AN AGE UNDREAMT OF - EXCEPT IN DREAMS...

CONAN copyright the Estate of R.E. HOWARD

Must've been back around 1971 I guess.  I was sitting on the back step of a friend's house, going through a pile of comics his neighbour had given him.  Among them was the first issue of a mag about a barbarian hero, in which one of the villains had a vision of space travel, oddly incongruous in a sword and sorcery tale set in forgotten ancient times I thought.  (Many years later, the story's writer, ROY THOMAS, came to the same conclusion.)

Yes, it was CONAN The BARBARIAN #1, and I read the tale again four years later when it was reprinted in MARVEL UK's weekly comic, SAVAGE SWORD Of CONAN.  That short span somehow seemed like an immense gulf to me back then, but I immediately 'saw' myself in my mind's eye, sitting on that step at my friend's back door.  Around five years ago, I was back in that house once more (for the first time in nearly 30 years) and I took photos of the garden, essentially unchanged since my friend had moved into the house in the late '60s or early '70s.

Not long after my visit, the garden was remodelled and changes were instituted, making me glad I'd had the foresight to pictorially capture its appearance as it had been in 'my' day.  Sadly, my childhood friend's mother died recently, meaning that I'll probably never see the inside of the house (or stand in its garden) again, as it will be sold and the proceeds divided among the family, as is the way of things under such sad circumstances.

You be wondering why I'm telling you this as if you're at all interested.  Well, it's simply because I recently acquired a copy of that first issue of Conan, and whenever I look at it, I'm once again back on that step, looking through a bunch of comics as if there's no end of tomorrows, in an age when each new day seemed to last... well, perhaps not forever, but at least far longer than 24 hours does nowadays.

And yes, that's the cover to my very own issue of CTB #1 at the top of the post - isn't it a beauty?!  (Incidentally, I know the post's title makes no real sense, but hey - it captured your attention, didn't it?)  

Posted in: Cartoons