CONAN THE BARBARIAN: NIETSZCHE’S ÜNINTENTIONAL ÜBERMENSCH, Part 3

“Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandaled feet.”—Robert E. Howard.

By his own admission, Conan was born on a battlefield. He said it, matter-of-factly. A throw-away line, almost, in the story he said it in. (Forgive me, but I’ve forgotten which of the Howard Canon that Conan said it—was it “Beyond the Black River”?) Plenty of other authors have gone into this detail, but for Howard, it was as nonchalant as Conan telling a story. That’s the important thing to remember—Howard wrote as if he and Conan were drinking buddies, with Conan telling his tall-tales like the cowboys told their stories to young Howard. It’s why Howard ran out of ideas for Conan stories—Conan ran out of them!

When you read the Howard Canon, none of the stories are in order. Howard jumped around from different points in Conan’s life, but never in a straight line. There are no less than four ‘official chronologies’, made by the fans, that try and determine what order the Howard Canon should be read in, like the fans were trying to make a complete biography. I’m not too worried about it. I’ll provide a sketch of the order of Conan’s life as revealed in the stories.

Conan was born to a hill-tribe with sullen, dour god, Crom. They, the Cimmerians, were a small tribe, not known for mighty deeds, only their stubbornness. Their home was swampy hills, and they imagined their after-life as foggy, swampy hills. I can imagine that Conan went adventuring to flee from the sheer boredom. When Conan was fifteen, he joined a war party of barbarians that overran, sacked, and slaughtered a border fortress of Venarium, which belonged to the kingdom of Aquilonia—where one day Conan would become king.

As a youngster, Conan wandered as a petty thief-for-hire (“The Tower of the Elephant” and “The God in the Bowl”), though he was already as tall and strong as a grown man. Once he was hired as an assassin (“Rogues in the House”). When he reached full maturity, Conan donned his usual garb—scale mail vest, long boots, a bright red cloak, and a helmet with short horns! There, for about twenty years—wait, you thought Conan fought naked? In a loin-cloth? Far from it! Conan wasn’t stupid, body armor saved his life, though not as much as did his physical prowess. His prowess was more important—you can’t take armor with you everywhere. Frequently, Conan is described as a ‘giant’ and as a ‘panther.’ If you’ve ever seen how the big cats move, fight, and hunt, you will know exactly how damn dangerous Conan is, armed or unarmed! Be it giant apes or giant men, Conan has killed them with his bare hands! (“The Man-Eaters of Zamboula” and “Iron Shadows in the Moon”)

That’s another thing about Conan stories—he kills an ape or a snake in nearly every story! Even out of the blue, Conan kills one or the other (“Queen of the Black Coast”). Sadly, Conan does not fight and kill an ape-snake monster, even though such a creature is not out of the question in the setting.

Anyway, for about twenty years Conan adventures all over the Hyborian world; if he didn’t travel there himself, he met a fellow adventurer who did go there. Here is where we get the lion’s share of Conan’s personality. And I suppose we can finally talk about how Conan is an ‘ÜNINTENTIONAL ÜBERMENSCH’. Just keep in mind that Conan becomes King of Aquilonia in his early forties, when he was part of a palace coup against the king.

What makes Conan the Übermensch? The first is that he is physically unstoppable—except for the time he almost died in Xuthal, or when he almost died from crucifixion (“Xuthal of the Dusk” and “A Witch Shall be Born”, respectively). Conan fears nothing, because he can out-fight or out-run any bad situation. He’s a pragmatic fighter through and through, and never takes a bad fight. When a bad fight finds him? He wins.

Conan rules his world, his situation, by force. He breaks through the rotten rules of ‘civilized man’ by his strength and arms, but is clever enough to work within rules, as when he seeks leadership over other ferocious men (pirates in “Iron Shadows in the Moon”, mercenaries in “A Witch Shall be Born”). It is a combination of his rough charisma, raw ability, and ruthlessness that lets him take over any band of fighting men, even in places where it does not make sense!

Be they African/’Kushite’ tribesmen (“The Vale of Lost Women”) or ‘Afghuli’ (read, Afghan) hill-men (The People of the Black Circle), Conan rises to become their chief or captain.

Conan is not a true brute; for he reads men like a psychologist, and understands at least six languages (helpful for reading treasure maps, like in “The Jewels of Gwahlur”). He himself is an accomplished map-maker, and has some understanding of tax law (both in “The Phoenix on the Sword”, when he is king). He also understands enough of philosophy to not give a damn about philosophy, or its questions (“Queen of the Black Coast”). He is neither an atheist or agnostic nor especially pious, but understands the minds of all three views (the same story). For Conan, if life is an illusion, it’s real enough for him; nor does he care about death, because death is dull and boring.

It is life! The struggle! That is where Conan is most alive. Conan lives to struggle, endlessly, against all the odds. (Sound familiar?) It is his struggle against all the world that gives him meaning, against monsters, fiends, and ‘civilized men’. Conan has an especial kind of hate for most civilized men he meets; of all the men that Conan meets in the Howard Canon, only 3 are ones he likes, and a fourth as a potential apprentice. Conan has no friends. Who is good enough to be like him? Who is his equal? Almaric, Trocero, and Prospero are his counselors when Conan is already King; but none match him. The fourth, a young Balthus, is a tragic forester and frontiersman, whose valiant last stand against other invading barbarians is the only feat of arms that Conan enthusiastically respects! (“Beyond the Black River”, where Conan was hired as a frontier scout, and where he met Balthus.)

