Double Trouble: Two Racists for the Price of One
What do you do when you are a person of colour (POC) planning an anthology inspired by the work of not one, but two racist writers? That’s my situation right now. I say you talk about it!
First, let’s get it out of the way. Robert E. Howard, considered the father of sword and sorcery, and H. P. Lovecraft, creator of the Cthulhu Mythos and major speculative author, were both racists.
No, don’t try to debate that point. Robert E. Howard is the man who wrote in a letter to Lovecraft “I don’t know whether an Oriental smells any different than a nigger when he’s roasting” and then went on to pen “Red Nails” an adventure in a quasi-Prehispanic setting. Here’s a description of one of the Prehispanic bad guys named Olmec:
“That smile [Olmec's] contained all the cruel cynicism that seethes below the surface of a sophisticated and degenerate race, and for the first time in her life Valeria experienced fear of a man.”
Lovecraft, for his part, wrote “The negro is fundamentally the biological inferior of all White and even Mongolian races, and the Northern people must occasionally be reminded of the danger which they incur in admitting him too freely to the privileges of society and government.”
He also wrote a poem which went:
When, long ago, the gods created Earth,
In Jove’s fair image Man was shaped at birth.
The beasts for lesser parts were next designed;
Yet were they too remote from humankind,
To fill the gap, and join the rest to Man,
Th’Olympian host conceived a clever plan.
A beast they wrought, in semi-human figure,
Filled it with vice, and called the thing a NIGGER.
There you have it. Robert E. Howard and Lovecraft were racists. Yet often when I say this, people will start protesting. It is understandable. We don’t want to be told that people we admire as artists had displeasing traits.
Lovecraft and Howard could be witty, smart and engaging men. They also had major racial issues. Don’t try to justify it with talks of these were them days of racists and wine and roses. People are not divided as villains and heroes. Lovecraft and Howard were not villains or heroes. They were men. Just as they could be very fun to hang out with, they also had their unpleasant side. We must accept this, and accept them as human beings with their quirks and their failings.
That does not mean we have to espouse the same beliefs as Lovecraft and Howard. This certainly does not mean we must keep writing exactly the same way they did, about the same things they did.
As a POC writer, editor and publisher, I have two choices: to completely ignore writers like Lovecraft and Howard, and the sub-genres they helped shape, or to engage them. Neither choice is worthier than the other. There are plenty of writers who may not see the point in penning Mythos stories or writing sword and sorcery adventures. They may choose instead to write magic realism, surrealism, science fiction, literary fiction or a bunch of other things.
However, I prefer to engage them. I think that if we don’t go into these spaces that have long been closed to us, where we have often been viewed as the alien or the exotic element, we will never be represented there. I also think that just because a space was originally designed with no room for us, it doesn’t mean that’s still the case. Women, for example, did not have a great space in sword and sorcery until the 60s and the 70s, but then we had anthologies like Sword and Sorceress. That doesn’t mean representation of women or of female writers in these sub-genres is perfect, but the emergence of heroines in the sword and sorcery arena proves that things can change.
Things must, in fact, change. For a sub-genre, any sub-genre, to remain important and vital, there must be new voices, new readers, new perspectives. Otherwise what you get are a repetition of cliches.
I live in Vancouver, a city where visible minorities account for 41.7 percent of Metro Vancouver’s population. Some 381,500 of Metro Vancouver’s 2.1 million residents (or 18.2 percent) call themselves Chinese. Canada’s Aboriginal population is growing faster than the general population, increasing by 20.1% from 2001 to 2006. In the United States, the Census Bureau projects that by 2050 one-quarter of the population will be Hispanic or Latino.
These are the readers of tomorrow. These are the people who will continue to buy – or not buy – sword and sorcery and Mythos stories. We can’t possibly give them the same mythologies, storylines and characters that were appearing in Weird Tales in 1935. Yet we have often done just that, happy to take readers to MacEurope or Exotica.
As the writers of the sword and soul movement have proven, our speculative fiction is changing and will continue to change. Embracing this idea, encouraging diverse writers and stories, sampling a variety of authors and expanding our frontiers, are ways to maintain these sub-genres alive. Otherwise we might as well re-read all the original stories of Howard and Lovecraft and call it quits.
I think modern fiction inspired by the pulps can be smart, can be diverse, can be thrilling, all at the same time.
We are trying to raise money to pay pro rates for the Sword and Mythos anthology. Please spread the word.
Richard Wagner wrote the tune that became Here Comes the Bride. I know all about his antisemitism. We still used the music at our wedding. I don’t have to like/admire/condone all of his beliefs/behaviors to enjoy the great music that he wrote.
I’m of a similar mind with Howard and Lovecraft.
