Michael Moorcock's Eternal Champion, Part 3: Hawkmoon & the Runestaff || Spoiler-free review

[@KelsaRavenlock]

I thought it worth mentioning that Moorcock routinely chats up fans on his fan sites like Moorcock's Miscellany and has for decades. He is a very accessible guy. He also goes out of his way to help people get out of print copies of his books for as cheap as he can and does readings of the ones he can't get back in print from his personal library and then posts them. In the early days before social media he used to spend massive amounts of time on the site.

[@elgatochurro]

That'll make having the collection so much easier

[@jerrycornelius2261]

New 'Outlaw BOOKSELLER' KZbin has recent interview and THE MANY WORLDS OF MM ON FACEBOOK as well as BUGGERLY OTHERLY. MM regularly answers readers and fiewers and deals with the rumours.

[@angry_wizard]

When I read an interview with Moorcock from (I think) the late '80s he mentioned having written the Hawkmoon books in single weekends fuelled by large amounts of amphetamine, which is when they clicked and suddenly made more sense to me.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

Nope. Moorcock never used drink or drugs for his 3-day novels. Sweet black coffee. He was a working journalist, used to getting copy to press very quickly.

[@Person0fColor]

@@jerrycornelius2261it’s not even that crazy of an idea to have written all these stories in one weekend these stories aren’t complicated and can be read quick as hell

[@jerrycornelius2261]

@@Person0fColor 3 days. 15,000 a day. In DEATH IS N0 OBSTACLLE 1990s. In which MM describes using different techniques for different books.

[@michaelk.vaughan8617]

It’s been a LONG time since I’ve read Hawkmoon! I remember really liking them. Great video!

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks, Michael! My reaction to the books has changed as I've aged. I still think they're fun reads, but I enjoyed them more in my youth. I'm more sensitive to their shortcomings (such as the deus ex machina plot resolutions) than I once was.

[@misanthropos6211]

Glad to see you here, Michael - I literally just watched your 12/31 video just before watching this one. My two favorite booktubers!

[@jerrycornelius2261]

THEY ARE IN PRINT FROM TOR BOOKS.

[@serjtyrjam]

I read the Elric, Hawkmoon, Korum and Erekose once again 3 month ago. I love these books so much!

[@ColinMcAlister-kilt]

My goodness - It’s been 35 years since I read all of the Eternal Champion books. Everything from Hawkmoon to Elric to Jerry Cornelius and all the other “JC’s” Erekose, Ulrik, Oswald, Pyat. Loved all of them - but I suspect it was a lot to do with being of a certain age. Don’t think I could read them now. It was a magical time being a teenager, reading all this stuff and also Le Guin’s Earthsee, LOTR, even the GOR books were fun (for a not yet sexually active young person). But You can’t go back.

[@ColinMcAlister-kilt]

Oh....and the Corum books were the best ones.

[@thelibraryladder]

That's a perfectly understandable feeling. Some of Moorcock's books really do seem as if they were written for young readers whose life experience and views of the world and people are still largely unformed. It might be because he wrote many of the when he was quite young himself. I agree that Corum is a high point of the series. Thanks for sharing!

[@jerrycornelius2261]

@@thelibraryladder People rereading them say they find new depths in most of them which they had't noticed first time around.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

YOU'D GET MORE OUT OF MANY OF THEM AS AN ADLT!

[@LordEriolTolkien]

I have read almost all of the volumes you have reviewed thus far. I still count myself a Moorcock fan despite not having read anything of his since the 90's. But I read many many of his works and still remember them with great fondness

[@jerrycornelius2261]

THERE HAVE BEEN A LOT since the 90s,incuding four Elric books and a variety of others!

[@JackMyersPhotography]

I absolutely LOVE the Hawkmoon stories. Stormbringer gets a lot of attention but the Sword of the Dawn is vastly more deadly. There’s a very cool comic book version of the story too. Thanks for the great review.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! There was even a tabletop role-playing game about Hawkmoon in the 1980s. Some of the images I used in the video are from the game materials.

[@elgatochurro]

​@@thelibraryladderwould you have the name of it for research? I plan my next game to be based heavily on Hawkmoon setting

[@thelibraryladder]

@@elgatochurro It was called Hawkmoon, and it was released by Chaosium in 1986.

[@ThiagoOliveira-yk5sy]

You are making invaluable and hard to find cotent, please continue. I am very grateful.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thank you! I plan to keep making videos like this.

