Nov 13
Tor Mented Comments: Not sure if it is a two-headed gorilla with one head missing, a headless gorilla behind the gorilla in front, or something else entirely.
Published 1968
Tor Mented Comments: Not sure if it is a two-headed gorilla with one head missing, a headless gorilla behind the gorilla in front, or something else entirely.
Published 1968
November 13th, 2017 at 10:14 am
Is this book based on a heated debate between two nine-year-old boys?
“Conan versus King Kong — who’d win?”
“Conan, ‘cos he’s got a big sharp sword!”
“Yeah, but King Kong can grab his foot!”
“But then Conan chops off his hand!”
etc. etc.
November 13th, 2017 at 11:02 am
But that’s just baby King Kong. And the one who has been relieved of their head is a mere toddler. Just wait, Conan, until the parents get here.
November 13th, 2017 at 11:17 am
Looks like Conan the Freeloader has a pacifier in his mouth.
November 13th, 2017 at 1:30 pm
Faux Tarzan.
November 13th, 2017 at 1:50 pm
Reminds me of my favorite Red Skelton character, Freddie the Freebooter.
November 13th, 2017 at 2:11 pm
This is a masterpiece. Only a true master could show such utter disregard for proper perspective.
November 13th, 2017 at 3:21 pm
Memories of a 70s Christmas: finally finding a use for last year’s novelty Conan bottle-opener when given a novelty after-shave bottle in the shape of a giant gorilla.
November 13th, 2017 at 3:31 pm
I know we don’t often indulge in personal narrative here, but every time a Conan shows up on GSS it reminds me of the summer of my boyhood (aged 11 or 12) when I discovered him. I was so enthralled, even more so upon reading about the strange sad life of Robert E. Howard down there in Texas, and the crazy trance states he’d go into when he plunged himself back into the Hyperborean Age (12,000 years ago), which I totally believed then must have existed (maybe I still believe it). Even at that tender age I was developing a kind of Conan-snobbishness, to wit, any cover not by Frazetta was inferior and the stories Howard left unfinished or in outline form which were eventually completed by L. Sprague De Camp and/or Lin Carter are inferior to the ones Howard wrote himself (not much, really, since he died so young).
Thanks for the indulgence. By the way, this cover sucks, if only for its ludicrous failure to understand perspective, as @Tom Noir points out. The Spanish version is a little better, especially since it displays the weirdest knee-calf rendition I’ve ever seen. But it’s not a Frazetta either.
November 13th, 2017 at 4:21 pm
I always pictured Beowulf just like this.
November 13th, 2017 at 4:47 pm
@Mellie: what, with a huge number 3 hovering over his head?
November 13th, 2017 at 5:07 pm
Arms being chopped off seems to be an old illustrative theme with this story.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadows_in_the_Moonlight_(story)#/media/File:Hugh_Rankin_-_Shadows_in_the_Moonlight.jpg
November 13th, 2017 at 5:10 pm
“This one’s for Neil Sedaka!”
November 13th, 2017 at 5:19 pm
I think Conan just decapitated Kong’s friend, hence the large red spot on the page.
And yes, the pose he’s in does look exceptionally ridiculous.
November 13th, 2017 at 5:30 pm
Kong seems to be screaming, “Jaysus, man! Get some underwear!”
November 13th, 2017 at 5:42 pm
So many gaffes here. If the other creature’s head has been lopped off, why is it just standing there? And what is Conan bracing his left foot on? The gorilla’s shoulder can’t be that high, and its ear wouldn’t offer much stability. For that matter, what surface is he bracing his right foot on? The gorilla is holding him pretty gently, not trying to yank him off. In fact, he’s holding Conan like he’s a lollipop. How can Conan remain upright in such a position?
Also, Conan’s sword seems way too flimsy to chop through a giant gorilla’s neck.
November 13th, 2017 at 5:48 pm
My first GSS cover. Yay!
I reread the book after sending in the cover. The gorilla is supposed to be of normal size and not a mini-Kong. Even with the cover in front of me, I cannot tell where the background foliage ends and the ape’s right side begins. There is a frond or vine on the left side of the cover that looks for a moment like the ape’s right rib cage, which means it would have to be lying on its left side. All in all, a terrible painting made worse by memories of Frazetta.
And its head does not seem to be attached to the rest of the body. Perhaps an anatomical issues tag is suitable.
