Steve Tompkins -- Ten Years Gone
Steve Tompkins died ten years ago today. I and a few other bloggers will be posting blog entries in tribute to Steve, whom I consider the best “genre” blogger of the first decade in this twenty-first century. Below, you'll find a very concise history of Mr. Tompkins' life and hyperlinks to all of his blog entries and online essays. This post is intended to function as a one-stop guide to Steve's online legacy.
Grab a mead-horn and lash yourself to the rudder, Gentle Reader, 'cuz this is gonna be a long one...
Steve Tompkins was born in New England. From childhood, he was a huge fan of weird fiction, especially that of Robert E. Howard. He was also a big fan of Marvel comics, Sergio Leone movies and James Bond. After high school, he studied in Europe for several years. Upon his return to the States, he once again pursued his love of genre fiction, eventually joining the Robert E. Howard United Press Association (REHupa) in 1995. It was within the ambit of that group of REH fans that Steve really began to write fantasy literary criticism in earnest, drawing upon his extremely wide knowledge of the field. Meanwhile, he also posted occasionally online, especially at the REH Yahoo group, “rehinnercircle.”
The year 2001 saw Steve's unique brand of litcrit hit the Interwebz for real. Visions, Gryphons, Nothing and the Night, his online “zine” for Frank Coffman's REHeapa website, produced one classic essay after another.
Grinning, Unappeased Aboriginal Demons
North By Southwest; Or, the Yellow Rose of Valhalla
After the Goldrush: From Whapeton to Poisonville
The Shortest Distance Between Two Towers
Black Stone in a Red Setting: Howard's Midsummer Night's Dream
Tompkins drifted away from REHeapa in 2003—while maintaining his membership in REHupa. He used that relative downtime to put together the classic REH collection, The Black Stranger and Other American Tales, for Bison Books. His introduction for the volume incorporated and greatly expanded upon his “North By Southwest” essay. He then wrote an article about the experience for Leo Grin's legendary Howard studies journal, The Cimmerian. Tompkins would go on to be one of the standout contributors to the journal, with his essays appearing therein right up through the final issue.
At the 2006 Howard Days celebration in Cross Plains, Leo Grin announced that Tompkins would be writing for The Cimmerian blog, which had been up and running for almost a year. Less than a week later, Steve took the bit in his teeth and hit the Road of Kings at full gallop.
Maybe Not a Boom, But a Drumbeat
Above and Beyond the Call of Booty
David Gemmell Has Done His Part. How About You?
Novalyne Didn't Pull the Trigger. Novalyne Didn't Load the Gun...
The GoH Who Got Away, a.k.a. Another Redbeard for the Black Circle
Uncollected Letter in a Locke Box
The Cat, the Skull and the Editor
Don Santiago de Valdez, Call Your Agent...
Kavalier (Not Cavalier), Clay and REH
Awards Season Special: Presenting the Lemurians!
Stage Stress-tested and Reinforced to Support All That Greatness...
Different On-Ramps to the Road of Kings
This Happy Breed of Men, This Little World/This Precious Stone Set in a Silver Sea
After the End: Howard & London's Postapocalyptic Imagery
London Calling: The Ragnar Lodbrog Chapter of The Star-Rover
“Friends Who Never Grow Stale”: A Historical Novelist Steeped in Howard
An Occurrence, But Not at Owl Creek Bridge
Let That Be Their Last Battlefield – Until the Next One
The Voice of Saruman, Speaking the First Age Into Being
The Boy Who Delivered Sean Connery's Beer
A Little Touch of Harry in the Akaana-Haunted Night
Ze, Mozadrim, Vachama Vongh Razan*
An Irish Bard at King Hrothgar's Court
Frazetta & Howard, Moorcock & Howard
Little Lost, and Much Gained, In Translation
Long Ago, Far Away, and So Much Better Than It Is Today?
“Northern Woods,” Eastern Frontier, and a Very Young Southwesterner
Abomean Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves – And So Is Charles R. Saunders
Superman on a Psychotic Bender No More
Contra “Hyboria”; Or, Convenience Isn't Everything
Rogues and the Dark Horse They Rode In On
Pan Versus Peter Pan; Or, Can't We Have Some Adult Fantasy to Go With the Adulterated Fantasy?
After Aquilonia and Having Left Lankhmar: Sword-and-Sorcery Since the 1980s
What a Mummer Wild, What an Insane Child
Tainted Fruit From the Bitter Tree
REH Alive & Well As a Ghost in the Pop Culture Machine (An Occasional Series)
Larry Fessenden and the Spirits of the Lonely Places
Three Wise Men Bearing Gifts; No Myrrh, Just Frank Sense
All Disquiet on the Western Front
Howard on the Menu at the Shagadelicatessen
Mournful and Never-ending Remembrance – Plus Bodysnatching?
Something to Do With Deathlessness, Part One: Violence Reigns
Something to Do With Deathlessness, Part Two: Eyes We Dare Not Meet in Dreams
Something to Do With Deathlessness, Part Three: Splintered Shards of Time's Reflection
Maybe They'll Devise an “Origin” for Ahab...
“Red Shadows”: Subgenre-Dawn's Early Light?
Household Name in CBS-Watching Households?
“The High-Spired Splendidness of Old”
Thongor. Brak. Conan. One of These Things Is Not Like the Others...
Lonely Mountain, Crowded Expectations; Or, Prelude as Successor
A Farewell to Armistice Day: “What Hellish Seed...”
“Lawless Speculation and Sharply Realized Detail”
An Early, Albeit Pagan, Christmas in the Old North
Legions From the Shadows, At This Late Date
Glaurung and Smaug Make Room For Fafnir
Still Dancing Attendance On A Dance With Dragons
Bicentennial Bash at the Dank Tarn of Auber!
Really Dead White European Males (and Females)
Yet Another Drive-By Pathography
Fire and Water, Or At Least Serious Swiggage of Fire-Water
Mystic Chords of Memory and the Melancholy Tune Thereof
Derleth Be Not Proud: S.T. Joshi's The Rise and Fall of the Cthulhu Mythos
Derleth Be Not Proud, Part Two: Cry 'Havoc' and Let Slip the Hounds of Tindalos
Derleth Be Not Proud, Part Three: Autochthonic Masses Howling and Wet-Mouthed
Green Hell, Golden Civilization?
Wheel of Pain, Tree of Woe, Throne of Tin-Foil; Or, The Daze of Highly Insulting Adventure
“I'll Kill the Mama-Mfuka”: The Trail of Bohu in 2009
Sewer Charons, Scarab Beetles, and Salieri-ism
A week after uploading his last post to The Cimmerian, Steve Tompkins suffered a very serious case of food poisoning. Complications from that triggered a heart attack and he died on March 23, 2009.
Requiescat in pace, Steve.
