Seeing as all good Americans read L Frank Baum, it might be worthwhile to
note facets of The Wizard of Oz that also appear in Howard. Baum
peppered his stories with moralising dictums and, as we know, Howard often
adopts a moralising tone when the when the wolflike earthpower of Conan bests
the sophistry of civilization.
Baum’s stories are sometimes thought of as political allegories, with
large canvases of war and conquest (grotesque bloodshed, as in the arrival). In
The Marvelous Land of Oz females lead an army to dethrone the men. The
obvious difference is Baum’s wizards are hopeless, if charlatans; however, of
all the influences on Howard, such as Jack London or Talbot Mundy, only Baum
has wizardry (?)
In the film, at least, the wizard’s apparatus appears technological. If
one made the assumption that the gimcracked illusions of the wizard of Oz
actually worked, then one would have a perspective illusion of sorcerers run by
acolytes, so it could be taken as a symptom of advanced civilization, such as
Acheron in Conan the Conqueror.
Xaltotun makes the explicit statement that his allies will be vassals in
the coming order
“Conan is wiser than you.. He already knows what you kings have yet to learn..
Xaltotun is the real master of the western nations… all the nations of the
world we shall weld into one vast empire.” (page 168)
Of course, they will be all-powerful vassals (acolytes), that’s the
attraction. In Howard’s morality, civilization degrades the raw nature of Man.
If you assume, then, that he read Baum (as seems almost sure) the parallel
between sorcery and technology seems quite close too.
In Howard, the muscular physique is really the ne plus ultra and
signifies an earthpower as against the solar serpent of the sorcerers. In our
world, the solar serpent has come to dominate, and no more so than in the news
channels that bombard us with Stairway to Cleveland topics, via lenses
of perspective illusion.
Has it ever struck you that there are more head-lines per square minute
nowadays than probably in the entire Middle Ages? Does that not suggest to you
that the head has come to dominate and that the body is inert?
Somebody to Love? page 27, Grace Slick (continued from prev.)
Why are our bodies inert? Because our physical reality is an illusion of
perspective order. In Howard’s world of muscular physique, there are ancient
and early physical realities of the body and of the earth. The smells of the
earth, the texture of naked wood, the flaming fire. Howard’s descriptions are
full of naked stone, worked wall hangings, nothing superfluous. It seems
possible Howard identified his early life in quite rudimentary surroundings and
the strongly felt presence of his mother with both an Earth Mother figure and
an ancient predominance of the body.
Howard is never one to skimp on food and drink, or the rudiments of the
home and hearth (Dorothy?)
He set the
platter on the floor, and she was suddenly aware of a ravenous hunger. Making
no comment, she seated herself cross-legged on the floor, and taking the dish
in her lap, she began to eat, using her fingers, which were all she had in the
way of table utensils. After all, adaptability is one of the tests of true
aristocracy. (People of
the Black Circle)
A roving warrior with a muscular physique is always going to have two
paramount rituals. One is that the body needs fuel; the other is that body and
clothes need periodic cleaning from sweat, filth, encrusted blood (chores of
the hearth). If you imagine the young Howard was forever listening to his mother’s
Celtic folk-tales, the link between early and ancient is self-evident.
Maybe Grace Slick is his soul-mate, as her disdain for etiquette is
apparent
What have such crudities to do with early or ancient physical realities
of the body? Might as well ask what has Aristophanes to do with the origins of classical
culture! (Pictorial 47)
Slick the Earth Mother figure also opened the doorway to time in “Hyperdrive”
(CH5). Physical and deadly (“Black Widow”), one of her greatest performances
was captured on film at Monterey by Pennebaker, and you can tell she means
every word of BE Wheeler’s ode to the power of death. Howard would probably
have approved.