The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith

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The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith
Black book of CAS.jpg
cover by Andrew Smith of The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith
Editors Donald Sidney-Fryer and Robert A. "Rah" Hoffman (uncredited)
Author Clark Ashton Smith
IllustratorAndrew Smith
Cover artistAndrew Smith
LanguageEnglish
Subject Notebook, memoir
Publisher Arkham House
Publication date
1979
Publication placeUnited States
Media typePrint (Paperback)
Pagesxv, 141
ISBN 0-87054-087-4
OCLC 6303502
813/.52
LC Class PS3537.M335 B5

The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith is a transcription of author Clark Ashton Smith's own literary notebook, used from 1929 for more than thirty years until Smith's death in 1961. "This notebook contains plot ideas, bits of poetry in various states of completion, lists of fantastic names and titles of stories, both used and unused. The items in the Black Book have been carefully reproduced in the exact order in which they appeared in Smith's original notebook and each item has been numbered to aid in location and comparison, By comparing plot ideas with their corresponding finished tales, or first drafts of poems against the final versions, it is possible to gain insights into the creative process demonstrated by Smith." [1]

Contents

Creation and publication

Donald Sidney-Fryer found out about Clark Ashton Smith's black notebook from Smith himself, at the author's home in Pacific Grove, California:

During my last visit to Smith [in 1959], he had shown me the notebook he had used since about 1929, The Black Book, and hence during the years of his intensive fictioneering, 1929-1937. He had read to me a number of plot-sketches, including "The Doom of Azedarac" and "The Oracle of Sadoqua". These were tales of Averoigne, his mythical province in medieval France. I instantly realized the great value of this notebook to dedicated students of Smith's writings, and in March or April of 1961 I sent a money-order of $25 to the author, asking him to have a microfilm made of The Black Book in order to insure the preservation of this valuable material. For some reason he could not agree to this." [2]

After Smith’s death in 1961, his widow Carol entrusted Robert A. “Rah” Hoffman with Smith’s black notebook. Hoffman and his friend Donald Sidney-Fryer spent months (October 14, 1961 - March 1962) deciphering Smith’s handwriting, transcribing the text, and proofreading. Then Sidney-Fryer wrote introductory material and an index and gathered supplementary material by poet Marvin R. Hiemstra and Smith’s close friend George F. Haas. "Preparing my own edition of The Black Book proved more difficult than I had thought possible", Sidney-Fryer wrote. "I became so conscious of trying not to make errors that I almost drove myself, unwittingly, to a nervous breakdown." [3]

The book was published in 1979 by Arkham House in an edition of 2,588 copies. Although edited by Sidney-Fryer and Hoffman, for unknown reasons they are not credited as editors in the book itself.

Critical response

Smith expert Ron Hilger wrote: "One of the most important research tools available to the Smith scholar (along with Donald Sidney-Fryer's excellent bibliography Emperor of Dreams ) is The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith." [4]

Contents

The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith contains the following:

  1. "Foreword", by Marvin R. Hiemstra
  2. The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith
    • "A Note on the Text"
    • "Explanation of Editorial Devices"
    • "Index by Title"
    • "The Black Book of Clark Ashton Smith"
    • "Excerpts from The Black Book"
    • "Appendix of Finished Poems"
      • "Song of the Necromancer"
      • "Dominium in Excelsis"
      • "Shapes in the Sunset"
      • "Don Quixote on Market Street"
      • "Soliloquy in an Ebon Tower"
      • "The Isle of Saturn"
      • "The Centaur"
      • "Ye Shall Return"
      • "Thebaid"
    • "Appendix of Published Epigrams and Pensées"
  3. Two Memoirs of Smith by George F. Haas
    • "As I Remember Klarkash-ton"
    • "Memories of Klarkash-ton"

See also

References

  1. ↑ Ron Hilger and Donald Sidney-Fryer, "The Phosphor Lamps of Clark Ashton Smith," Chronicles of the Cthulhu Codex n. 17 (Winter 2000), reprinted in Donald Sidney-Fryer, A King Called Arthor and Other Morceaux (New York: Hippocampus Press, 2020), p. 133.
  2. ↑ Sidney-Fryer, “A Memoir of Timeus Gaylord: Reminiscences of Two Visits with Clark Ashton Smith, &c.,” Romanticist n. 2 (1978), p. 15; reprinted in Sidney-Fryer, The Golden State Phantastics: The California Romantics and Related Subjects first edition (Los Angeles: Phosphor Lantern Press, 2011), p. 154; second edition (New York: Hippocampus Press, 2012), p. 146.
  3. ↑ Donald Sidney-Fryer, Hobgoblin Apollo: The Autobiography of Donald Sidney-Fryer (New York: Hippocampus Press, 2016), pp. 190, 221. “A Memoir of Timeus Gaylord", Romanticist, p. x; The Golden State Phantastics first edition, p. y; second edition, p. 148.
  4. ↑ "The Phosphor Lamps of Clark Ashton Smith," p. 133.

Sources

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