In honor of Michael Moorcock’s 82nd birthday in December and 60+ years of Elric, I decided a read from his Eternal Champion oeuvre was in order, and so turned to perhaps my favorite incarnation—Corum Jhaelen Irsei, as featured in The Swords Trilogy (1977, Berkley Medallion). Be warned; spoilers follow.

Elric deserves the considerable love we sword-and-sorcery fans have heaped upon him. He is the eternal champion Michael Moorcock has written the most about, returning to his most famous creation for 60 years (1961 and counting). So, it’s only right that Elric command the largest portion of our attention. But, from my point of view, and without having read all of Moorcock’s considerable literary corpus, Corum is on near equal footing with the emperor of Melniboné. A recent re-read of The Swords Trilogy (a collection that includes The Knight of the Swords, The Queen of the Swords, and The King of the Swords) reminded me how much I enjoy the Corum stories, and would stack them up alongside his famous albino counterpart without suffering.

The two heroes invite comparison. Corum is Elric-esque in many ways, starting with his appearance—long, fine hair, almond eyes, a long narrow skull, high forehead, pointed ears tight alongside the head. He is of a race older than that of men, the Vadhagh, a rough equivalent of Tolkien’s First Age elves, or perhaps Poul Anderson’s elves from The Broken Sword. Both are royalty; while Corum does not rule like Elric he is a prince (in the scarlet robe) and of obvious high lineage.

But there are many differences. Unlike the oppressive, amoral Melnibonéans, the Vadhagh are gentle beings, who have turned from a history of war to art and leisure and the accumulation of knowledge. They’re a waning race, vitality spent, and their long lives are turned inwards. They exist in scattered fashion across an empty countryside in ornate, isolated castles and strongholds. This makes Corum rather more likeable than Elric and his kin.

Corum’s idyllic existence is interrupted by an incursion of Mabdens, or humans, a new barbaric young race bent on their destruction. Led by their brutal warlord Glandryth they kill Corum’s family, destroy his home, and shockingly and brutally maim Corum himself, removing an eye and lopping off a hand. Corum survives his injuries and swears vengeance. Maimed and alone, Corum needs help, and seeks out a pair of powerful artifacts—the eye of Rhynn and the hand of Kwll—which he is granted in exchange for stealing the heart of the King of Swords, and freeing the demigod Shool.

This starts three books of entanglements across the planes. Equipped with his artifacts Corum becomes a sort of demigod himself. In succession he confronts the Knight of Swords (Arioch), the Queen of Swords (Xiombarg), and finally the King of Swords (Mabelrode). Along the way he befriends Jhary, another manifestation of the eternal champion—a permanent companion, the equivalent of Rackhir the Red Archer. Due to a rare confluence, the conjunction of the Million Spheres, Corum meets up with Elric and Erekosë in a final battle against the forces of Chaos to restore equilibrium. It’s an epic series studded with adventures and wonders.

Themes and relevance

Outside of a cracking good story, The Swords Trilogy offers up some interesting thematic material to chew on. Here are some standouts:

Sword-and-sorcery inversions. Though inspired by and an admirer of Robert E. Howard, Moorcock enjoyed subverting many of his themes. For example, Elric—dependent on drugs for his strength, and an emperor of an ultra-civilized and decadent peoples—is an inversion of Howard’s durable, born-on-a-battlefield barbarian. In Corum’s universe the barbarians (Maben) are portrayed as crude and vicious destroyers of the remains of a beautiful civilization. The Mabden hate Corum and his fellow Vadhagh because they despise something in themselves, something unfinished that they sense they are lacking. This is unlike many sword-and-sorcery barbarians, overthrowing corrupt civilizations and purifying them with sword and fire.

Chaos vs. law, and the balance. A force of wanton destruction, gluttony, and carelessness, chaos is clearly the enemy in The Swords Trilogy. Corum fights for law (“That is why mortals are best served by Law, for Law believes in the freedom of mortals and Chaos sees us merely as playthings to be molded and used according to its whims,” he explains), but too much law leads to stifling conformity and cruelty. The answer is equilibrium, which can only be found in the fabled city of Tanelorn.

