brief evaluations of Clark Ashton Smith's stories

[geoffrey]

I own the 5-volume set of Clark Ashton Smith's collected fantasy stories, published by Night Shade Books. The stories are arranged in the order in which they were written. Below I list all the stories by volume, accompanied by my very brief evaluations of each story. The list is probably worth what you paid for it.

Volume 1
“To the Daemon”: excellent prose-poem
“The Abominations of Yondo”: amazing language
“Sadastor”: very good prose poem
“The Ninth Skeleton”: forget it
“The Last Incantation”: Poseidonis; good
“The End of the Story”: Averoigne; not bad
“The Phantoms of the Fire”: forget it
“A Night in Malneant”: forget it
“The Resurrection of the Rattlesnake”: forget it
“Thirteen Phantasms”: forget it
“The Venus of Azombeii”: good, sensuous tale
“The Tale of Satampra Zeiros”: Hyperborea; excellent
“The Monster of the Prophecy”: sci-fi; not bad; excellent language
“The Metamorphosis of the World”: sci-fi; OK
“The Epiphany of Death”: not much to it
“A Murder in the Fourth Dimension”: merely OK
“The Devotee of Evil”: evocative presentation of evil
“The Satyr”: Averoigne; rather insubstantial
“The Planet of the Dead”: superb Dying Earth story
“The Uncharted Isle”: good, solid tale
“Marooned in Andromeda”: sci-fi; pot-boiler, but vivid
“The Root of Ampoi”: humorous lost world story
“The Necromantic Tale”: not bad
“The Immeasurable Horror”: sci-fi; not bad
“A Voyage to Sfanomoe”: Poseidonis; OK

Volume 2
“The Door to Saturn”: Hyperborea; excellent and funny
“The Red World of Polaris”: sci-fi; not bad; vivid, brilliant imagery like A. Merritt’s The Metal Monster
“Told in the Desert”: powerful and beautiful 5-page Arabian story
“The Willow Landscape”: touching Chinese story; last paragraph is unfortunate
“A Rendezvous in Averoigne”: Averoigne; vampire story
“The Gorgon”: good; literally Medusa’s head
“An Offering to the Moon”: merely OK
“The Kiss of Zoraida”: Arabian conte cruel
“The Face by the River”: not that interesting
“The Ghoul”: clever, but not that great
“The Kingdom of the Worm”: OK; very undead-ish
“An Adventure in Futurity”: sci-fi; forgettable
“The Justice of the Elephant”: insubstantial revenge tale
“The Return of the Sorcerer”: gruesome, Lovecraftian
“The City of the Singing Flame”: sci-fi; very good and haunting
“A Good Embalmer”: silly, forgettable
“The Testament of Athammaus”: Hyperborea; excellent
“A Captivity in Serpens”: sci-fi; mediocre; lots of action
“The Letter from Mohaun Los”: sci-fi; not that great
“The Hunters from Beyond”: very good and creepy occultism

Volume 3
“The Holiness of Azedarac”: Averoigne; very good
“The Maker of Gargoyles”: Averoigne; good
“Beyond the Singing Flame”: sci-fi; beautifully told
“Seedling of Mars”: sci-fi; forgettable
“The Vaults of Yoh-Vombis”: sci-fi; excellent; Lovecraftian
“The Eternal World”: sci-fi; powerful and poetic
“The Demon of the Flower”: weird and fantastic
“The Nameless Offspring”: eerie and Lovecraftian
“A Vintage from Atlantis”: memorable and good
“The Weird of Avoosl Wuthoqquan”: Hyperborea; excellent
“The Invisible City”: fascinating; quasi-Lovecraftian
“The Immortals of Mercury”: sci-fi; forget it
“The Empire of the Necromancers”: Zothique; excellent
“The Seed from the Sepulcher”: creepy Amazonian story
“The Second Interment”: harrowing story of being buried alive
“Ubbo-Sathla”: kind of Hyperborean; very good
“The Double Shadow”: Poseidonis; excellent with poetic language
“The Plutonian Drug”: sci-fi; not bad
“The Supernumerary Corpse”: OK, not great
“The Colossus of Ylourgne”: Averoigne; best of this series
“The God of the Asteroid”: sci-fi; OK