It’s wishful thinking to say HPL wasn’t a racist. But Lovecraftian fiction is still one of my favorite genres. I actually quite enjoy stories by diverse authors in this area and want to see more of it, which is one reason I happily support IFP. If it weren’t for women no Lovecraftian story would have yet won the Hugo (Shoggoths in Bloom) and if it weren’t for writers in a completely different culture we would never have had the great 4 book series from Kurodahan Press. I don’t know that much is accomplished by turning one’s back on the genre. The themes of cosmicism and alienation resonate as strongly today as ever. I want to hear what every author has to say about it!
[...] Fungi antho sometime in the coming months?—?and editor Silvia Moreno-Garcia has firmly set out in a post entitled “Double Trouble: Two Racists for the Price of One” more about why they’re [...]
[...] Silvia Moreno-Garcia, who is running an IndieGoGo campaign to help Innsmouth Free Press afford to pay pro rates for their upcoming Swords and Mythos anthology (totally worth supporting – I already have, you should too), has been blogging about topics relating to Swords and Sorcery and the genre’s intersection with the Mythos, and topics related to both in general. Though all the articles are worth reading (When is Silvia’s work not worth reading?) two especially are worth looking at: “Welcome to Exotica or OMG I See Brown People” and “Double Trouble: Two Racists for the Price of One“. [...]
Great post. And thank you for naming *with honesty* the blatant racism of Howard and Lovecraft, whose beliefs permeated much of their work–genius or not. Of course, what is even harder is to find those more subtle aspects of racism (or racialisms) that find their way into so much of speculative fiction, handed down by many of the “great white fathers” of the genre(s).
Yeah, well said. I think the same is true of celebrating birthdays of Lovecraft or anyone else. It’s fine to celebrate the work you admire, but it’s also irresponsible not to acknowledge the existence of racism and weakness in those people. Particularly on dates like birthdays which celebrate the person not the work. If nothing else, for future generations who might hear people celebrate Lovecraft or Howard then go discover their racist writings, what kind of message are we sending? Tried to make this point a month ago and go slammed. I stand by it. Did they have talent? yes. Did they write masterpieces, yes. But were they racists, also, yes, and that should be acknowledged.
[...] feminism in fantasy and depictions of ‘the other’ among other topics on her blog. Her most recent post dovetails quite nicely with my own thoughts on the matter of how we, as readers, approach a lot of [...]
Great article. I agree that it’s important to not ignore the ugly parts of ourselves or our past. If we ignored every racist or bigot artist, we would have almost no culture we could talk about before the early 20th century.
So let’s not mince words; these men were bigots. They celebrated their racial “superiority” even though that was a common thing to celebrate during their time. Many important figures assumed this was true as well. Churchill shared this belief, and wrote opinion articles urging the US to get involved with Cuba’s revolution for independence from Spain to prevent “another black republic” from taking hold. They believed, like almost every educated white man, that whites were superior because the scientists of the age agreed that there was proof for this “fact.” On the one hand, we should call that out. On the other, we shouldn’t use that as an excuse to ignore their roles in history. As other commenters have pointed out, a person’s life and work can’t be summed up by a single belief.
They were racists, sure, but so was almost everyone in western cultures. It was a racist culture. It still is a racist culture. I am unfortunately a racist because I was born white into a culture that assumes everyone is like me. But I strive to not perpetrate that, as many from all walks of life do, despite the racial inequality still benefiting many of us and oppressing many more.
It’s only in recent decades that racism (social inequality and oppression based on race) became separated from bigotry (the belief that one is superior to another based on intrinsic traits), and I’ve found it helpful to separate the two. If we hold compassion for why they were blind to a more enlightened view, we may, among other benefits, be more aware of where we might be blind in our modern times.
I agree there was racism back in the day(Sarcasm)
It’s not like we haven’t heard or learned from it.
It’s something that people
It’s like Mexico’s Govt(who you would think would be educated)
and how they love to continue criticizing our immigration policy(even though tens of millions still come here illegally)
the hypocrisy is how they have the same anti immigrant policy as Arizona.
While being much more corrupt and abusive.
So to sum up, Yes Racism was prevalent, And also it’s often used by those who point the finger at someone else.
After Malcolm saw the light, he died for denouncing his corrupt and racist organization in which he was a leader. But that is not the man that is celebrated.
Shame.
I’ve long since sworn off on discussing racism in the context of Howard and Lovecraft given how much of a complex issue it is. However, I still deeply feel that it’s an important topic to discuss, but without reducing it to “yes, they were racist” and “nuh-uh, they totally weren’t.” Racism is insidious and has many different degrees, so dividing it into stark “yes” and “no” doesn’t help matters, in my opinion. Of course, being a white male from a country that’s 98% white, I can’t truly speak from any real standpoint.