[@Calypso694]

really love how you covered Moorcock. Not many booktubers have and its always great to see.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! The fifth installment in my coverage of the Eternal Champion is up next and coming soon, focused on Elric.

[@whom382]

Wow! You said everything I feel about this set of stories better than I ever could. I hope you continue this series of reviews.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thank you! I plan to continue this series on the Eternal Champion, but it will be a few months before I produce the next installment. I have a very long list of videos I want to make, and I'm trying to spread the Moorcock ones out to make room for other videos in my schedule.

[@Jay-Kay-Buwembo]

You need to do a tier ranking of Moorcocks works, I have started with Eric whilst OK the stories so far have been quite flat, I am listening via audible. I am also reading Gloriana which was recommended to me by a friend. Moorcocks stule, voice and approach can be wildly different. A tier ranking will be great to get some perspective on your thoughts on the quality of his work and which books/series are best.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for the suggestion! I probably will do something like a tier ranking once I've completed my overviews of all the Eternal Champions. Elric is up next in my queue, and I hope to have that video out soon.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

I'D GO 'BYZANTIUM ENDURES' etc MOTHER LONDON, THE WHISPERING SWARM. STRAIGHT FANTASY WOULD BE 'WARHOUND AND THE WORLD'S PAIN',GLORIANA, CITY IN THE AUTUMN STARS.

[@richardgregory3684]

Hawkmoon got me into Michael Moorcock's stories. Bizarrely, my grandmother had a copy of _The Mad God's Amulet_ (in fact, it was actually titled _Sorceror's Amulet_ ) handing around, and I picked it up and read it, and was totally hooked. I gradually collected other stories using my pocket money to buy them as used paperbacks. I think the Hakwmoon tales are in many ways som eof the most accessible and involve the least amoutn of actual, well, sorcery. And Hawkmoon is a pretty straightforward hero unlike the doomladen Corum, Elric and Erekose. After Hawkmoon I think I got some Corum books, from the library, although they only had the second trilogy where he fights the Fhoi Myore. I gradually began to realise that all the books, whilst perfectly good standalone stories, all link with each other; that's much more explicit in the Elric stories . Ironically, the second Hawkmoon series pretyt much ties all the books together and act as a sort of final volume.

[@tripdefect87]

I'd just like to say that because of this video, I went out of my way to buy the current collected edition of Hawkmoon: History Of The Runestaff. Thank you! The overall plot you described just sounded incredibly interesting

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! I hope you enjoy it! One of the things I enjoy about reading Moorcock is the opportunity to play the 'influence spotting' game -- identifying the earlier works and authors to which he pays homage, as well as the influence he had on later authors as they took his creative ideas and elaborated on them. Each Eternal Champion has its own set of unique influences in both directions, and the Hawkmoon books are some of the best examples.

[@kennethmgray4129]

I found it. Thank you and I'm loving your show.

[@oxhine]

Hey, Bridger! Please continue with this series.

[@thelibraryladder]

Good timing! Episode 4 (A Nomad of the Time Streams) is my next video. :)

[@HistoryMovieCritic]

Thank you for reviewing this vastly underrated series. It is one of my all time favorites and though Elric is more popular, Moorcock’s masterpiece. I think you were a bit hard on it. I found the world building some of the best in fantasy. The stories are quick paced and enjoyable, but that is what makes them so good. I would rather have that then the ponderous 1,000 page modern books that take ten pages to describe a single hillside. I like the good guy nature of Hawkmoon and the downplaying of magic. The books have an excellent RPG that is fun and easy to learn. I have run many fun campaigns based upon it and players grasp the world easily even if they haven’t read the books. I can’t praise this series enough. I wish more people read it. My only complaint is that there weren’t more books done about this world. It is so fascinating. It would make an epic movie.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! I agree that the Hawkmoon novels are one of Moorcock's best story cycles and that they should be more widely known and read. These days, my preference for fantasy worldbuilding tends to fall between the extremes of Moorcock's wildly inventive worlds that are only sparsely described (often implausibly) and the bloated, 1,000-page tomes that frequently let the worldbuilding get in the way of a good story. I've never played the Hawkmoon RPG, but I can see how it would provide a great framework for a wide variety of adventures.