Volume 4
“The Mandrakes”: Averoigne; OK
“The Beast of Averoigne”: Averoigne; excellent
“A Star-Change”: sci-fi; interesting concept
“The Disinterment of Venus”: Averoigne; good and sensuous
“The White Sybil”: Hyperborea; exquisitely beautiful
“The Ice Demon”: Hyperborea; awesome
“The Isle of the Torturers”: Zothique; very good
“The Dimension of Chance”: sci-fi; forgettable
“The Dweller in the Gulf”: sci-fi; OK
“The Maze of the Enchanter”: Xiccarph; very good
“The Third Episode of Vathek”: only OK
“Genius Loci”: very good and creepy “vampire” story
“The Secret of the Cairn”: sci-fi; beautiful; worthy of “The City of the Singing Flame”
“The Charnel God”: Zothique; very good
“The Dark Eidolon”: Zothique; excellent
“The Voyage of King Euvoran”: Zothique; very good
“Vulthoom”: sci-fi; forgettable
“The Weaver in the Vaults”: Zothique; very good
“The Flower-Women”: Xiccarph; very good

Volume 5
“The Dark Age”: post-apocalyptic; merely OK
“The Death of Malygris”: Poseidonis; quite good; opulent prose
“The Tomb-Spawn”: Zothique; excellent
“The Witchcraft of Ulua”: Zothique; good
“The Coming of the White Worm”: Hyperborea; very good; grimly humorous
“The Seven Geases”: Hyperborea; excellent
“The Chain of Aforgomon”: good tale of time displacement in a past life
“The Primal City”: quite good in first half, then drops off
“Xeethra”: Zothique; excellent
“The Last Hieroglyph”: Zothique; very good
“Necromancy in Naat”: Zothique; weird and excellent
“The Treader of the Dust”: Lovecraftian and very good
“The Black Abbot of Puthuum”: Zothique; excellent and a lot of fun to read
“The Death of Ilalotha”: Zothique; quite good
“Mother of Toads”: Averoigne; good
“The Garden of Adompha”: Zothique; very good
“The Great God Awto”: forget it
“Strange Shadows”: forget it
“The Enchantress of Sylaire”: Averoigne; good
“Double Cosmos”: Lovecraftian; not bad
“Nemesis of the Unfinished”: not very good
“The Master of the Crabs”: Zothique; very good
“Morthylla”: Zothique; good
“Schizoid Creator”: forget it
“Monsters in the Night”: forget it
“Phoenix”: sci-fi; not bad
“The Theft of the Thirty-Nine Girdles”: Hyperborea; good
“Symposium of the Gorgon”: forget it
“The Dart of Rasasfa”: sci-fi; forgettable

[kesher]

Thou Art Exalted.

As always, Geoffrey, thanks for taking the time to write this out and post it!

[geoffrey]

When I was re-reading my CAS collection during the assembling of my Isle of the Unknown, I jotted down those notes as I read each story. What made me decide to do this was some of CAS's real clunkers. I thought to myself, "I need to write notes so as to remember which stories I never want to read again!"

[stevemitchell]

Thread necromancy--I don't agree with all your assessments (some of the "forget it" stories worked for me), but I appreciate the effort you made in coming up with this overview. d**n, when is someone going to come up with a standalone Hyperborea or Zothique RPG? Preferably based on OSR mechanics.

[Falconer]

Jul 1, 2021 11:45:09 GMT -6 stevemitchell said:

d**n, when is someone going to come up with a standalone Hyperborea … RPG? Preferably based on OSR mechanics.

You seriously didn’t know?

[stevemitchell]

I seriously did know. I think Astonishing Swordsmen & Sorcerers of Hyperborea is a pretty cool game, but it's not Clark Ashton Smith's Hyperborea. (And I guess I should have clarified that was what I was looking for.)

[Falconer]

Ah, I thought it was based on CAS’s Hyperborea.

[stevemitchell]

Heavily inspired by Smith's Hyperborea, but with lots of other elements added in as well, including a heaping dose of Robert E. Howard. Again, a fine product, just not Smith's version of the Land Beyond the North Wind.