I agree entirely with the assessment that Howard and Lovecraft held many views that are abhorrent and reprehensible to modern standards. That’s easy to say and impossible to deny. However, I think it’s important to acknowledge that Howard’s and Lovecraft’s views on race evolved over time to become less racist, and that there are even a few examples of anti-racist sentiments in Howard’s fiction:
http://www.rehupa.com/OLDWEB/SouthwesternDiscomfit.htm
Howard wasn’t writing in a vacuum, but I think it would be a shame to ignore such fascinating creations as Ace Jessel, N’Longa, Juan Lopez and the like, because it shows that even a man who wrote stories about black people conspiring to overthrow the west was capable of writing sympathetic, intelligent, heroic people of colour. That’s not even getting into his fantastic female characters It hardly “makes up” for anything, but it shows that if a white man in 1930s Texas can write a story where a white Englishman feels shame for underestimating the wisdom, intelligence and goodness of a black African (“The Hills of the Dead”), a tale where a black boxer overcomes hometown bigotry despite his tremendous success as a boxer and human being (“Double Cross”) and many adventures starring a feminist heroine (“Sword Woman,” “The Shadow of the Vulture,” “Red Nails”), then there is zero excuse for modern writers not to be more diverse.
Hopefully you’ll forgive the pedant in me for this, but I think there’s a lot Howard can teach modern writers on a few levels, not just as a cautionary tale.
It’s fine to celebrate the work you admire, but it’s also irresponsible not to acknowledge the existence of racism and weakness in those people. Particularly on dates like birthdays which celebrate the person not the work. If nothing else, for future generations who might hear people celebrate Lovecraft or Howard then go discover their racist writings, what kind of message are we sending?
Hopefully for the same reason people celebrate Churchill’s or Lincoln’s birthdays despite their extreme views: when people choose to celebrate Howard and Lovecraft, they’re praising the good they did, the work which is eternal and enriches the world. As Ms Moreno-Garcia said, they were complex human beings.
I’ve enjoyed his heroines. I was not partial to Kull or Conan, although I read most of the Conan’s stories. I did like Bran Mak Morn better than the other men. Even though he had noble savage traits and even though some parts of “Worms of the Earth” make me go ‘nooo,’ I found him sympathetic.
I’d be tempted to throw out the “it was a different time” defense just to play devil’s advocate but I’m not sure if I completely buy that one myself. For a bright guy, some of Lovecraft’s personal beliefs were far from progressive. And his own view on the insignifiance of humanity in the cosmic scheme of things seems to undermine any argument about one race being superior to the other, if not render it meaningless. Maybe the thought of belonging to an inherently “superior class” brought a little bit of comfort to his otherwise bleak existence. From what little I know about Robert E. Howard, he grew up in a place where being a racist was practically a legal requirement, so I’m willing to give him some leeway. Not that that makes some of the things he believed any less horrible, of course. I think that in both cases, their creations have risen above the foibles of their creators and taken on a life of their own. Conan would just as soon kill a Northman as a Nubian and the Old Ones are about as post-racial as you can get! I for one will continue to enjoy their works and the works they inspired even as a I occasionally cringe at examples of the personal short-comings of these very talented but very human writers.
[...] far she’s talked about people of color in S&S (and did a separate piece on racism in the genre), the prevalence of beef/cheesecake in S&S, princesses and regular ladies in [...]
1. What Al said.
2. This topic is covered in great detail in my biography of Howard, and in the above article Al hyperlinked to, so I won’t go over it.
All of that aside, I have to ask, and I really want some honest answers here: is that what you take away from an REH (or an HPL story)?
The reason why I ask this is because this notion that Howard and Lovecraft were bigots is always followed with cries of outrage by people who swear to never read them–as if somehow reading a Conan story will cause bigotry to rub off on a person.
I want to make it very clear that when I first read Solomon Kane, Bran Mak Morn, Conan–even El Borak and Kull–all of it, I never sat the book down after reading a story and thought to myself, “Boy, that Howard guy sure knew how to keep the darkies in their place.” I just never saw it. And I don’t think that it’s in there, either.
I was, rather, fascinated by this idea that Howard’s characters never gave up, never gave in, fought to their last breath, and had a code, if not a moral center, that governed their actions. That was my take away.
I offer that up, not because I think some people are looking for trouble, but because I think so many modern readers refuse to put anything written prior to 1964 into any kind of historical context.
“The reason why I ask this is because this notion that Howard and Lovecraft were bigots is always followed with cries of outrage by people who swear to never read them”
Considering that I have written Lovecraftian fiction and published it I don’t go into a panic and think it’ll rub off on me.
“I just never saw it. And I don’t think that it’s in there, either.”
