Tied Cottage - the screenplay

 This scene from the play is influenced by what Robert. E Howard read in Jack London’s novel “Star Rover.” The theme of reincarnation occurs frequently in Howard’s stories. Howard:  There can be no going back now. The whole house feels abandoned. There is only the sound of the clock and I used to hate the damned ticking when I was here, alone, as a boy. It seemed to mock my aspirations when it struck the hour! (Laughs). What’s more, I did witness something that holds true to what I just spoke of. I slept out on the prairie one night, near an old Indian village at Paint Rock. Nothing remained except an air of desperation and death. The rock faces were grey, covered with moss, and I imagined I saw faces carved between the fissures as I settled down for the night before riding home. The ululation started beguilingly. The fire, just ashes, scattered with the breeze, as I awoke and heard the chanting and plangent voices in the distance. The images were indistinct, but I know what I...

Here is another extract from the play and the heading refers to a postcard that Howard received from Lovecraft who was on holiday in Quebec in 1930. This is mentioned before the following extract. Howard:   My biggest regret is that I was born out of my time. I would have liked to have seen the frontier as it once was and survival is all people cared about. Man is complacent, by God, losing all perspective, when he becomes burdened by civilization. Mores change and the innocents forfeit their heritage and die broken, starving on reservations, and drinking themselves to death with hooch. I distrust all that I see around me and that is why I have become introverted. To have been breathing back then, I could have witnessed Chisum leaving Concho County with his cattle for New Mexico and little knowing of the Lincoln County War to come, the mysteries of the Old West would have been mine to witness. There is killing for the sake of it with Kid Curry, John Wesley Hardin, and those wh...

 The past is a doorway that can be opened and reveal stories which have been forgotten. One of Robert E. Howard's monologues tells of his love of hearing a good yarn. The fight at the Alamo he enjoyed listening about. I incorporated one facet into the play that told of William Irvine Lewis (1806-1836) who served as a rifleman with the volunteers who rode with Jim Bowie. Many years later, his mother was given a keepsake of his death that had been fashioned from stone taken from the ruins of the Alamo. The other story I did not use was that of Edward Edwards, who also died at The Alamo, and has a plaque commemorating his death in the church of St John the Baptist, Aberdare. He was a Major-General in the Mexican army of General De Santa's Anna 

 A Drifter off Hyperborea All fled-all done, so lift me on the pyre- The Feast is over and the lamps expire  Robert E. Howard (1906-1936) is the pulp fiction writer who found fame in the pages of “Weird Tales” that first published his stories of Conan the Cimmerian. His other creations are well-known and too numerous to list; he also wrote in other genres that showed his individualistic style. A man of vast contradictions, irascible temper, he committed suicide on June 11th when he knew his mother would not recover from her final illness. Howard survived for eight hours after shooting himself in the head. His mother, Hester, died the following day. Mother and son were buried in the same grave on June,14th.  An extract from the play” A Drifter off Hyperborea” is printed below. We are interested in this one-act play that explores Howard’s last hours, exploring his different ideals, and offers a perspective on why he took such a course of action. Howard:  I am asleep ev...