Flashing Swords!

Flashing Swords! is a series of fantasy anthologies published by Dell Books from 1973 to 1981 under the editorship of Lin Carter. It showcased the heroic fantasy work of the members of the Swordsmen and Sorcerers' Guild of America (SAGA), a somewhat informal literary group active from the 1960s to the 1980s, of which Carter was the guiding force. Most of the important sword and sorcery writers at the time of the group’s founding were members; later, membership was extended to other fantasy authors.

Cover of Flashing Swords! #1, 1973

The Flashing Swords! series provides a cross-section of the heroic fantasy of the period. Carter and SAGA also sponsored The Gandalf Award from 1974-1981. With the collapse of Carter’s health in the 1980s the anthology series, the Gandalf award, and likely SAGA itself all went into abeyance.

A revival of the series edited by Carter's literary executor Robert M. Price was projected, with the first volume, Lin Carter's Flashing Swords! #6 published (briefly) by Pulp Hero Press in July, 2020. Due to an introduction found objectionable by some of the authors whose works were included, the publisher delisted the book a few days after publication.[1]

Contents

In all, twenty-three stories by fifteen authors were published in the original five-volume series, all of them for the first time. These included two "Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser" stories by Fritz Leiber (in #1 and #3), two "Dying Earth" stories by Jack Vance (in #1 and #4), the first two parts of the novel The Merman's Children by Poul Anderson (also in #1 and #4), two "Amalric the Mangod" stories by Lin Carter (in #1 and #3), a "Pusad" tale and the first part of the novel The Incorporated Knight by L. Sprague de Camp (in #2 and #3, respectively), two "Elric of Melniboné" stories by Michael Moorcock (in #2 and #4), two "Witch World" stories by Andre Norton (in #2 and #3), two "Brak the Barbarian" stories by John Jakes (in #2 and #4), one story by Avram Davidson (in #3), a "Deryni" story by Katherine Kurtz (in #4), a "Dilvish" story by Roger Zelazny (in #5), a story by C. J. Cherryh (in #5), a story by Diane Duane (in #5), an "Ebenezum" story by Craig Shaw Gardner (in #5), and a story by Tanith Lee (in #5).

The much later Flashing Swords! #6 contained twelve additional stories by eleven authors, including "The Island of Shadows" by Paul R. McNamee, "Godkiller" by Cliff Biggers, "Varla and the Mad Magician" by Glen Usher and Steve Lines, "Blood Games in the Temple of the Toad" by Frank Schildiner, "The Bloody Crooked One" by Charles R. Rutledge,"The Lion of Valentia" by Steve Dilks, "Immortals of Lemuria" by Robert M. Price, "The Tower in the Crimson Mist" by Adrian Cole, "Bellico and the Tower of Mouths" by Richard Toogood, "The Emerald Tablet" by Robert M. Price, "Tale of the Uncrowned Kings" by Steve Dilks, and "A Twisted Branch of Yggdrasil" by D.M. Ritzlin. Within days of publication Biggers, Schildiner, Rutledge and McNamee all publically withdrew their contributions in reaction to Price's controversial introduction, and publisher Pulp Hero Press delisted the book shortly after.[1]

Books

Relation to other works

A precursor of the series was Swords Against Tomorrow, edited by Robert Hoskins (Signet Books, 1970), an anthology which included pieces by four of the eight SAGA members of that time.

Before editing Flashing Swords! #6 Robert M. Price edited a similar Sword and Sorcery anthology, The Mighty Warriors (Ulthar Press, 2018), showcasing some of the same authors whose works appeared in the Flashing Swords! volume.

Notes
  1. Johnston, Rich. "Publisher Delists Flashing Swords #6 After Authors Object to Foreword." On https://bleedingcool.com/ bleedingcool.com], 31 July, 2020.


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