I did see it. I remember putting books down (not just Lovecraft) and realizing that when the writer was talking about those “bad” people he was talking about people who looked like me. I was the feared ‘other.’
This doesn’t mean I didn’t find stuff to enjoy in the stories, but I most definitely noticed that there were some funny racial thoughts in the prose.
Silvia,
No, I don’t think you’re the one to go into a panic. But I find it interesting that other people do. I think that those “funny racial thoughts” merit a discussion, but do not mean throwing the baby out with the bath water.
I also do not think REH was grinding any particular axe in his fiction regarding other “racial types.” I think he thought all of humanity was a bastard at one time or another. I’m not so sure about HPL, but I DO feel that intention in fiction has to be accounted for, and in Howard’s case, what he says in his letters to HPL, what he says to other friends and family in person, and what he wrote in his stories, are three different things.
“Intention in fiction has to be accounted for.”
I disagree. If I write a story that is full of nasty stereotypes and bits about African Americans, my intention is irrelevant. Consciously or unwittingly I have created a problematic work. Howard wasn’t very likely (I think) thinking “oh boy, I’m going to create some nasty POC characters today” but sometimes he did just that. He had his biases and these were reflected in some of his output. More in some than other stories and likely more in certain periods of his life than in others.
The issue with Howard & Lovecraft is that sometimes we look at their output and we are so terrified of some of those biases that we just won’t go there. At all. Meaning POCs or other writers won’t touch sword and sorcery or Lovecraftian fiction with a 10 foot stick. Which diminishes the sub-genre.
The other problem is that some writers have kept using the same tropes, settings and characters that these guys originally produced without questioning their relevancy. I get a ton of stories at IFP that are set in New England with a WASP male character. I lived in New England so I know that what they’re writing is not New England nowadays, but more like an imaginary pastiche of current New England. I mean, even in Lovecraft’s day the image of the well-bred New England gentleman was wishful thinking, so why should it hold true now? We create our own boxes and we say “only this is Lovecraft” or “only this is sword and sorcery” and we often fail to see that there is so much stuff out there for the taking.
For example, some of the more interesting Howard stories I read where the ones with the Picts and Romans. I wouldn’t mind seeing some more sword and sorcery that is set in real-world Europe which uses a setting like that. Or, you know, something inspired by Eastern Europe as opposed to Western Europe. Or some stuff that is patented after Prehispanic cultures. I thought Charles Saunder’s tales were a blast, for example, but you don’t see a lot of that heroic adventure floating around.
I most definitely think that Howard had a pretty good sense of adventure and I hope we can draw on that for inspiration instead of simply brushing him off and saying “Nope, don’t go there. He was a racist. Case closed.” Same for Lovecraft.
You don’t need that quotation to know Lovecraft was a racist. There’s plenty of it in his writing. I still flinch getting through some of his stories.
People are a complex mix. Henry Ford ensured the livelihood of his workers during the depression and established the idea of a minimum wage. He was also an outspoken anti-Semite. Orson Scott Card is a big name in science fiction, yet one of the biggest homophobes on the planet. To disregard someone’s better qualities because they possess one particular trait you despise seems to be a rather silly modern notion. It’s possible to appreciate someone’s talents and accomplishments while being aware of and disagreeing with world views they hold that you don’t share.
Yes. Case absolutely closed. None of these people has contributed ANYTHING beautiful enough to offset the fact that they think or thought of me as a subhuman, corrupted beast. Nothing.
When i find out one of my favorite writers is or was a sexist, racist, homophobe, etc. that’s it. I don’t read their work post that point and I generally dump the work of theirs that i previously owned. They are as disgusting as a bathtub full of maggoty horse manure.
And it’s crap to think there aren’t stacks of equally good or, often, superior writers whose works quite nicely fill the gap. I don’t need Tolkien when LeGuin and Herbert are on the shelf. I don’t need Burroughs when I’ve got Zelazny and Butler and Brust and Williams and Barker. Life is far too short to waste any of it on the mental and ethical gymnastics necessary to give these scumbags a pass. And I don’t.
Why should I? Because Conan and Tarzan are such stellar literature? Not quite.
I don’t have people like that in my real life and, as a reader or writer, i don’t want their crap, however superficially pleasing their storytelling may be, in my mind or influencing my own works. I can never take enough showers to get their stench off me. People like them make the shit in the world. They do not get my support on any level.
There is no separation, to me, between the artist and their work. Zero.
Which is partly why I try to limit myself when it comes to biographical data about people whose work I like. Otherwise, when i find out was scum they were or are in real life, I’m forced to make ethical choices about whether or not to support them. Orson Card’s homophobia comes immediately to mind.
However, when their racism or bigotry actually shows up in their actual work, they are dead to me from that point on as well as retroactively.
Nobody gets a pass. Nobody.