Mr. Robert E. Howard, within 12-years, created over 800-short stories, novels, poems; born in 1906, and died in l936, he was suicidal, yet his works live on as does Poe's, Kipling's, Lovecraft's, Bierce, London's and Doyle's do. A strange man indeed, but well gifted. Who was this giant of a figure? I shall look at him briefly; I myself care more for his poetry, then his other works, and the best, of which he was a huge fan of R.W. Service (poet), of which I am also. Second, I like his short stories, I do not care for his Conan series, not sure why, but we can't like everything of a persons, now can we. Clyde Smith, a poet I like too, was also Mr. Howard's close friend, whom he confided in. And who knew his suicidal tendencies. It has been said, Howard committed suicide because of his mother's imminent death, and there might be some validity in this, but I think there is more to this than just that, his mother; there normally is. She was ill, and it did take a lot of his time from him caring for her, and he did have to stop his writing for periods, and he did not want to out live his mother, this is all true. Along with his parents house where he was living during this period was in chaos from all the souls walking through it to see his mother, for she was ill a long period indeed, and this caused some friction with him. Along with this, his estranged relationship with a certain lady had some pressing results that brought about despair, which he carried with him (this relationship lasting about a year)) throughout 1935)). It is perhaps what triggered it all: a combination. His lady friend was much like him, independent; they loved each other, but never could love enough at the right time. Thus, they would go their own ways, but yet she held high regard for him. I admire this lone wolf, this self-destructive man, who kept himself alive so he could kill himself one day" ?waiting for a chance to blow his brains out; poets often do you know: admire him for his craving for writing. So we see a man here who had a plan, it was perhaps tucked away for a while, then pulled out of storage, like one might pull out an old poem, long overdue, to reedit: the plan was of course suicide. I have a good amount of his quality poetry (and some short stories), and you can see his reflections on it. Poets are often self destructive anyway, and ponder on failure too often; and in Howard's case, I'd consider this part of his failure to ponder that he had only a limited chance of success and freedom for the future: so he thought. Howard was different, like George Sterling was (who also committed suicide), like a lot of writers and poets are, and he knew it, different than the common folks around him. He felt he was a misfit in a controlled world, perhaps born too far ahead of his times. Growing old, and feeling like a misfit in a strange world, was too much for him. Again I must say, to analyze why he committed suicide, there are a lot of variables, a variety here, I doubt I can connect the dots, but there is more than one piece to the puzzle I do believe here. It just didn't happen, it was" ?planned. He was thinking about it for perhaps two years in advance and as I said before, tucked away for God knows how long. Howard's mother had gone into a coma, one that she'd never come out of and he knew this, that was when he made his final decision to leave this earth and he wrote: '...the feast is over...' then he got into his automobile, and shot himself in the head: he survived eight hours thereafter. His mother died the next day. He was 30-years old. I cannot link Howard's death solely to his mother's illness, and nearing of death, I do believe there was several links to the suicide (mood changes being one I have not mentioned earlier, of which he had). I think for myself, he was trying to tell the world: look here, I'm a great writer, take notice; and he didn't think they were: taking notice. And as far as I consider it, writers have a right to be weird, different, or eccentric, because that is part of their building blocks" ?and the gospel truth is, good writers are. |
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