[@wileyschmitt]

Ooooh I've been looking forward to this one! So far I've read 5 of the books from the Elric saga and loved them all (except Fortress of the Pearl which was so-so), and am currently reading about Corum in 'The Knight of Swords' and am very much enjoying it too. Still so much to be read, but at least now I have most of Moorcock's books after a lot of hunting :)

[@thelibraryladder]

I think you'll probably enjoy the Hawkmoon stories. Elric, Corum and Hawkmoon are often considered the 'Big 3' Eternal Champions, because of their central roles in the saga and how their stories overlap in the multiverse. Their stories are also some of the more accessible ones, with plenty of plot and less of the strangeness found with some of the other Champions.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

Most are in print via AMAZON UK!

[@wileyschmitt]

@@jerrycornelius2261 Yeah thanx to the internet we can just about any book fathomable, but I actually found most of my Moorcock titles in the wild. Got a ton of duplicates too, and only a few obscure one that I didn't come across, some of which I went to the internet to get.

[@CMDR_Verm]

Forgive me, but I came across this video entirely by chance and then sat and listened enraptured. Speaking as a man, you have a beautiful voice to listen to. Once upon a time, aged 16 or thereabouts, I read through Moorcock's Eternal Champion series. I had no critical background, I just enjoyed them for what they were. Elric of Melnibone I remember as my favourite. Such sadness, tragedy and melancholy! It was hard not to be affected by Elric's tales and their ultimate conclusion. Listening to your critique I get the impression that Moorcock was almost churning these tales out because they were his only source of income. Very similar to the novels of Philip K. Dick, though of a completely different nature. I finally began my awakening to literary awareness (if you will forgive my pretentiousness) when I began to read his Jerry Cornelius series. I cannot say with any honesty that I would have been able to see the theme of the Cornelius series without the introduction by John Clute in ''The Condition of Muzak''. This lead to me re-reading the series and, instead of it being a romp through history, it was a heartbreaking tour de force about Moorcock's own environment. I have never been able to revisit it since. Thank you for bringing this all back to me.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thank you for your kind words and for sharing your experience with Moorcock's books! Many of his Eternal Champion stories seem to resonate most with younger readers, perhaps because of the novelty and fast pacing of their plots as well as the angst felt by antiheroes such as Elric. Like many other writers for the pulp magazines, a lot of his stories, particularly in the first decade or so of his writing career, were indeed churned out at a rapid pace in order to support himself financially. He has stated that several of his early Champion novels were written in as little as 2-3 days, with very little attempt at editing and polishing before submission for publication. As he matured, though, his writing matured as well. By the 1980s, it was a lot more polished, perhaps reflecting a slower and more thoughtful pace of writing. And even his early works contain a lot of depth in the ideas and themes they explore, although I sometimes wish he had taken more time to explore them more fully (the first four Hawkmoon books are an example of a missed opportunity to flesh out some very interesting themes and worldbuilding, in my opinion). Thanks again!

[@BookishChas]

Excellent video Bridger! This is intriguing to me, as I’ve just finished collecting the new Elric bindups. Once I’ve read those, I may look into the other eternal champions.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thank you, Chas. I hope you enjoy the Elric books so you can explore some of the other Champions. Elric actually crosses paths in his books with several of the other Champions, including Hawkmoon, Corum and Von Bek. Happy New Year!

[@mr.pinkfloyd541]

Great video. Discovered your channel some months ago, through the first two Eternal Champions videos, so I was looking forward to the follow-ups. Reading the new Elric novel right now, the Eternal Champion sequence is on my list for 2023.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks and welcome aboard! I have a very long list of videos that I want to make and only limited available time to work on them, so I'm trying to spread out my Moorcock ones to make room for some other large retrospectives of books and authors that I have planned.

[@EPICSAWIKI]

I randomly stumbled onto this channel after I was recommended by a friend to check out Moorcock's eternal champion series. These videos have been great and I'm definitely sold. Thanks for all the spoil free info! I can't wait to jump into this series.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks and welcome aboard!

[@RHampton]

Great review. A friend sent me a few Hawkmoon books. Looking forward to reading them.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! I really hope you enjoy them.

[@murph_archer1129]

Brilliant video. The Hawkmoon books were pretty awesome. I loved the worldbuilding in these books a lot since it starts out pretty subtle but as time goes on you notice the parallels to Great Britain. I also loved the darker sides of Hawkmoon with his battle lust and moments of insanity which made him more interesting than the usual romantic hero archetype. Cant wait to see you continue your Moorcock videos!

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! The future Earth described in these books is wildly diverse. Each part of the world is _very_ different and could stand on its own as the setting of a completely separate story. It's one of the reasons I'm conflicted about the books. The worldbuilding is fascinating, but I'd rather have one long story that fleshes out in more detail a single part of the world. Instead, the Hawkmoon books feature several quick stopovers in different locations that provide only hints of what makes those weirdly diverse cultures tick.