November 13th, 2017 at 5:54 pm
@ Tracy: Conan cut off the ape’s right arm in the story. The cover makes it look like an entirely separate gorilla is behind the first one.
@ B. Chiclitz: Much the same here. Robert E. Howard and H.P. Lovecraft formed my transition from reading Marvel comics to reading fiction. Even in my teen years, I always thought that the super-macho descriptions of Conan were absurd. I identified more with Lovecraft’s neurotic protagonists.
November 13th, 2017 at 6:29 pm
Dead Stuff: Totally with a big #3 over his head! Only it’s a rune. And next to it is “Grendel wuz here.”
November 13th, 2017 at 6:31 pm
@Tor M—Yeah, the over the top part was delightful to my adolescent hero fantasies. I recall one scene where this gigantic torturer comes by to break Conan’s neck and Conan’s neck muscles are just so strong that the guy can’t choke him. Conan naturally turns the tables on the would-be executioner and says something like: “Fool, try to break the neck of a Cimmerian bull as I did before I was twelve years old.” Then of course Conan snaps the torturer’s neck like twig.
As I mentioned, I don’t like to write about the books themselves on GSS, but Conan is a special kind of guy and just gets me sailing down memory lane.
November 13th, 2017 at 6:39 pm
@ B. Chiclitz: In one of the stories in this collection — it might be this very story, Shadows in the Moonlight — Conan tells a delicate woman that he can lie down naked in the snow and go to sleep with no harm.
I was amazed as a kid about how tough he was, until I realized that having muscles does not make you invulnerable to hypothermia!
November 13th, 2017 at 6:43 pm
@Tor (17): Five years ago I was a four-stone apology… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4MkhTGTurc Wrestle poodles and win!
November 13th, 2017 at 6:44 pm
I suspect that the artist originally painted this cover without the gorilla. Conan might have been standing on the steps of a temple, the deck of a pirate ship, etc., fighting a horde of generic foes. Then the artist was ordered to add the gorilla from Shadows in the Moonlight. Instead of starting from scratch, he/she crammed the ape in there any old which-way.
Note how the arch of Conan’s sword swing does not match any of the action, the trail of blood notwithstanding.
Perhaps experts at the Louvre can do a spectroscopic analysis to determine if there are any painted-over figures.
November 13th, 2017 at 6:48 pm
@ Tat: Had to Google the lyrics: I am two separate gorillas. Spot on!
November 13th, 2017 at 8:17 pm
Now let’s all go check out “Rusty (Champion Thrust).”
November 13th, 2017 at 9:19 pm
Unless the gorilla’s playing with his Stretch Armstrong, I’ve got some anatomical issues with that right thigh.
November 14th, 2017 at 12:15 am
Conan the Freeballer.
(Can’t believe nobody said that yet.)
Maybe Kong’s holding Conan up and is about to smack him against a tree? We’re just seeing him mid-swing?
@Mellie M: I pictured Beowulf as wearing more clothing, as befits Scandinavian weather.
@THX: obscure reference FTW.
I agree both Conan and the ape need the “anatomical issues” tag.
November 14th, 2017 at 3:51 am
L. Sprague de Camp: Conan the Rebooter
November 16th, 2017 at 2:38 am
Is it an original novel? IS IT AN ORIGINAL NOVEL? I must know, is it an original novel? Why, why is there no blurb to tell me whether it is an original novel or not? Oh, the horror, the shame!
November 18th, 2017 at 7:08 pm
If boots are free, why isn’t he wearing any?
November 19th, 2017 at 7:01 pm
@Captnlunch: Earlier today I passed up the opportunity to take a television set because I had my hands full of bagels. Maybe Conan is too busy for the free booties.
Love your meal, BTW, big fan.
November 20th, 2017 at 5:20 pm
Hmm. Maybe if Conan is always giving away free boots, that’s why he doesn’t have any.
If they wanted to make this book appeal to a young demographic, they might have called it Conan the Retweeter.
November 21st, 2017 at 3:25 am
Conan the Freebaser.
November 25th, 2017 at 6:28 pm
In Cimmeria, the leading treatment for migraine is amputation.
March 6th, 2020 at 1:01 pm
The sequel CONAN VS. GODZILLA was only released in Japan.
March 6th, 2020 at 11:27 pm
No, being Japan-exclusive, it was titled GOJIRA VS. CONAN.
Guess who won.
March 7th, 2020 at 10:09 am
Even when Conan is free of his boots – no attempt is made to paint his feet.