The Enchanter Reborn
The Enchanter Reborn is an anthology of five fantasy short stories edited by American writers L. Sprague de Camp and Christopher Stasheff, the first volume in their continuation of the Harold Shea series by de Camp and Fletcher Pratt. It was first published in paperback by Baen Books in 1992;[1] an ebook edition followed from the same publisher in May 2013. The book has also been translated into Italian.[2] All but one of the pieces are original to the anthology; the exception, de Camp's "Sir Harold and the Gnome King", first appeared in the World Fantasy Convention program book in 1990 and was then published as a separate chapbook in 1991.[3]
The series
De Camp and Pratt's original Harold Shea stories are parallel world tales in which universes where magic works coexist with our own, and in which those based on the mythologies, legends, and literary fantasies of our world and can be reached by aligning one's mind to them by a system of symbolic logic. In these stories psychologist Harold Shea and his colleagues Reed Chalmers, Walter Bayard, and Vaclav Polacek (called "Votsy", a nickname derived from the Czech pronunciation of Vaclav, approx.: VAHTs-lahff), travel to a number of such worlds. In the course of their travels other characters are added to the main cast, including Belphebe and Florimel, who become the wives of Shea and Chalmers, and Pete Brodsky, a policeman who is accidentally swept up into the chaos.
The book
In The Enchanter Reborn the series is opened up into a shared world to which other authors were invited to contribute. In addition to stories by de Camp and Stasheff, who collectively oversaw the project, it includes contributions by Holly Lisle and John Maddox Roberts, both of whom worked from outlines provided by the editors. The initial impulse for the continuation may have been the successful adaptation of the characters into a gamebook adventure (Prospero's Isle, by Tom Wham, published by Tor Books in October 1987), to which de Camp had contributed an admiring introduction. This may have encouraged him to wrap up long-unresolved loose ends from the original series, such as the stranding of Walter Bayard in the world of Irish mythology, and to resolve the unaddressed complication introduced by L. Ron Hubbard's "borrowing" of Harold Shea for use in his novel The Case of the Friendly Corpse. Both of these goals he accomplished in "Sir Harold and the Gnome King" (1990 chapbook). When the decision was made to continue the series further this story was revised slightly to reconcile it with the other new stories, though the fit is somewhat awkward.
Summary
Once the loose ends are resolved, most of the action in the second sequence involves Shea and Chalmers' quest across several universes to rescue Florimel, who has been kidnapped by the malevolent enchanter Malambroso. Milieus encountered in the stories of The Enchanter Reborn include the worlds of Irish myth and of Ludovico Ariosto's epic poem the Orlando furioso from the original series, revisited in "Professor Harold and the Trustees," L. Ron Hubbard's setting from The Case of the Friendly Corpse and L. Frank Baum's land of Oz in "Sir Harold and the Gnome King," the world of Taoist legend as portrayed in Wú Chéng'ēn's classic Chinese novel Journey to the West in "Sir Harold and the Monkey King," the romantic fantasies of Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote (with the unique twist of its being Quixote's version of reality rather than Cervantes') in "Knight and the Enemy," and Virgil's Graeco-Roman epic the Aeneid in "Arms and the Enchanter." The last two stories appear to have been transposed as published; the opening sequence of "Knight and the Enemy" refers to Shea and Chalmers as having just come from the world of the Aeneid, which is the setting of the story following it in the collection.
Contents
- "Professor Harold and the Trustees" (1992) (Christopher Stasheff)
- "Sir Harold and the Gnome King" (1990) (L. Sprague de Camp)
- "Sir Harold and the Monkey King" (1992) (Christopher Stasheff)
- "Knight and the Enemy" (1992) (Holly Lisle, from an outline by de Camp and Stasheff)
- "Arms and the Enchanter" (1992) (John Maddox Roberts, from an outline by de Camp and Stasheff)
Sequel
The Enchanter Reborn was followed up by a sequel anthology, The Exotic Enchanter (1995), which featured more stories by de Camp and Stasheff, together with additional new authors.
