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Happy Birthday Michael Moorcock

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9 years ago

December 18, 2017

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The Legacy Of A Fantasy Master

♦ One of Tripwire’s favourite writers Michael Moorcock turns 78 years old today and here’s a Top 20 of his finest works. It only scratches the surface really…

Moorcock is perhaps best known for his interconnected novels featuring the Eternal Champion which manifests itself in different forms on different worlds and in different dimensions. Here’s a Top 20 of his novels and also graphic novels written by him.

1. Warriors of Mars (1965)

Michael Kane is basically Moorcock’s take on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ John Carter of Mars but with Moorcock’s obsessions and idiosyncrasies.

2. Stormbringer (1965)

Elric of Melnibone was Moorcock’s ultimate creation: a degraded royal from another world caught between the lords of order and chaos. There has been talk of a film for years but nothing has materialised so far.

3. The Jewel In The Skull (1967)

Dorian Hawkmoon, another manifestation of the Eternal Champion, lives in an alternate version of the Camargue in France on a world riven by war.

4. The Time Dweller (1969)

A collection of short stories first published in the seminal magazine, New Worlds, that Moorcock was editor of for many years, The Time Dweller features eight short stories by Moorcock and is definitely a product of its time.

5. Behold The Man (1969)

Behold The Man is not part of the Eternal Champion cycle but deals with Karl Glogauer, a man who goes back in time in order to meet Jesus Christ.

6. The Final Programme (1969)

The first Jerry Cornelius novel, and probably his trippiest book, The Final Programme explores many of the themes that were popular in counter-culture London in the late sixties.

7. The Eternal Champion (1970)

Erekose is yet another version of The Eternal Champion and he is a deceased hero who has been brought back to fight the alien Eldren.

8. The Chinese Agent (1970)

A light-hearted comic spy novel starring Jerry Cornell, The Chinese Agent is not part of The Eternal Champion series either.

9. The Knight Of The Swords (1971)

Corum was yet another version of The Eternal Champion, who battles the forces of Chaos, particularly the god Arioch. His full name, Corum Jhaelen Irsei, is an anagram of Jerry Cornelius

10. Gloriana (1978)

Based on Edmund Spenser’s poem The Faerie Queene, Gloriana explores the themes of multiple worlds that have been Moorcock’s stock in trade throughout his career but with a different feel to something like his Elric work.

11. Swords of Heaven, Flowers Of Hell (1979)

This graphic novel conceived by Moorcock and written and drawn by Howard Chaykin for Heavy Metal magazine features Moorcock’s Erekose and is a unique take on Moorcock’s Eternal Champion concepts.

12. The Warhound And The World’s Pain (1981)

Von Bek is another Eternal Champion figure, this time living in a Europe that has been ravaged by a thirty year war. Von Bek has to ally himself with Lucifer to save his soul. This book explores religious symbolism, an occasional theme of his.

13. Byzantium Endures (1981)

Part of the Pyat Quartet tetraology, The book is written in the first person from the point of view of his unreliable narrator Maxim Arturovitch Pyatnitski, whose posthumous notes Moorcock claims to have transcribed.

14. Mother London (1988)

One of Moorcock’s rare forays into straight fiction, Mother London is a novel which follows three outpatients from a mental hospital: a music hall artist (Josef Kiss), a reclusive writer (David Mummery) and a woman just awoken from a long coma (Mary Gasalee).

15. King Of The City (2000)

A sequel of sorts to Mother London, King Of The City is a satire of Modern London and a parody of its literary scene.

16. Michael Moorcock’s Multiverse (1997)

A comic anthology that DC published back in 1997 by DC’s short-lived Helix imprint, Michael Moorcock’s Multiverse featured three regular strips: Moonbeams and Roses is set in the Terminal Cafe, in present-day Biloxi, Mississippi where Jack Karaquazian indulges in meta-universal games of chance with an assortment of leading characters from the Moorcock novels, together with Moorcock himself, and later, artist Walter Simonson; II: The Metatemporal Detective is set in the inter-war period and follows Sir Seaton Begg and his off-sider Dr Taffy Sinclair from the eponymous novel sleuthing an array of crimes Sherlock Holmes-style, including the murder of Adolf Hitler’s incestuous girlfriend and niece and III: Duke Elric features the popular albino emperor Elric of Melniboné displaced from his fantastical world and transported to the Europe and the Middle East of 1000 AD. Here he pursues a quest to uncover certain artifacts which will allow him freedom to confront King Silverskin and to return to his home world. It ran for 12 issues and the three stories converged in the final issue.

17. Elric: The Making Of A Sorcerer (2007)

Collaborating once again with artist Walter Simonson, Moorcock turned his attention to the youth of Elric and the machiavellian machinations of the kingdom of Melnibone. Published as a four issue prestige format series by DC, the pair proved what a perfect fit they were once again.

18. The Metatemporal Detective (2007)

A collection of Sir Seaton Begg stories written by Moorcock back in 1962, a character who owes a great deal to Victorian detective Sexton Blake. The Begg stories are well-meaning parodies of the classic detective story.

19. Doctor Who: The Coming Of The Terraphiles (2010)

Moorcock hasn’t often written other people’s characters but here is a rare example of him doing just that. In order to avert the impending collapse of the Multiverse from the mysterious “dark tides” that have begun to appear, the Doctor and Amy join the Terraphiles, a group of humans in the far future who have become obsessed with recreating Earth’s distant past and reenacting medieval Earth sports (or rather, unknowingly comic misinterpretations of the same). The Doctor and his new friends compete in a Grand Tournament in the Miggea star system, which lies on the border of parallel realities.

20. The Whispering Swarm (2015)

The first part of a new series, Sanctuary of The White Friars, Moorcock returned once again to his obsession with London and its history. Part memoir and part fantasy novel, it is probably his most ambitious book in many years.