[@matthewhelmers1426]

Looking forward to your take on the Corum stories. My White Wolf editions have been read a couple times but it has been a long time, perhaps finding your videos will prompt a reread!

[@KelsaRavenlock]

I have multiple versions of the omnibus collections as well as all the collections from the first along with most the original pulps. I have an extensive knowledge of all things Moorcock and haven't as yet found new info in these videos other than added analysis. What I needed was a series of overveiw videos to recommend to friends who don't know him, so thank you very much for covering an author who was the genesis of modern fantasy while somehow being unknown to most modern audiences.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! My primary motivation for making these videos about the Eternal Champion is to provide an introductory overview for readers not familiar with Moorcock that encourages them to read his works. Moreover, many other readers are familiar with Elric, but have little knowledge of the rest of the pantheon of Champions. Later this summer, I'll be producing my fourth video in this series, which will focus on Oswald Bastable.

[@Spyros.ts13]

thank you for this exvellent review all three videos!

[@thelibraryladder]

Thank you! I'm very glad you enjoyed them.

[@patytrico]

Conan, John Carter and Dorian Hawkmoon where my entry point in adult fantasy universes, coming from Grimm's fairy tales and Tarzan adventures :) It was a shock and I am in love with Fantasy and Science Fiction since then! Thank you for this series and the rest of your channel content! Saludos desde Uruguay!

[@thelibraryladder]

Hola y gracias! Like you, the Barsoom books played formative roles in my early appreciation of fantasy that wasn't traditional high fantasy. From there, I discovered Moorcock and Conan and Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd & the Gray Mouser.

[@MrChristophSteininge]

The casual mention of things that came before reminded me a bit of Larry Nivens and David Gerrolds "The Flying Sorcerers". Whereas the empire of Granbretan has many Warhammer vibes. Surely many ideas in those novels sound like they fell out of time, particularly when Dorian goes to London as the ambassador of Asiacommunista. Many ideas in these novels were super interesting, like the undying emperor who fell to his own hubris and folly rather then to the agency of the hero himself. I hugely enjoyed the series and I think it is a sad state in what fantasy is now. The grand scale of the adventure is very appealing!

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for sharing that! I haven't read 'The Flying Sorcerers' or Warhammer, so I missed those connections. I agree with you that the Hawkmoon novels are fun and extremely inventive on a grand scale.

[@ishtarian]

The "banality of evil" connection is, if memory serves, spot on. I cannot at the moment recall exactly where, but I *do* remember Moorcock making a statement about how true insanity, like true evil, tends toward the banal. This may have been in an essay I've not read in quite some time, or it may be one of the many such lines he brings into his fiction; but, given the notability of Arendt's book on Eichmann around the time these books were being written, it is not at all unlikely there was an influence there.

[@thelibraryladder]

That's an intriguing possibility. Thanks for sharing!

[@jerrycornelius2261]

MM read most of Hanna Arendt in the 60s.

[@ishtarian]

@@jerrycornelius2261 Thanks for the update on that. As I said, I don't recall exactly where I came across that connection, but that narrows it down a good bit..... Well, given Moorcock's prolificity during those years, that "narrows" is relative, to say the least......

[@movingthroughkashmir-]

part 4 and 5 please :) keep going!

[@thelibraryladder]

I'm currently working on part four. I hope to have it up within the next week. :)

[@nyarparablepsis872]

I loved the worldbuilding the most in the Hawkmoon stories. That and the episode with Ilian of Garathorm

[@dixieflatline1189]

It’s been nearly 40 years since reading these books as a teen. They are iconic, but best left to nostalgia if you have read them before. Roger Zelazny’s Amber series follows similar theme’s but probably holds up better for adult readers today

[@thelibraryladder]

Having recently re-read both Hawkmoon and Amber, I agree with you that Amber holds up better for today's readers.

[@Pebble3007]

The History of the Runestaff were the first Moorcock I read. In a way, you can see his contrariness, as Elric was devised as contrast to Conan, Hawkmoon was more juvenile stories to support the more experimental New Worlds. I think MM wrote these novels in 5 days and are based on pulp 4 act dramas. You will have missed the satire of the Labour Government names as well. The Chronicles of Count Brass are later and after Corum Swords trilogy.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for sharing! I'm sure I missed some of the humorous references sprinkled throughout the Hawkmoon tetralogy. The Count Brass volume is likely to be my last video in this series, since it contains the culmination of many of the Champion storylines.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

3 days. Introduction. Development. Resolution. Coda.

