Book Club 81: Black Gods And Scarlet Dreams

[fainiel]

This sounds really interesting, just ordered a second hand copy from Amazon!

[hammard]

Got it yesterday evening. So far, I have mixed views...

[Barsoom]

Well, I've finished this now, and I also have mixed feelings about it. Where I liked it, it reminded me of other writers, but it seemed undeveloped, leading to a lot of vagueness or repitition.

Black Gods, Scarlet Dreams collects the stories of CL Moore's 2 most well-known protagonists, Jirey of Joiry and Northwest Smith. At first glance you might think it an odd thing to bring stories for a swordwoman from Medieval France and an anti-hero in a Sword-and-Planet version of Mars together, but what binds them into one whole is a shared sense of cosmic horror, a feeling that there are forces and beings in the wider universe that are far more powerful than we are and hostile. This cosmic horror is more Clark Ashton Smith than HP Lovecraft, being more familiar than the creatures from the Cthulhu Mythos, and actively antagonistic towards mankind rather than merely indifferent.

So far so promising.

In the Jirel of Joiry stories, she is very much like Robert E Howard's Dark Agnes or Red Sonia characters, a swordswoman in a man's world, though here the supernatural elements are more explicit. Jirel is usually whisked away to another world or plane, where she has to confront a dark god who wants to seduce her in some way. The story that I preferred was the one that stepped away from that formula the most called 'Hellsgarde', where because of circumstances Jirey must go to a haunted castle to retrieve a casket and finds the the descendent of the orginal lord there with his own retinue and his own agenda. The other stories, while having some nice imagery in places, were a bit vague and didn't leave that much of an impression.

The Northwest Smith stories reminded me of Leigh Brackett's Mars stories, with Northwest Smith a stand-in for Eric John Stark. Again, the supernatural element is more explicit, with Northwest Smith usually trying to avoid the law when he meets a femme fatale who asks him for help. He then goes on to confront creatures reminiscent of gods and monsters from Greek mythology. I liked 'Shambleu' the best, but the stories were very similar, and I got the feeling she was telling the same story, only changing the details. As a result I did find myself speed-reading through it.

Overall, the collection was ok. I preferred the Northwest Smith stories, and you could easily imagine them fitting into Leigh Brackett's Solar System stories. But is it really that much of a recommendation that you like them because at their best they reminded you of someone else?

[Clown Asylum]

Okay, I’ve read both of ‘em, and I’m glad I did, because there was some great stuff in there. CL Moore had a great imagination when it came to ideas, but her characters were nothing more than ciphers.

Take Jirel -supposed feminist superstar, and in the time these tales were written, maybe she was. But she’s just a collection of lascivious character descriptions, in which her red hair, her lion eyes and her curvaceous body are described, again and again, endlessly. Plus she’s very cross all the time. That is the entirety of her character. Northwest Smith fares little better, but at least he’s not held up as some paragon of his gender. Regarding their backgrounds, what made them who they are, we get nothing. Jirel is a fearsome hottie, granted – but why?

Plus she’s in love with the guy who conquered her, and doesn’t realise it until she kills him. Silly, silly flame-haired, golden-eyed temptress with the excitingly formed bottom. Andrea Dworkin she ain’t.

I suspect that the main essay is going to parp on about what a triumphant force for feminism Jirel was, and I have to say that these must have been pretty dark days indeed for the awesome sex if she’s the best example of Girl Power to be found.

Where Moore truly does excel is in the ideas informing her stories. There she really is deserving of her place in the pantheon of Golden Age SF writers. She’s easily as good as Leigh Brackett, and that’s high praise. Her tales are sublimely written and brimming with imagination. If only she’d paid a bit more attention to character, then she might not have been as obscure as she is, and SFX might not have had to dig her up out of the mud.

[hammard]

It's way past the deadline so I've decided to just stop. To be honest I found the whole thing a really dull slog, and although I've only read the first 300 pages (and the end story) I have no desire to read any more.

The Black Gods section is about Jirel (a female knight whose main description seems to be that she has red hair and is striking) who keeps finding hidden realms and defeating a magical diety by some plot point plucked out of the air. Clown Asylum very well points out the absurdity of the main plot, but I have to reiterate that this would certainly not be considered a feminist work if it was published now.

The Scarlet Dreams has the usual pulp hero sitting in the mix of fantasy, western and sci-fi we come to expect now don't know how inventive it was in the 1930s either way. The introduction to the first tale not only ruins the story by giving away the twist, it made me laugh out loud as I kept imagining the original BSG theme music to come in over the top. Although I never finished the section the stories were pretty much the same as the first ones, only finding mystical seductive women. We should know they're evil as they always have some signs (the first one is only ever described as having brown skin, red hair and green eyes, how could he not suspect *rolls eyes*) whilst Northwest Smith doesn't seem to posess a personality or even any great skills.

Throughout the prose is florid and all the stories very repititve. I honestly can't think of anything good to say. Even for it's time these stories would soon to be outshown. It lacks the fun of Conan, John Carter, Skylark or Ourborous but has none of the depth of the legendary works soon to be published like the Hobbit, Out of the Silent Planet, The Sword in The Stone or Star Maker. The only thing I can think is that this might be the first work to involve the famous "and the knight removed his helmet and, GASP, it was a woman!". If so then perhaps Moore can be said to be to blame for lame plot twists ever after...

Unfortunately, I tend to go through phases of liking then disliking these books, so I assume you're going to get a lot more moanng for a few months. Apologies in advance.