The Dark Eidolon and Other Fantasies (42 page)

Hateful, and most abhorred,

about us the season

of sleet, of snow and of frost

reaches, and seems unending

as plains whereon

lashed prisoners go,

chained, and enforced

to labor in glacial mines,

digging the baubles of greybeard kings,

of bleak Polarian
34
lords.

Benumbed and failing,

we languish for shores Canopic
35

that foulder to vaults of fire,

for streams of ensanguined lotus

drinking the candent flame

with lips unsered, unsated,

for valleys wherein no shadow,

whether of cassia or cypress,

shall harbor the ghost of ice,

the winter's etiolate phantom.

Benumbed and failing,

we languish for shores Canopic

that foulder to vaults of fire.

Fain would we hail the summer,

like slaves endungeoned

beneath some floe-built fortress,

greeting their liberator,

the hero in golden mail. . . .

But . . . if summer should come no more,

and winter remain

a stark colossus

bestriding the years?

If, silent and pale,

with marmorean armor,

the empire of cold

should clasp the world

to its rimed equator

beneath the low,

short arc of the sun,

out-ringed by the far-flung

orbit of death?

Who has seen the towers of Amithaine

Swan-throated rising from the main

Whose tides to some remoter moon

Flow in a fadeless afternoon? . . .

Who has seen the towers of Amithaine

Shall sleep, and dream of them again.

On falcon banners never furled,

Beyond the marches of the world,

They blazon forth the heraldries

Of dream-established sovereignties

Whose princes wage immortal wars

For beauty with the bale-red stars.

Amid the courts of Amithaine

The broken iris rears again

Restored from gardens youth has known;

And strains from ruinous viols flown

The legends tell in Amithaine

Of her that is its chatelaine.

Dreamer, beware! in her wild eyes

Full many a sunken sunset lies,

And gazing, you shall find perchance

The fallen kingdoms of romance,

And past the bourns of north and south

Follow the roses of her mouth.

The trumpets blare in Amithaine

For paladins that once again

Ride forth to ghostly, glamorous wars

Against the doom-preparing stars.

Dreamer, awake! . . . but I remain

To ride with them in Amithaine.

The sorcerer departs . . . and his high tower is drowned

Slowly by low flat communal seas that level all . . .

While crowding centuries retreat, return and fall

Into the cyclic gulf that girds the cosmos round,

Widening, deepening ever outward without bound . . .

Till the oft-rerisen bells from young Atlantis call;

And again the wizard-mortised tower upbuilds its wall

Above a re-beginning cycle, turret-crowned.

New-born, the mage re-summons stronger spells, and spirits

With dazzling darkness clad about, and fierier flame

Renewed by aeon-curtained slumber. All the powers

Of genii and Solomon the sage inherits;

And there, to blaze with blinding glory the bored hours,

He calls upon Shem-hamphorash, the nameless Name.

ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THE NOTES:

AY
:
The Abominations of Yondo
(Arkham House,
1960
)

BL
: Clark Ashton Smith Papers, Bancroft Library, University of California at Berkeley

CAS
: Clark Ashton Smith

CF
:
Collected Fantasies
(Night Shade,
2006
–
10
; five volumes)

CPT
:
Complete Poetry and Translations
(Hippocampus Press,
2007
–
8
; three volumes)

DC
:
The Dark Chateau and Other Poems
(Arkham House,
1951
)

EC
:
Ebony and Crystal
(Auburn Journal,
1922
)

FFT
:
Scott Connors, ed.,
The Freedom of Fantastic Things
(Hippocampus Press,
2006
)

GL
:
Genius Loci and Other Tales
(Arkham House,
1948
)

GS
: George Sterling

HD
:
The Hill of Dionysus: A Selection
(Roy A. Squires,
1962
)

HPL
: H. P. Lovecraft

JHL
: Clark Ashton Smith Papers, John Hay Library, Brown University (Providence, Rhode Island)

LW
:
Lost Worlds
(Arkham House,
1944
)

OED
:
Oxford English Dictionary
(
1933
edition)

OS
:
Odes and Sonnets
(Book Club of California,
1918
)

OST
:
Out of Space and Time
(Arkham House,
1942
)

PD
:
Planets and Dimensions: Collected Essays
(Mirage Press,
1973
)

PP
:
Poems in Prose
(Arkham House,
1965
)

S
:
Sandalwood
(Auburn Journal,
1925
)

SL
:
Selected Letters of Clark Ashton Smith
(Arkham House,
2003
)