[@blankfrancine]

The Jewel in the Skull was another fantasy paperback sold at my local Mom and Pop store. I think it was a Lancer paperback and cost 75 cents!

[@grahamturner1290]

Must reread my Panther editions. 🤔

[@aquamanpl]

I like Hawkmoon. I read The Runestaff saga as a teenager when I was big fan of other fantasy "action heroes" like Conan and Kane. But at the end what stayed in my mind was not Hawkmoon but the intriguing world. And I think that's because of the incompleteness of Moorcock's worldbuilding.

[@thelibraryladder]

That's largely how I feel about these four Hawkmoon books. The settings have stuck with me far more than the characters have.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

@@thelibraryladder I think MM agrees! Image and landscape was at that time what interested him most!

[@HistoryMovieCritic]

I feel like it is one of the most complete cases of world building in fantasy. One of the most immersive and thoroughly convincing I have ever read.

[@LordEriolTolkien]

Hawkmoon, Corum, and Elric, and perhaps Bastable are my personal favourites

[@summerkagan6049]

I'd like you to opine on Jerry Cornelius and that strange novel "Blood: A Southern Fantasy" By far my favorite Eternal Champion book is "Stormbringer".

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for the suggestion! I plan to get to them eventually. I'm following Moorcock's recommended reading order for his Eternal Champion books.

[@jerrycornelius2261]

@@thelibraryladder Blood,Fabulous Harbours and The War Amongst the Angels are a series as is the Elric/EC series beginning with THE DREAMTHIEF'S DAUGHTER and the current WHITEFRIARS series beginning with THE WHISPERING SWARM which mix real memoir with wild fantasy. MM never stops pushing the envelopes. He's 84 now.

[@wileyschmitt]

Maybe the people making the Hawkmoon adaptation can take advantage of filling in gaps and developing characters (hopefully with Moorcock's input).

[@thelibraryladder]

We can hope! The announcement of the TV adaptation was three years ago, right at the start of the pandemic, and I haven't seen any press reports since then. It might be stuck in 'development hell.'

[@wileyschmitt]

@@thelibraryladder A very similar thing happened to the adaptation of Stephen King's 'The Long Walk', which I'm very interested in after recently reading, plus I want to see if they expand on the story prior to the walk.

[@Leopard589]

I wonder if this channel will do a reaction of the Eternal Champion tv show by David Goyer when it releases.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for the heads-up about the Goyer adaptation of Moorcock. I wasn't aware that he was working on filming the Von Bek and (possibly) Elric and Erekose stories until now. The Hawkmoon adaptation I mentioned in the video is a different production. Given Goyer's successful track record, his version seems most likely to see the light of day. Thanks also for the suggestion to comment on the show when it's released. I might do a reaction video, depending on several factors, such as whether I enjoy the show. However, YT channels that make videos reacting to movies and tv shows tend to be in a race to be the first to provide commentary or to provide extreme opinions so as to capture the lion's share of audience views. I'll never be first, or even close to it, and I'm not interested in slanting my opinions to generate views. Any video I make would likely come after the full show (or season) has been released and I've watched all of it (which might not happen if I don't enjoy it). It also depends on how much attention the show gets from other YT channels. I started this channel primarily to cover books and authors and related topics that don't already receive a lot of attention on YT. There's an echo chamber aspect of BookTube that I'm trying to avoid. :)

[@Leopard589]

@@thelibraryladderThe moment I heard about them bringing Michael Moorcocks multi-verse to Apple TV+. The first thing that popped up was the channel. Ever since then, I’ve been binge watching your videos. One thing that sets this channel apart from tbt others channels? You take your time and break it down. You also reference books that were the inspiration to the movies of today. Other KZbinrs just throw a bunch of information at you so that they have the first reaction. Many of them don’t even watch the content they’re reacting to. Since Apple is going to give The Eternal Champion series and Buck Rogers movie big budgets. I hope you react to both.

[@seeker2182]

I started with erekose and then read Elric and then corum. I liked erekose a lot but moorcock writing style back then was very bad tbh. I really enjoyed the first Elric story and it’s probably my favorite but some of the other stories I didn’t like as much. I really hated how rushed his return to melnibone was and cyromil’s death felt so underwhelming. The corum stories I liked a lot and I think his world is probably the best. I look forward to reading hawkmoom next. I do have a question though. At the beginning of the Elric story the sleeping sorceress there is a guy named earl of aubec. The sequence felt so out of place in the story but apparently I read he’s featured in other stories and it a part of Elric’s world hundreds of years ago. I tried to find which stories he’s in but there’s not that much Info online. Any ideas what stories he’s in? I’d liked to learn more about the character.

