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this time one that engaged with the present without calling on the methods of “modernism” which, in my view, had become merely generic, having very little to say to me, at least. Jerry was the epitome (with Ballard’s “condensed fiction”) of what others called the New Wave in SF, where we tried to use science fiction in subtler, more complex ways than before, to confront rather than avoid the issues of the modern world. The authors who gathered around my magazine New Worlds shared my feelings that through literary SF we could regenerate Anglophone fiction. I am glad to say that this experiment largely succeeded, so that most of our best-known literary writers employ techniques which we were responsible for developing. The latest Thomas Pynchon novel, Against the Day, as well as work by Martin Amis, Salman Rushdie, Don DeLillo, Brett Easton Ellis and many, many other writers contains methods first developed in New Worlds. We were all, of course, part of the general zeitgeist which was also influenced by non-European fiction and created what some came to call “magic realism.”

Elric, of course, contains more magic than realism, but I do hope there is enough realism in his stories to help you suspend disbelief long enough to enjoy them as they were intended—a way of passing a few hours in an agreeable “other world” where the big issues are a matter of sorcery and battle, rather than mortgages and politics! These stories were first and foremost intended as escapism in the manner of the great romances and folk-stories of the world—and so I wish you “a happy escape.”

With best wishes to all my new Chinese readers.

Sincerely,

Michael Moorcock

Lost Pines, Texas

January 2007

ONE LIFE, FURNISHED

IN EARLY MOORCOCK

ONE LIFE, FURNISHED

IN EARLY MOORCOCK

(1994)

by Neil Gaiman

The Pale albino prince lofted on high his great black sword “This is Stormbringer” he said “and it will suck your soul right out.”

The Princess sihged. “Very well!” she said. “If that is what you need to get the energy you need to fight the Dragon Warriors, then you must kill me and let your broad sword feed on my soul.”

“I do not want to do this” he said to her.

“That’s okay” said the princess and with that she ripped her flimsy gown and beared her chest to him. “That is my heart” she said, pointing with her finger. “and that is where you must plunge.”

HE HAD NEVER got any further than that. That had been the day he had been told he was being moved up a year, and there hadn’t been much point after that. He’d learned not to try and continue stories from one year to another. Now, he was twelve.

It was a pity, though.

The essay title had been Meeting My Favourite Literary Character, and he’d picked Elric. He’d toyed with Corum, or Jerry Cornelius, or even Conan The Barbarian, but Elric of Melniboné won, hands down, just like he always did.

Richard had first read Stormbringer three years ago, at the age of nine. He’d saved up for a copy of The Singing Citadel (something of a cheat, he decided, on finishing: only one Elric story), and then borrowed the money from his father to buy The Sleeping Sorceress, found in a spin-rack while they were on holiday in Scotland last summer. In The Sleeping Sorceress Elric met Erekosë and Corum, two other aspects of the Eternal Champion, and they all got together.

Which meant, he realized, when he finished the book, that the Corum books and the Erekosë books, and even the Dorian Hawk-moon books were really Elric books too, so he began buying them, and he enjoyed them.

They weren’t as good as Elric, though. Elric was the best.

Sometimes he’d sit and draw Elric, trying to get him right. None of the paintings of Elric on the covers of the books looked like the Elric that lived in his head. He drew the Elric’s with a fountain pen in empty school exercise books he had obtained by deceit. On the front cover he’d write his name: Richard Grey, Do Not Steal.

Sometimes he thought he ought to go back and finish writing his Elric story. Maybe he could even sell it to a magazine. But then, what if