SP
:
Selected Poems
(Arkham House,
1971
)

SS
:
Strange Shadows
(Greenwood Press,
1988
)

ST
:
The Star-Treader and Other Poems
(A. M. Robertson,
1912
)

SU
:
The Shadow of the Unattained
(Hippocampus Press,
2005
)

TSS
:
Tales of Science and Sorcery
(Arkham House,
1964
)

INTRODUCTION

1
. The review appeared in the London
Evening News
(February
12
,
1916
). See Scott Connors, “An Arthur Machen Review of Clark Ashton Smith,”
Faunus: The Journal of the Friends of Arthur Machen,
no.
6
(Autumn
2000
):
31
–
38
(the entire review is quoted in the article).

2
. GS to CAS, June
10
,
1920
(
SU
183
).

3
. Harriet Monroe, “Recent Poetry” [review of
The Star-Treader and Other Poems
],
Poetry
2
, no.
1
(April
1913
):
31
–
32
(quoted in
FFT
52
).

4
. CAS to GS, September
5
,
1921
(
SL
59
).

5
. GS to CAS, November
28
,
1925
(
SU
263
).

6
. CAS to GS, December
1
,
1925
(
SU
264
).

7
. CAS ultimately did produce translations of nearly all the
158
poems of
Les Fleurs du mal,
but many of these are literal prose translations that Smith did not get around to versifying. They were first published in their entirety in
CPT
3
.

8
. CAS to HPL, January
9
,
1930
(
SL
108
).

9
. The Zothique stories were gathered in
Tales of Zothique,
edited by Will Murray and Steve Behrends (West Warwick, RI: Necronomicon Press,
1995
). For an analysis, see Jim Rockhill, “As Shadows Wait upon the Sun: Clark Ashton Smith's Zothique” (
FFT
277
–
92
).

10
. The Hyperborea stories were gathered in
The Book of Hyperborea,
edited by Will Murray (West Warwick, RI: Necronomicon Press,
1996
). For an analysis, see Steven Tompkins, “Coming in from the Cold: Incursions of ‘Outsideness' in Hyperborea” (
FFT
259
–
76
).

11
. For an analysis, see Stefan Dziemianowicz, “Into the Woods: The Human Geography of Averoigne” (
FFT
293
–
304
).

12
. CAS to August Derleth, January
4
,
1933
; quoted in David E. Schultz, “Notes Toward a History of the Cthulhu Mythos,”
Crypt of Cthulhu,
no.
92
(Eastertide
1996
):
20
. See my discussion of Smith's Lovecraftian work in
The Rise and Fall of the Cthulhu Mythos
(Poplar Bluff, MO: Mythos Books,
2008
).

13
. Donald Sidney-Fryer, “The Alleged Influence of Lord Dunsany on Clark Ashton Smith,”
Amra
(January
1963
); reprinted
Klarkash-Ton,
no.
1
(June
1988
):
9
–
13
,
15
. Donald Sidney-Fryer, “Klarkash-Ton and Ech-Pi-El: On the Alleged Influence of H. P. Lovecraft on Clark Ashton Smith,”
Mirage
1
, no.
6
(Winter
1963
–
64
):
30
–
33
.

14
. “The Boiling Point,”
Fantasy Fan
1
, no.
1
(September
1933
):
6
.

15
. For a recent collection of CAS's science fiction tales, see
Star Changes,
edited by Scott Connors and Ron Hilger (Seattle: Darkside,
2005
).

16
. Letter to
Strange Tales
(January
1933
);
PD
18
.

17
. Letter to
Weird Tales
(February
1933
);
PD
23
.

18
. CAS to HPL, [c. October
24
,
1930
] (
SL
126
).

19
. From the prose poem “Nostalgia of the Unknown.”

SHORT STORIES
THE TALE OF SATAMPRA ZEIROS

This story was completed on November
16
,
1929
. CAS sent it to HPL, who responded enthusiastically: “I must not delay in expressing my well-nigh delirious delight at ‘The Tale of Satampra Zeiros'—which has veritably given me the one arch-kick of
1929
! . . . what an atmosphere! I can see & feel & smell the jungle around immemorial Commoriom . . . You have achieved in its fullest glamour the exact Dunsanian touch which I find almost impossible to duplicate . . . Altogether, I think this comes close to being your high spot in prose fiction to date” (letter to CAS, December
3
,
1929
;
Selected Letters
1929
–
1931
[Sauk City, WI: Arkham House,
1971
],
87
–
88
). But the story was rejected by the science fiction magazine
Amazing Stories,
and Farnsworth Wright of
Weird Tales
also rejected it upon its initial submission in early
1930
. Toward the end of the year, however, Wright reconsidered the story and accepted it; it was published in
Weird Tales
(November
1931
), and later in
FW
and
CF
1
.