[@thelibraryladder]

Aubec is a relatively minor incarnation of the Eternal Champion who is featured in a few isolated stories that don't have much narrative linkage between them. Aubec seems to me to have been something of an experimental character that Moorcock used to flesh out some of the mythology of his multiverse, particularly the histories of Law and Chaos. Most of the Aubec stories are collected in an omnibus volume (Earl Aubec and Other Stories) published in the 1990s by White Wolf Publishing in the US and by Millennium/Orion in the UK. They're out of print and can be difficult to find at affordable prices, although I just checked and there's a softcover UK edition currently listed on eBay for around $12 (the hardcover US edition is more than $100). A list of the stories it contains can be found at www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?283366. I hope that's helpful.

[@seeker2182]

Thanks! Also I love your channel. I never could’ve gotten into this series without your videos.

[@arthurparkerhouse537]

Is there an in-depth video explaining how the multiverse works?

[@jerrycornelius2261]

MM EXPLAINS IT IN THE CURRENT COMIC 'MULTIVERSE' FROM TITAN.

[@LaBibliotecaEterna]

Thanks for bringing the next part of this retrospective and I feel the same but with the Corum books, too much hapoening and ending in just one book. Greeting from México and Happy New Year.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks! I can appreciate your similar thoughts about the Corum books, and I'll probably make the same observation when I get to those books in this video series. Feliz Ano Nuevo!

[@achunaryan3418]

True about world building and plot

[@ChagrinElectric]

The graphic version of Jewel is one of the pieces I lend to people interested in Moorcock's work. If you can't handle that then his work probably will go over your head😂

[@Arational]

Jewel in the forehead also appears in Zardoz 1974

[@jerrycornelius2261]

Don't remember that. First paperback was 1966, I think.

[@shelleyleiba3763]

is there a part 4 video to the Eternal Campion ?

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for asking! Part 4 started out as a standalone video about Moorcock's Oswald Bastable trilogy. As I worked on it, though, I decided to expand it, with the result being my recent video about the history of steampunk.

[@Melvinshermen]

Do Jerry corenlius and also some moorcock stuff like kane of mars and sir seaton begg

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for the encouragement! I'm making these Eternal Champion videos in Moorcock's own suggested reading order. Up next in the list are the Oswald Bastable stories.

[@sandyhausler5290]

When can we expect your next video on Moorcock’s Eternal Champion?

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for asking. My recent video about steampunk contains the fourth installment in my look at Moorcock's Eternal Champion. I cover the Oswald Bastable novels in it. Elric is the next Champion on deck, and I hope to get to him sometime this summer.

[@fengusburnt]

Are the rest of the saga videos coming?

[@thelibraryladder]

Yes, Part Five, focused on Elric is up next in my queue and coming soon. (Part Four, focused on Oswald Bastable, is contained in the video I made about the roots of steampunk.) Thanks for your interest!

[@fengusburnt]

@@thelibraryladder For sure! I read the Cornelius Quartet years ago, and your series inspired me to order the Von Beck books.

[@m.scottmcgahan9900]

A TV series would be the best way to do The Eternal Champion Stories. Different seasons could be different characters, like True Detective or Fargo. Some stories could work as movies as well, like how Marvel has the movies and series interlinked. I had heard at one point that an idea for an Elric series had been shelved due to it being too similar superficially to the Netflix adaptation of The Witcher (irony!) but maybe now that the writers have ruined it, the way will open up for Elric to happen?

[@thelibraryladder]

I think it's only a matter of time before the Eternal Champion saga is developed for TV, and I think your idea of giving different champions their own 8- or 10-episode season makes a lot of sense. At a minimum, Elric, Corum, Hawkmoon and Erekose would seem to be logical choices, although deciding which one to feature in season one might be a tough choice.

[@m.scottmcgahan9900]

@@thelibraryladder Yes, these four to begin with, maybe with a "Three-Who-Are-One" crossover movie...

[@richardgregory3684]

The BBC acquired the rights to the Runestaff stories back in 2019 - but there's been nothing about it since.

