As a result, Elric is almost indestructible in battle, since the more he kills, the stronger he becomes.Įlric travels with a companion by the name of Moonglum, an ugly little man who’s facile with a blade and his wit. When it slays, it steals the life force, the soul, from its victim and feeds that energy to Elric. Stormbringer is no ordinary blade it has sentience of a type. He draws his strength from his potions and his magic sword Stormbringer. His constitution is naturally weak, so much so that he is helpless. He now wanders the land as a freebooter, reviled by his remaining countrymen and the humans of the Young Kingdoms as well.Įlric also happens to be an albino and sorcerer. Yet it was Elric who brought down the millennium-old Melnibonean empire after his cousin Yrrkoon usurped the throne. Some series background: Elric is one of the last of a dying race, the Melniboneans he is also their king. That’s not to say The Bane of the Black Sword is bad, but it certainly didn’t live up to my lofty recollections.
Moorcock, Howard, Leiber, Norman, Wagner–these are the first authors I remember reading, and as such they left an indelible impression on my psyche.Īlas, as is often the case, the memory is more enjoyable than the reality. Michael Moorcock’s books–Elric, Corum of the Silver Hand, and the Runestaff books–had a major role in initiating my interest in speculative fiction. I recently revisited Michael Moorcock’s The Bane of the Black Sword. Plenty of people quote the title of Thomas Wolfe’s novel and say, “You can’t go home again.” What they mean is: that home that you remember, the complicated and nostalgic memory of the place where you grew up–or in this case the books you read–isn’t there any more.
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