Hour of the Dragon

[mindboggled]

I noticed that there was no thread for Hour of the Dragon, so thought I'd make one! And I just did! Hour of the Dragon is my favorite Conan story, and one of my most beloved Howard stories. I think there is a lot to discusses regarding this tale.

One of the most interesting aspects of this tale for me is that as Conan traverses through a good chunk of Hyboria seeking the Heart of Ahriman, we get a deeper look into Conan's psychology as he visits places familiar to him from his past. To me this the ultimate Conan tale, it has everything you could want in a Conan story, and much more than that. There's never a dull moment, the pacing is perfect! So if you want to talk about Hour of the Dragon this is the thread to do it in!

[charleshelm]

It's a great story for sure, and deserving of a real movie treatment..which will probably never come.

[Sangria Sword]

Hour of the Dragon. I'm going to re-read it tonight. I've read it before, but its been a few years. Life has detoured me from Howard fandom for a while, but I'm back now. I will post a comment after I've re-read the yarn. For me, when it comes to a riveting action yarn no one comes close to Robert E. Howard. By Crom!

[mindboggled]

Mar 7, 2019 19:02:34 GMT -5 Sangria Sword said:

Hour of the Dragon. I'm going to re-read it tonight. I've read it before, but its been a few years. Life has detoured me from Howard fandom for a while, but I'm back now. I will post a comment after I've re-read the yarn. For me, when it comes to a riveting action yarn no one comes close to Robert E. Howard. By Crom!

I've only read it once, and that was a couple of years ago. It's been on my mind a lot recently(main reason I made this thread actually)I'll reread it soon.

[Von K]

Howard knew what he should do with The Hour of the Dragon and how he should be doing it: he was at the same time recycling several elements from his past Conan stories and trying to conquer a new readership. He had thus to present as much as possible of his Hyborian Age and its possibilities to his intended new readers, and also should have no compunction about recycling several elements from former Conan stories, since the British market was averse to publishing short stories. The reader would thus have hints of Stygia, of the Hyborian Age equivalents to the African kingdoms, would even get a glimpse – by way of the mysterious sorcerors – of the countries east of Vilayet, in a tale which remained, however, centered on the Hyborian countries he would be familiar with: the kingdoms corresponding to modern occidental Europe.

Excerpted from Hyborian Genesis by Patrice Louinet.

[mindboggled]

Feb 17, 2019 21:44:32 GMT -5 charleshelm said:

It's a great story for sure, and deserving of a real movie treatment..which will probably never come.

True unfortunately. The chances are practically zero.