[@reedl2353]

Ah, the first of Moorcock's stories positing Great Britain as the ultimate evil. I never got the impression that he was kidding about that. Over time they grow from just threatening Hawkmoon's version of Earth to potentially taking over the entire Multiverse. Regardless, his concept of the masked empire of evil is one of the most arresting 'visual' images in all of the fantasy literature of my youth. What an incredibly vivid mental picture that paints. Hawkmoon's stories are enjoyable in a way that the nihilistic stories of Elric never were, and I believe that he is still the only incarnation of The Eternal Champion to get some version of a happy ending. I'm sure that says something about Moorcock's own psychology, but I have no idea what. I seem to remember that Moorcock said that he wrote them as a literal fever dream - he was very ill at the time of their writing. I have no source for that but my own memories so I don't know if it is true, but the idea has stuck with me for 4 decades. Even if it's completely apocryphal, it's a perfect description of the books. I did find the (much later retcon) idea that the jewel in his skull was his incarnation of the Black Sword to be a stretch, but I suppose that's a discussion for another time. Or perhaps another year, given the pace at which this series is being produced. No judgment; I understand as well as anyone just how much time it takes to read all of these stories, let alone produce content based on them!

[@thelibraryladder]

Another great comment! I agree that the retconning becomes a little obvious and difficult to accept as the saga progresses. I read much of the Eternal Champion saga in my youth and am now revisiting it 40 years later. As you noted in an earlier comment, Moorcock's works tend to satisfy in small doses and can overstay their welcome in larger doses. I prefer not to read too much of him at a time, which is one reason why I'm spacing the videos in this series out every few months. The next installment will focus on Oswald Bastable, which I hope to have ready later this summer.

[@reedl2353]

@@thelibraryladder I just noticed that you had posted replies to my comments! I know that this format isn't intended as a conversation per se, but I also don't want it to feel like I'm ignoring your responses. Regardless, I really look forward to your review of the Bastable stories. Those were amongst the works that I really wanted to like, but didn't. Of course, I haven't read them in a very long time. I get the feeling that you and I have similar literary experiences, but different tastes.

[@MadderMel]

Liked Hawkmoon ! Loved Corum ! More than Elric ! Didn't think I'd like Warhound and the World's Pain , but it's brilliant , and should be a big movie ! Loved the Bastable novel ! Wasn't overly keen on Elric , Corum is a far more cool character !

[@Scottlp2]

Read all the Elric books decades ago. SPOILERS Moody stuff with a sword with a personality and Elric who possessed the sword but not always happy with the outcome of using it.

[@thelibraryladder]

That's a pretty good nutshell summary of the Elric saga. :D

[@richardgregory3684]

What I really liked about the Hawkmoon books is that they are definitely set on OUR Earth - but in the future. The Tragic Millenium is obviously a perid of chemical, biological and nuclear war set in our future, as the technology is extremely advanced - which is why it;s confused with sorcery in Hawkmoon's time. I loved spotting the changed place names and stuff like the Gods of Granbretan (which are former British Prime Ministers - and the Beatles!). Our time now would be John Daker's time. Hawkmoon live sin our future. Elric and Corum I would suggest live in our distant past - we live in the "more Lawful" futire that the events in Elric work towards.

[@thelibraryladder]

I think part of the fun of the Eternal Champion stories is figuring out which of the stories are set in our slice of the multiverse, as opposed to parallel planes of existence. The Runestaff sequence certainly feels like it might be set in our future.

[@richardgregory3684]

@@thelibraryladder It is; it's definitely out earth, as the geography is the same - even the placenames are recognisable, if corrupted - Londra-London, Granbretan-Great Britain etc etc. And the Gods of Granbretan - Churshil=Churchill, Aral Vilsn=Harold Wilson can only come from our history. Jhone, Jorg, Phowl, Runga are the Beatles (John, George, Paul and Ringo); all said to have ruled the land before the Tragic Millenium. Elvereza Tozer, the Granbretanian playright in Swor dof the Dawn, writes a play about "Adolph and Steleen" (Hitler and Stalin). There are references all through the books (though some are also injokes by Michael Moorcock!). The worlds of Corum and Elric are for sure not ours, except peraphs of a much earlier age. The geopgraphy of the landmasses is very different.

[@DeathAlchemist]

Good video, but to give some constructive criticism whenever you talk I hear static on the audio side. This has been reoccurring throughout quite a few of your videos. It doesn't make them unwatchable since I can still understand your voice fairly well, but it is noticeable.