The tale is the first of CAS's narratives to be set in the realm of Hyperborea, and it not only introduces the ancient and now deserted capital of that realm, Commoriom, but also the toad-god Tsathoggua. HPL was so captivated by this entity that he elaborated upon it extensively in a story he ghostwrote for Zealia Bishop, “The Mound” (
1929
–
30
); and he also dropped a mention of it in “The Whisperer in Darkness” (
1930
), which appeared in
Weird Tales
in August
1931
, a few months before CAS's tale was published there; this led many to believe that HPL had created the entity.

HPL's comment about the “Dunsanian” quality of the story suggests that the tale is an echo of the fantastic narratives in Lord Dunsany's
The Book of Wonder
(
1912
), many of which deal with baleful punishments meted out by bizarre entities upon those venturesome individuals who seek to pilfer valuable objects from them. Farnsworth Wright remarked on this when he rejected the story: “Personally, I fell under the spell of its splendid wording, which reminded me of Lord Dunsany's stories in
The Book of Wonder
” (letter to CAS, January
18
,
1930
; quoted in
CF
1
.
263
).

See Dan Clore, “Satampra ‘Lefty' Zeiros,”
Lost Worlds, no.
3
(
2006
):
32
–
33
.

1
. Lemuria was thought to be a sunken continent in the Indian Ocean. Its existence was conjectured by the biologist Ernst Haeckel (
1834
–
1919
) to account for the presence of lemurs and other animals and plants in southern Africa and the Malay Peninsula. Occultists seized upon the idea and wrote fanciful books about the continent; see W. Scott-Elliot,
The Lost Lemuria
(
1904
).

2
. In one of the earliest entries in his
Black Book,
CAS writes of a story titled “The White Sybil of Polarion,” noting that the creature is “a pale, beautiful, unearthly being, goddess or woman, who comes and goes mysteriously in the cities of Hyperborea, sometimes uttering strange prophecies or cryptic tidings” (entry
2
). CAS's story “The White Sybil” (written July–November
1932
) does not in fact deal with any such prophecy, but rather with a man who falls in love with the entity. CAS habitually misspelled
sibyl
as
sybil.
Polarion
might be meant to suggest Polaris, the polestar.

THE LAST INCANTATION

This story was completed on November
23
,
1929
. CAS discussed his purpose in writing the story in a letter to Donald Wandrei (August
26
,
1929
): “My main intention and endeavour, just now, is the writing of a few short stories, in a weird, fantastic vein. One, ‘The Last Incantation of Malygris,' which I am just beginning, deals with an old sorcerer who tries to evoke the dead sweetheart of his youth, with disastrous results” (manuscript, Minnesota Historical Society). The tale was readily accepted by Farnsworth Wright of
Weird Tales
and was published in the June
1930
issue; it was reprinted in
LW
and
CF
1
. CAS wrote several other stories mentioning Malygris, notably “The Death of Malygris” (
Weird Tales,
April
1934
; in
LW
and
CF
1
).

1
. A balas ruby is a spinel ruby of a pale rose color.

THE DEVOTEE OF EVIL

This story was originally titled either “The Satanist” or “The Manichaean.” CAS describes the plot in a letter to HPL: “‘The Satanist' won't deal with ordinary devil-worship, but with the evocation of absolute cosmic evil, in the form of a
black
radiation that leaves the devotee petrified into a sable image of eternal horror” (January
27
,
1930
;
SL
110
). See also the fragmentary plot synopsis in
SS
157
. CAS finished the story on March
9
,
1930
, and submitted it to
Weird Tales,
but Farnsworth Wright rejected it, as did Harold Hersey of
Ghost Stories.
In November
1931
CAS revised the story “with a view to ridding it of certain vague verbosities; and I also cut down on the pseudo-scientific element” (letter to HPL, [early November
1931
; manuscript, JHL), but Wright rejected the story again, as did several other periodicals, including the
New Orleans Times-Picayune.
Finally, CAS included it in his slim self-published pamphlet,
The Double Shadow and Other Fantasies
(
1933
). It was reprinted in
AY
and
CF
1
.