If you’re of a certain age, the phrase “sword and sorcery” conjures up visions of muscular barbarians and busty damsels fighting monsters or evil wizards on paperback covers illustrated by Frank Frazetta, Boris Vallejo or Jeffrey Catherine Jones. If you’re a little younger or a certain Seattle-based online retailer, “sword and sorcery” might be a synonym for fantasy in general.
However, “sword and sorcery” designates a very specific subgenre of fantasy. Brian Murphy, author of 2019’s Flame and Crimson: A History of Sword-and-Sorcery, identifies the following key elements of the subgenre: sword-and-sorcery tales are short and episodic, flourishing mostly in short fiction, novellas, and very short novels. The protagonists are men and women of action. They are often outsiders, and their motivations are personal, i.e., they’re looking for treasure or revenge, not to save the world or defeat the dark lord. The worldbuilding is based on real world history. Their magic is dark, wild, dangerous, and strongly influenced by horror; there are no magic systems here.
As a distinct subgenre, sword and sorcery is almost 100 years old; Robert E. Howard’s 1929 story “The Shadow Kingdom,” which introduced Kull of Atlantis, is considered the first true sword-and-sorcery story, though some would argue that it had its predecessors. The subgenre emerged in the 1930s and early 1940s, with Robert E. Howard giving us the adventures of Kull of Atlantis, Bran Mak Morn, and of course his most famous creation, Conan the Cimmerian (also known as Conan the Barbarian). Clark Ashton Smith emphasised the horror element of sword-and-sorcery tales in his darkly poetic tales, while Fritz Leiber played up the comedy with rogues Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser. Henry Kuttner gave us Elak of Atlantis and Prince Raynor, and C.L. Moore proved with the adventures of the medieval swordswoman Jirel of Joiry that sword-and-sorcery adventures weren’t just for men.
But even as those authors created this subgenre, there was one problem: This new genre didn’t have a name. In correspondence with fellow writers and friends, Robert E. Howard only referred to the Conan, Kull, and Bran Mak Morn stories as “weird fiction,” a term H.P. Lovecraft also used for his cosmic horror stories. And in a 1924 editorial for Weird Tales, where many of these stories appeared, Assistant Editor Otis Adalbert Kline struggled to explain what sort of fiction the magazine published—science fiction, fantasy, and horror—because none of those terms existed at the time.
After lying dormant for almost 20 years, the genre of sword and sorcery re-emerged in the early 1960s, when editors like Cele Goldsmith Lalli of Fantastic or John Carnell of Science Fantasy started to publish such of stories from new authors like Poul Anderson, Roger Zelazny, John Jakes, and Lin Carter. However, the genre still didn’t have a name.
By now it was becoming painfully clear that this newly revived subgenre needed a name, since “that Conan stuff” didn’t really cut it. One of the new authors, a young Englishman named Michael Moorcock, suggested calling these stories “epic fantasy,” a term which ultimately stuck to a very different type of fantasy.
Meanwhile, Fritz Leiber, the only remaining veteran from the first sword-and-sorcery boom—everyone else was either retired or dead—had a suggestion of his own. In issue two of the fanzine Ancalgon, dated March/April 1961 (1.88 MB .pdf), later reprinted in the fanzine Amra, Leiber wrote:
[…] fantasy adventure—a field which I feel more certain than ever should be called the sword-and-sorcery story. This accurately describes the points of culture-level and supernatural element and also immediately distinguishes it from the cloak-and-sword (historical adventure) story—and (quite incidentally) from the cloak-and-dagger (international espionage) story, too! The word sorcery implies something more and other than historical human witchcraft, so even the element of an alien-yet-human world background is hinted at. At any rate, I’ll use sword-and-sorcery as a good popular catchphrase for the field.
Other writers joined the conversation. Lin Carter suggested “heroic fantasy,” and L. Sprague de Camp “non-historical fantasy adventure.” Ultimately, it was Leiber’s suggestion that stuck because it was descriptive, alliterative, and easy to remember.
In 1963, L. Sprague de Camp edited an anthology of such stories and called it Sword and Sorcery, further popularising the term. And when Lancer reprinted the adventures of Conan the Cimmerian in paperback form with striking Frank Frazetta covers, “sword and sorcery” was cemented as the name of the genre, which is currently undergoing another revival.
Do you enjoy sword-and-sorcery stories? Did you know how the genre originated and who created it? Who are your favourite writers and characters? Let’s continue the conversation in Seattle, as this genre from the past is alive and well in our present and will undoubtedly continue into the future!
Cora Buhlert is a writer and translator from Bremen in North Germany. She’s a contributor to Galactic Journey and the winner of the 2022 Hugo Award for best fan writer. You can also find her at her website.