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The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories

The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories is the third book by Anglo-Irish fantasy writer Lord Dunsany, considered a major influence on the work of J. R. R. Tolkien, H. P. Lovecraft, Ursula K. Le Guin, and others. It was first published in hardcover by George Allen & Sons in October 1908, and has been reprinted a number of times since. Issued by the Modern Library in a combined edition with A Dreamer's Tales as A Dreamer's Tales and Other Stories in 1917.

The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories
First edition
AuthorLord Dunsany
IllustratorSidney Sime
LanguageEnglish
GenreFantasy
PublisherGeorge Allen & Sons
Publication date
1908
Publication placeUnited Kingdom
Media typePrint (hardback)
Preceded byTime and the Gods 
Followed byA Dreamer's Tales 

The book is a series of short stories. One of the stories, "The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save For Sacnoth", was afterwards (1910) published by itself as a separate book, a now very-rare "Art-and-Craft"-style limited edition.

Contents

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  • "The Sword of Welleran"
  • "The Fall of Babbulkund"
  • "The Kith of the Elf-Folk"
  • "The Highwayman"
  • "In the Twilight"
  • "The Ghosts"
  • "The Whirlpool"
  • "The Hurricane"
  • "The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save for Sacnoth"
  • "The Lord of Cities"
  • "The Doom of La Traviata"
  • "On the Dry Land"

Reception

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The Irish Times review described Dunsany's stories as "baffling", but called his style beautiful and his imagination strange but "captivating". It predicted that he would not be popular, but that he would have a cult following. It also praised Sime's illustrations.[1]

The Sword of Welleran and Other Stories marked the end of Dunsany's writing about Pegāna and the beginning of a new phase of his career, in which he wrote heroic fantasies in a more modern style. Darrell Schweitzer states that this period included much of his best work.[2] "The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save for Sacnoth" was one of the chief influences on sword and sorcery fiction.[3][4] Another important breakthrough was that Dunsany was writing short stories; heroic fantasy's forerunners were usually lengthy works.[2]

References

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  1. ^ "The Sword of Welleran". Irish Times. 16 October 1908. JSTOR 48536155. Retrieved 10 September 2023.
  2. ^ a b Schweizer, Darrell (1989). Pathways to Elfland: The Writings of Lord Dunsany. Wildside Press. pp. 12–14, 17–18. ISBN 9781587151330. Archived from the original on 14 August 2023. Retrieved 31 July 2023.
  3. ^ Clute, John (1997). "Dunsany, Lord". In Clute, John; Grant, John (eds.). The Encyclopedia of Fantasy. London: Orbit. Retrieved 3 August 2023.
  4. ^ Landow, George P. (Spring 1979). "And the World Became Strange: Realms of Literary Fantasy". The Georgia Review. 33 (1): 7–42. JSTOR 41397679. Archived from the original on 31 July 2023. Retrieved 31 July 2023.

Sources

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  • Joshi, S. T. (1993). Lord Dunsany: a Bibliography / by S. T. Joshi and Darrell Schweitzer. Metuchen, N.J.: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. pp. 2–3.
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