Conan
the Barbarian
Conan
from the Marvel Comics of the
1970s
Conan-
--1st appearance in print: Weird Tales -a pulp
magazine-(December, 1932) 1st Comic Book Appearance,
Conan the
Barbarian #1 (October 1970), a Marvel Comic
book.
Arnold
Schwarzenneger
as Conan
The character of Conan
began in Depression-era Texas with a writer named Robert
E. Howard. Howard wrote adventure and fantasy short
stories for the pulp magazine Weird Tales in the early
1930s. Howard, who also created the characters Kull the
Conqueror and Solomon Kane, revised an unpublished Kull
story, and created a barbarian character from the wilds
of a fictional land he called Cimmeria. Howard named this
barbarian Conan, whose introduction to the world took
place in the December, 1932 issue of the magazine Weird
Tales.
Conan was a native of a
cold, dark, windswept land of gaunt hills named Cimmeria.
Howard described Conan's native land in a poem he wrote
in 1932. It is believed that Howard may have based
Cimmeria's description on what he saw of the hill-country
above Fredricksburg, Texas in a mist of winter
rain
"It
was gloomy land that seemed to hold
All winds and clouds
and dreams that shun the sun,
With bare boughs
rattling in the lonesome winds,
And the dark
woodlands brooding over all,
Not even lightened by
the rare dim sun
Which made squat
shadows out of men; they called it
Cimmeria, land of
Darkness and deep Night.
It was so long ago
and far away
I have forgotten the
very name men called me.
The axe and
flint-tipped spear are like a dream,
And hunts and wars
are like shadows. I recall
Only the stillness of
that sombre land;
The clouds that piled
forever on the hills,
The dimness of the
everlasting woods.
Cimmeria, land of
Darkness and the Night."
In Howard's tales of Conan
and his life, the barbarian adventurer left his native
Cimmerian hill-country for a life of adventure. In his
freebooting career, Conan lived and fought as thief, a
mercenary, a pirate, a hero, and, toward the end of his
life, an usurper of the crown of the kingdom of
Aquilonia.
Conan's debut as a comic
book characvter began in 1970 in Marvel Comics. Conan
the Barbarian enjoyed a run of 275 regular issues
into the early-1990s. While the Marvel Comics version of
Conan was popular, it was limited in how it could present
Conan as a true, bloodthirsty, studly barbarian who
always gets the barely-clothed girl (after saving her
from being eaten by some monster). In order to present
Conan in all of his true savagery, Marvel (under the
imprint of Curtis Magazines) also published a magazine
called the Savage Sword of Conan, which began in
1973. As a magazine, this version of Conan did not have
to follow the restrictive Comics Code Authority, which
governed what could and could not appear in comic books.
The Savage Sword of Conan, with its more adult
themes and artwork (see below) was very popular with
readers, and also a place where many of the top comics
artists of that time wanted to work. Dark Horse Comics
also publishes a comic version of Conan.
Frank
Frazetta covers of Savage Sword of Conan
In 1982, famed director
John Milius introduced Conan to the big screen for the
first time. Conan the Barbarian featured a new
action movie actor with a thick foreign accent named
Arnold Schwarzenegger as the big Cimmerian. This first
Conan movie was successful, launchdding Arnold's movie
career, and leading to a less successful sequel in 1984,
Conan the Destroyer. In August, 2011 the latest
iteration of Conan hit the theaters starring Jason Momoa
as Conan and Rachel
Nichols as Tamara,
his love interest in the movie.
News out of Hollywood
reports that a new Conan film, starring the original
Conan, Arnold Schwarzenneger, is in pre-production, as of
2013. The film will feature an older Conan.
Jason
Momoa as Conan
Sources
and Links on Conan the Barbarian:
Frank
Frazetta website
Conan
the Barbarian (2011)--Official
site for the 2011 Conan movie
See also: Conan
the Barbarian History
Conan
the Barbarian
Rachel
Nichols