Notes
- ^ The Enchanter Reborn title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- ^ L'incantatore Rinato title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- ^ Sir Harold and the Gnome King title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
Preceded by | Harold Shea Series The Enchanter Reborn | Succeeded by |
- v
- t
- e
Interplanetarias
Krishna |
|
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Kukulkan |
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Other |
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- "The Roaring Trumpet" (1940)
- "The Mathematics of Magic" (1940)
- The Castle of Iron (1941/50)
- The Wall of Serpents (1953)
- The Green Magician (1954)
- Sir Harold and the Gnome King (1990)
- Sir Harold of Zodanga (1995)
- The Tritonian Ring (1951)
- "The Eye of Tandyla" (1951)
- "The Owl and the Ape" (1951)
- "The Hungry Hercynian" (1953)
- "The Stronger Spell" (1953)
- "Ka the Appalling" (1958)
- "The Rug and the Bull" (1974)
- "The Stone of the Witch Queen" (1977)
- The Goblin Tower (1968)
- The Clocks of Iraz (1971)
- "The Emperor's Fan" (1973)
- The Fallible Fiend (1973)
- The Unbeheaded King (1983)
- The Honorable Barbarian (1989)
- The Incorporated Knight (1987)
- The Pixilated Peeress (1991)
speculative
fiction
Novels |
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Short stories |
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- The Dragon of the Ishtar Gate (1961)
- The Arrows of Hercules (1965)
- An Elephant for Aristotle (1958)
- The Bronze God of Rhodes (1960)
- The Golden Wind (1969)
- The Wolf Leader (1950)
- Swords and Sorcery (1963)
- The Spell of Seven (1965)
- Conan the Warrior (1967)
- The Fantastic Swordsmen (1967)
- Conan the Conqueror (1967)
- Warlocks and Warriors (1970)
- 3000 Years of Fantasy and Science Fiction (1972)
- Tales Beyond Time (1973)
Science and history |
|
---|---|
Lit crit and biography |
|
- The Conan Swordbook (1969)
- The Conan Grimoire (1972)
- To Quebec and the Stars (1976)
- The Blade of Conan (1979)
- The Spell of Conan (1980)
- Demons and Dinosaurs (1970)
- Heroes and Hobgoblins (1981)
- Phantoms and Fancies (1972)
- The Continent Makers and Other Tales of the Viagens (1953)
- The Virgin of Zesh & The Tower of Zanid (1983)
- The Incomplete Enchanter (1941)
- Wall of Serpents (1960)
- The Compleat Enchanter (1975)
- The Complete Compleat Enchanter (1989)
- The Enchanter Reborn (1992)
- The Exotic Enchanter (1995)
- The Mathematics of Magic (2007)
- The Tritonian Ring and Other Pusadian Tales (1953)
- The Reluctant King (1985)
- Conan (1967)
- The Conan Chronicles (1989)
- The Conan Chronicles 2 (1990)
- Conan of Aquilonia (1977)
- Conan of Cimmeria (1969)
- Conan the Adventurer (1966)
- Conan the Avenger (1968)
- Conan the Freebooter (1968)
- Conan the Swordsman (1978)
- Conan the Usurper (1967)
- Conan the Wanderer (1968)
- Sagas of Conan (2004)
- Tales of Conan (1955)
- The Treasure of Tranicos (1980)
- Aristotle and the Gun (2002)
- The Best of L. Sprague de Camp (1978)
- Divide and Rule (1948)
- Footprints on Sand (1981)
- A Gun for Dinosaur (1963)
- The Purple Pterodactyls (1980)
- The Reluctant Shaman (1970)
- Rivers of Time (1993)
- Scribblings (1972)
- Sprague de Camp's New Anthology (1953)
- Tales from Gavagan's Bar (1953/78)
- The Undesired Princess (1951)
- The Virgin & the Wheels (1976)
- The Wheels of If (1948)
- Years in the Making (2005)
- GURPS Planet Krishna (1997)
- The Enchanter Completed (2005)