Fate vs. free will. The existence of the eternal champion archetype and their overriding “destiny” to fight for the balance invites the question of whether these characters operate with free will. Are Corum and the eternal champions truly “free” if they are destined to fight as avatars of the gods? In Moorcock’s skillful hands, the answer is … maybe. Says Corum to Elric, “We have one thing in common, Elric, and that is that we are both doomed to play a role in the constant struggle between the Lords of the Higher Worlds—and we shall never understand why that struggle takes place, why it is eternal. We fight, we suffer agonies of mind and soul, but we are never sure that our suffering is worthwhile.”

But, perhaps these Gods, Lords of the Higher Worlds, are merely external representations of our greed and lust and fear—human emotions insoluble from our nature. And Moorcock infers that these gods may be needed, for all their wantonness and avarice. They drive the eternal champions to achieve great feats, opening up the possibility of something greater than ourselves—even though they also may only be the daydreams of man, who is the architect of his own destiny. As the forgotten god Kwll tells Corum, “Do you not know that you dream of these gods—that you are stronger than they—that when you are fearful, why then you bring fearsome gods upon yourselves?”

The paradox of truth. The Swords Trilogy contains one of my favorite all-time lines from Moorcock: “The nearest we ever come to knowing truth is when we are witnesses to a paradox.” Fate and free will can war in the same heart, and is a form of truth. The city of Tanelorn is a paradox. How can mortal beings, with all their weaknesses, find rest there? Yet they can. Corum weeps when he beholds the city, because it is the ideal state—tranquility, the warring forces within the human breast are stilled by its equilibrium.

Bringing the fun

Fantasy fiction allows readers to explore the internal struggles of the heart in external, manifest form—and in the hands of an imaginative author, with unforgettable strokes of wonder and color. Moorcock, who described this process in a chapter of Wizardry and Wild Romance (“The Exotic Landscape”) is at the height of his powers in The Swords Trilogy, where literary symbol and theme are manifest in its wondrous landscapes. Gods are real and live on the page. We encounter castles of blood, dukes of hell, and siren-like seas of drowned voices. Dragons and airships soar above tortured landscapes.

The Book of Swords is a great depiction of Moorcock’s multiverse. The appearance of Elric in book 3 adds fun connective tissue, as does the eternal champion Erekosë and the Runesaff of Hawkmoon. Even Yyrkoon makes an appearance, as a summoned demon.

While Moorcock inverts many common sword-and-sorcery tropes, his depiction of magic has all the terrifying elements readers of the subgenre love. Casting a single spell takes a year off a summoner’s life, and magic often turns upon its user in unpredictable ways. “Ah, this sorcery. It wearies my mind. I cannot grasp its logic,” Corum complains. The response: “That is because it has none. It is arbitrary.”

Finally, it’s a wonderful story of romance and vengeance, with unexpected twists right up to the end (delivered with a Moorcockian twist on the Excalibur myth) and a satisfying conclusion.

The Book of Swords perhaps contains some of weaknesses often levied at Moorcock’s sword-and-sorcery stories. I find that where Howard’s stories feel grounded, Moorcock’s are remote and often disorienting, especially as characters shift between planes. Howard made the decision to set his stories in the deep time of our own earth, and so have an accessible verisimilitude to them that Moorcock’s often lack. But The Swords Trilogy manages to largely avoid this fault, partially due to Moorcock’s liberal use of Cornish language and folklore, which lend them a familiar air. Coupled with a compelling story arc they rank among Moorcock’s best writing.

In short, if you all know of this fantastic author is Elric, make it a 2022 resolution to branch out and enjoy the other incarnations of the eternal champion, starting with Corum and The Book of Swords.

Brian Murphy is the author of Flame and Crimson: A History of Sword-and-Sorcery (Pulp Hero Press). Learn more about his life and work on his website, The Silver Key.