[@thelibraryladder]

Thanks for the feedback. That's very strange, because there's no static in the audio I'm uploading. It's a very clean signal. What I suspect you're hearing is hoarseness in my voice, which can make it a little raspy at times. The microphone I use is very sensitive and it picks up every sound my voice makes. Depending on the kind of device/speakers/headphones you're using to listen to the videos, you might be getting a distorted version of my voice. Most of my voice is in the lower octaves, which many small speakers and headphones struggle to reproduce. Someone listening to my voice on those devices will lose most of the bass tone and be left primarily with the harsh raspiness of the consonants in my speech and any hoarseness I might be experiencing. On the cheap, tinny-sounding speakers built into my BENQ and Phillips computer monitors, my voice sounds terrible, but on better quality earbuds, headphones and speakers my voice sounds like it should. Also, some devices (such as TVs and hearing aids) have settings that can boost certain audio frequencies to separate speech from background sounds. Unfortunately for my voice, the frequencies they boost are the higher ones associated with those harsh consonant sounds. I'll try switching to a different microphone to see if it can tame some of my raspiness. And if that still doesn't work, you can always try watching with the sound muted and closed-captioning turned on (I enter the subtitles myself, so I know they're accurate).

[@misanthropos6211]

I have watched all of the recent videos and I haven't noticed any static noise - though I haven't listened with headphones. Sure it isn't your own speakers or headphones, whichever you're listening through?

[@thelibraryladder]

@@misanthropos6211 Thanks for the second opinion. It’s nice to get confirmation of what my ears have been telling me.

[@ts2975]

I can hear the static as well, I don't think it is the speakers. I've tried on headphones, desktop monitors, a portable Bluetooth speaker, and on a good car stereo and it is always present in multiple videos including the newest on Dan Simmons.

[@raphaelbernard7954]

Moorcock was writing about GB as it is now, despotic rule by Johnson, Starma and co, thought police not unlike 1984, and has been for some time, so much so that Rowan Atkinson recently put out a piece decrying this state of affairs

[@kennethmgray4129]

I can't find part 4

[@thelibraryladder]

Part 4 is my Roots of Steampunk video in which I discuss the Oswald Bastable novels in the Eternal Champion saga. Thanks for watching!

[@joaquinrivera1575]

Where is part 4?

[@thelibraryladder]

Part 4 is contained in my video about the roots of steampunk in which I discuss Moorcock's Oswald Bastable novels. Thanks for your interest!

[@richardgregory3684]

FYI the BBC acquired the rights to the first four Hawkmoon stories (the Runestaff sequence) back in 2019, so it looked like they were going to make a series. But nothing has been heard of since then. I;d say Hawkmoon would be the easiest to make a film or TV series out of as he's a pretyt straightforward heroic type and the stories are fairly simple as well (quite how they'd have handled the perversions of the Lord of Granbretan would be, err, interesting - like in the third book where they are entertained by sexual acrobats lol). On the othe rhand the BBC recently made a truly awful version of _War of the Worlds_ so heck knows what they'd do to the Runestaff stories. The battle scenes and sorcery-science (eg the Throbbing Bridge) woudl have onc ebeen all but impossible, but you could CGI them without too much trouble now!

[@thelibraryladder]

My guess is that they're looking for one or more deep-pocketed partners (HBO, Netflix, Amazon, Disney?) to help finance and produce the series and to broaden its scope. I think an Eternal Champion series could work well as a kind of anthology, with each season focused on a different champion, but to do that, they'd need to acquire the film rights for the other champions held by other studios. Thus the need for corporate partners who share a similar vision for the series.

[@richardgregory3684]

@@thelibraryladder Well, maybe. I think they most likely picked the Runestaff stories because they're th emost easily accessible; Hawkmoon is a pretty straghtforward hero type character and the stories themselves are easily understood and, more importantly, adapted to the screen. A character like Elric is much more complex and he's really an anti-hero.

[@Eudaimonist]

While I like Elric and Corum more, Hawkmoon is in a solid third place for me!

[@thelibraryladder]

You're in good company with that ranking!

[@dford4014]

MM is the idea man not the details man.

[@kmm3458]

There are more books about this Hawkmoon gyu? I'm reading book 3 and I'm bored. They don't eat, don't sleep, but constantly fight like gods. The knight in gold and whatever is there to save the day every time.. And in the next book the saviour is his brother..OMG, so stupid. Hawkmoon is an absolute moron. And the pearl will be reactivated in the 4th book. He has nothing toworry about, there's no brain to be eaten.

[@HistoryMovieCritic]

Finish the series before you judge.