth), The Little People, People of the Dark, The Thing on the Roof, Worms of the Earth, The Shadow Kingdom, Skull-Face.

The Cthulhu Stories of Robert E. Howard (ebook)

Includes: The Black Stone, The Breaking of the Chain, The Children of the Night, Dig Me No Grave, The Fire of Asshurbanipal, The Gods of Bal-Sagoth, The Haunter of the Ring, People of the Dark, The Shadow Kingdom, Skull-Face, The Thing on the Roof, Worms of the Earth.

Delphi Collected Works of Robert E. Howard (ebook)

Collects all of Robert E. Howard's works that are currently in the public domain under U.S. copyright law. This is the great majority of his output, but excludes some items that were first published posthumously. Of the Howard works that I have indexed for this website, this collection includes: The Challenge From Beyond (with C. L. Moore, A. Merritt, H. P. Lovecraft, and Frank Belknap Long), The Children of the Night, Dig Me No Grave, The Fire of Asshurbanipal, The Haunter of the Ring, The Hyborian Age, People of the Dark, The Shadow Kingdom, Skull-Face.

Delphi also publishes a British edition called the Delphi Complete Works of Robert E. Howard. This is a larger collection permitted by U.K. copyright law. In addition to the stories mentioned above, it also includes The Black Stone, The Dark Man, Dermod's Bane, The Dwellers Under the Tombs, The Gods of Bal-Sagoth, The House in the Oaks (fragment, not the version completed by August Derleth), The Thing On the Roof, Twilight of the Grey Gods. This version is available at https://www.delphiclassics.com/shop/robert-e-howard/ but is not for sale to U.S. customers.

The Horror Stories of Robert E. Howard

A large collection of Howard's horror stories. The items of Mythos or borderline Mythos interest include: The Black Stone, The Children of the Night, Dermod's Bane, Dig Me No Grave, The Dwellers Under the Tomb, The Fire of Asshurbanipal, The Haunter of the Ring, The Hoofed Thing, The House (fragment, not the version completed by August Derleth), The Little People, People of the Dark, The Thing On the Roof, The Valley of the Lost, Worms of the Earth, Untitled Fragment (beginning "Beneath the glare of the sun, etched in the hot blue sky...").

Bran Mak Morn: The Last King

Bran Mak Morn may have been Howard's most interesting barbarian hero: the last great king of a race, the Picts, that was already in decline and doomed to be overwhelmed by others. He also has links to the Hyborian Age cycle, through King Kull and Brule the Spear-Slayer, to the reptilian Little People, and to Von Junzt's Nameless Cults, which speaks of the Bran Cult. Stories of Mythos interest here include: The Children of the Night, The Dark Man, The Little People, Worms of the Earth.

Ar-I-E'ch and the Spell of Cthulhu

Robert E. Howard's correspondence with H.P. Lovecraft inspired the two-fisted creator of Conan the Barbarian to pit his square-jawed modern heroes against cosmic horrors, colossal beasts, and cannibalistic children of the night, in a short-lived effort to open new markets for his fiction. In this book, the first in the "Informal Guide to Robert E. Howard" series, Howard scholar Fred Blosser analyzes each of REH's Cthulhu Mythos stories, unpacking their plots, their themes, and their unexpected linkages to Howard's other works. The book includes a selected reading list, a study of elder horrors in the Kull stories, and an examination of a trio of tales that REH set in a most unlikely locale (for him): the haunted seaport. Paperback edition, ebook edition.

The Annotated Guide to Robert E. Howard's Weird Fantasy

The Annotated Guide to Robert E. Howard’s Weird Fantasy scrutinizes this full range of Howard’s dark fiction by listing, summarizing, and critically analyzing more than 50 tales. Surveyed not only are widely anthologized horror classics like “Pigeons from Hell” and “The Black Stone,” but also many lesser-known tales that further illuminate Howard’s genius for creating “real emotions of spectral fear and dread suspense,” as the great H.P. Lovecraft said. Whether you've read all of Robert E. Howard's weird fiction, or even none of it at all, you'll find new perspectives, incisive analysis, and engaging commentary in this definitive guide.

A Means to Freedom: The Letters of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard 1930-1932

H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard are two of the titans of weird fiction of their era. Dominating the pages of Weird Tales in the 1920s and 1930s, they have gained worldwide followings for their compelling writings and also for the very different lives they led. The two writers came in touch in 1930, when Howard wrote to Lovecraft via Weird Tales. A rich and vibrant correspondence immediately ensued. Both writers were fascinated with the past, especially the history of Roman and Celtic Britain, and their letters are full of intriguing discussions of contemporary theories on this subject. Gradually, a new discussion came to the fore—a complex dispute over the respective virtues of barbarism and civilisation, the frontier and settled life, and the physical and the mental. Lovecraft, a scion of centuries-old New England, and Howard, a product of recently settled Texas, were diametrically opposed on these and other issues, and each writes compellingly of his beliefs, attitudes, and theories. The result is a dramatic debate-livened by wit, learning, and personal revelation-that is as enthralling as the fiction they were writing at the time. All the letters have been exhaustively annotated by the editors.

A Means to Freedom: The Letters of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard 1932-1936

In the second volume of the letters of H. P. Lovecraft and Robert E. Howard, the two authors continue their wide-ranging discussion of such central issues as the relative value of barbarism and civilization, the virtues of the frontier and of settled city life, and other related issues. Lovecraft regales Howard with his extensive travels up and down the eastern seaboard, including trips to Quebec, Florida, and obscure corners of New England, while Howard writes engagingly of his own travels through the lonely stretches of Texas. Each has great praise for the other's writings in Weird Tales and elsewhere, and each conducts searching discussions of literature, philosophy, politics, and economics in the wake of the depression and Franklin D. Roosevelt's election. World affairs, including the rise of Hitler and Mussolini, also engage their attention. All letters are exhaustively annotated by the editors, and the volume concludes with an extensive bibliography of both writers as well as the publication of a few letters to Lovecraft from Robert E. Howard's father, Dr. I. M. Howard, in the wake of his son's tragic and unexpected suicide.

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