No, Conan hates civilized men, because to him, they are all phonies and impostors. They hide behind rules and awe; they have no strength to struggle. They do not make order from the chaos; they impose their will on others not by being worthy or amazing, but from worn-out, flimsy rules (master morality and slave morality? Hmm?). Conan is a man who takes chances, and has no respect for those who take the safe way through life. (Also sound familiar?) Conan hates weakness—for there is none in himself.

…Conan is not that self-introspective. His is a man of action, and not thinking. To say that he is an idealist is absolutely wrong. Conan is a virtuous pagan, through and through. He is completely petty in revenge, like the time he threw a former girlfriend into a sewage pit for a) dumping him and b) selling him out to the cops (“Rogues in the House”), and the worst thing you can truly do to Conan is to mock him, and then run away (“The Frost-Giant’s Daughter”)—because then he will never be able to settle the score. Truly, it is his personhood that is sacred to Conan—he recognizes the transitory nature of life, and has lost friends, a true love, warriors, companies, gold and ships a plenty. The only thing he has is himself.

If there is one truly remarkable trait about Conan, that neither Howard nor Nietzsche can explain, it is his jaw-dropping sense of responsibility. His barbarian code of honor makes sense—Conan is not and never will be an oathbreaker, for his word is his bond and his truth. That’s all normal for a barbarian and an Übermensch. But, to take up responsibility, completely out of the blue? Though ruthless, Conan is not heartless—he takes it as his vow to lead his men (pirates/outlaws/mercenaries/royal guards/tribesmen/other barbarians/etc.,) well, and to never throw their lives away. To sacrifice them like that is to dishonor their fighting spirit. He never belittles, only encourages his men under his command. He promises his men riches and glory, and the ability to earn them for themselves. Nor does he ever betray a contractor (“A Witch Shall be Born” has him be the captain of a royal guard, and when a royal plot overthrows a princess that Conan has no love for, he continues to protect the royal family out of duty).

To illustrate this more clearly, Conan is willing to betray, plot against, and kill every man in the room, if a) there’s treasure to be had, and/or b) he thinks the others are out to get him, but even in the midst of such a tense situation—if you throw a bag of gold at him and say ‘I need to hire you for something dangerous!’ Poof! It’s like an entirely new person emerged from that muscled barbarian! This happened in “Black Colossus”, where Conan was hired by a princess to save her kingdom from an evil sorcerer. He agrees to become a general over her soldiers, he fights the bad guys, the evil wizard kidnaps the princess, the evil wizard is about to sacrifice the princess, and then Conan kills the evil wizard and saves the day. Conan and the princess then have sex, on the altar, where she was supposed to be sacrificed.

Women and wizards! Conan hates the one, and love-hates the other! It is with women that Conan has a rough chivalry; he hates fighting women, though he will defend himself if attacked (“Red Nails”). He has flings where he can take them; most of his ‘girlfriends-of-the-week’ are airheads, a few are proper princesses. But his greatest loves? Ah! They are lionesses, neither timid or fickle, but as direct and brave as he. They are Belit, pirate queen; Valeria, swordswoman; and Zenobia, a former slave girl. (“Queen of the Black Coast”, “Red Nails”, and Hour of the Dragon/Conan the Conqueror, respectively.

Belit was a tragedy, undone by her greed, and Conan couldn’t save her (he was accidentally drugged out on a tropical plant), only avenge her later. She was his most intense love—and let her be the captain! She was the mind, he her right-hand. Valeria survived to fight another day. And Zenobia? Made his queen! When they met, Conan was imprisoned by an evil sorcerer, and Zenobia risked her life to rescue him. Ordinarily, Conan would have just said ‘thank you’, but what forever caught his eye was that Zenobia did not sneak him a prison shank or decorative knife—she smuggled to him a proper fighting dagger, that he then used to kill a man-eating man-ape that guarded his prison. (She paid attention to weapons, that’s what made her sexy in Conan’s eyes. The bravery, risk-taking, and common sense made her beautiful, too.) Afterwards, Conan looked for her and saved her from slavery.

But wizards? Wizards! I’m not sure if Conan would see them as like ‘civilized men’ but worse, or if they were a category all their own. What Conan hated about them was that it was their magic that made them strong, not their own might. Many were no more than power-mad bullies who had demons do their fighting and dirty work for them. Worse, though, than the wizards, were demons, things-of-magic. Monsters! Magical monsters were the only things that Conan was genuinely afraid of. Why? They did not follow the rules. Magical monsters like demons could not be struggled against by mortal methods. Conan feared them, because he couldn’t win—not without magical help. He never said it in the Howard Canon, but I suspect that the need for help against something burned Conan greatly.

Let’s wrap up our tale. Conan, after 20 or so years of adventuring, became King of Aquilonia, by killing the former king (don’t worry, the former king was a mean tyrant). He took the job seriously enough, but at the back of his mind, he probably laughed. When he was temporarily kidnapped (again by an evil sorcerer), and escaped back to his kingdom, an usurper was on the throne. Conan’s return caused a riot, where he threw the pretender off a tall tower, and watched as the traitors and loyalists battled it out in the streets. “And high above all, the naked figure of the king rocked and swayed on the dizzy battlements, mighty arms brandished, roaring with gargantuan laughter that mocked all mobs and princes, even himself.” (From ‘The Scarlet Citadel’)

How does Conan end? Well, Howard committed suicide, so other authors had to end his tale for him. When he approached his 60s, Conan gave up the crown to his son, Conn, and traveled west into the sunset for one last adventure. He was never found.

…

More to follow!