Is "Adept's Gambit" a real F&GM story?

[Finarvyn]

Ademt's Gambit was the first Fafhrd & Gray Mouser story written, although it wasn't the first published. What makes it unusual is that the characters are aware of places and people of Earth, whereas most of the stories center in their own world of Nehwon.

So ... does it count? Discuss.

[Finarvyn]

Okay, so two days passed and no discussion. Guess I'll start.

(1) The characters are very Fafhrd-like and Mouser-like, so in that sense "Adept's Gambit" fits the sequence. Ningauble is a load of fun as well.

(2) The base storyline is a great one and has the same iconic feel as the rest of the early stories. (Again, the best ones were the early ones, IMO.)

(3) The place-names of actual Earth rather than Nehwon is the killer for me, however. And the story is placed somewhere in the middle of the official sequence, so a casual reader might not know that it's the first one written. Makes it seem like a really odd duck.

(4) I have to wonder if Leiber would have done things differently if he'd written that same story later in life. Once he had established Nehwon and its contents, I suspect he would have written it with those places in mind instead of real-Earth ones. Actually, I'm sort of surprised that he didn't re-write it and "update" it somehow.

Anyway, those are some of my thoughts on the story.

[geoffrey]

I voted "Yes, technically, but it really doesn't fit the rest."

If it were the ONLY Fafhrd & the Gray Mouser story, then I wouldn't have a problem with it. But with them transforming into alternate-fantasy-Earth Fafhrd & the Gray Mouser takes it outside for me. Rather than later trying to retro-fit this story with the Nehwon stories, I think it would have been interesting if Leiber had instead released it as originally written and as an explicitly non-canonical tale.

[cadriel]

It's been years since I read it, but I recall the story acquitting itself well. My feeling is that it's a Fafhrd and Gray Mouser story, as much as any other. Leiber may have retrofitted it into Nehwon, but I have long felt it was the adventure of his tales that defined Fafhrd and the Mouser, and his worldbuilding outside of Lankhmar was hit and miss at its best anyway. Sure, Quarmall was pretty great, but it's mostly the city of sevenscore thousand smokes that was a character in its own right. So to me it's no less an achievement and part of the series than any non-Lankhmar story of the pair.

[Finarvyn]

One thing that always bothered me was the fact that F&GM both "think" in terms of our Earth in that story. Rather than curse with a Nehwon deity, they curse with Odin or the like. This makes it feel like Geoffrey's "explicitly non-canonical tale" instead of part of the real sequence.

Kind of like the "Splinter of the Mind's Eye" of Lankhmar fiction.

[talysman]

I can't quite remember the story, so I can't really answerr. I *think* it was the story with "the woman who will come when she is ready", who I think was named Anra Devadora, and she has a twin brother. But I can't even remember what the "gambit" of the title was.

If it *was* that story, I seem to remember that the characters did, in fact, feel like Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser, so I guess it all depends on whether you feel an F&GM story can be told in another setting, or whether it specifically must include Lankhmar to be real. If the latter, how far can you go before you've drifted too far from canon? I don't remember if the last book I read (Swords & Ice Magic? The one where they live on faux-Iceland) even mentioned Lankhmar. In a way, it might not be canon, either. The stories of them sailing the ocean and encountering faux-Aztecs kind of felt different as well.

[Finarvyn]

You are correct ... that was the story.

I'm glad to see some chatter here at last. When this thread sat dormant for two days I was aftaid I had stepped on some "sacred cow" of Lankhmarian fiction.

[talysman]

Nah, I think a lot of people are like me: couldn't remember enough of the story to form a useful opinion.

[geoffrey]

Apr 3, 2015 15:30:14 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

I was afraid I had stepped on some "sacred cow" of Lankhmarian fiction.

Be afraid. You did. You have been marked.

[bigjackbrass]

The older I get, the less worried I am about canon.

For me, it absolutely counts. Does it contradict elements of other stories and fit awkwardly in some respects? *shrug*

[Porphyre]

The real-place names effectively stand out like a sore thumb, and I agree that Leiber could have edited it with little effort to make it "fit" better, but apart from that, the overall story and narrative stays rather "toned" with the rest of F&tGM canon.

The main problem is the obvious "patch" that Leiber has to use to connect it with the rest of Nehwon corpus.

[jmccann]

Apr 3, 2015 14:33:00 GMT -6 talysman said:

I don't remember if the last book I read (Swords & Ice Magic? The one where they live on faux-Iceland) even mentioned Lankhmar. In a way, it might not be canon, either. The stories of them sailing the ocean and encountering faux-Aztecs kind of felt different as well.

You are talking about the stories that were set on Rime Isle, starting in Swords and Ice Magic. Lankhmar is mentioned as is Nehwon. I agree these do have a different feel though.