Editing Robert E. Howard (section)

=== New markets ===
In spring 1933, Howard started to place work with [[Otis Adelbert Kline]], a former pulp writer, as his agent.  Kline encouraged him to try writing in other genres in order to expand into different markets.  Kline's agency was successful in finding outlets for more of Howard's stories and even placed works that had been rejected when Howard was marketing himself alone.  Howard continued to sell directly to ''Weird Tales'', however.<ref name="Louinet 2003 347" /><ref name="Burke ¶ 39" /><ref name="Lord 1976 77">{{Harvtxt|Lord|1976|p=77}}</ref><ref>{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|pp=161–162, 207}}</ref>

[[File:SpicyAdventureVol4No6A.png|thumb|upright|alt=Cover of Spicy-Adventure Stories, showing a woman with torn clothing running away from a hook-handed sailor|''Spicy-Adventure Stories'' (September 1936) featuring "The Dragon of Kao Tsu" by Sam Walser (a.k.a. Robert E. Howard)]]

Howard wrote one of the first "[[Weird West]]ern" stories ever created, "The Horror from the Mound", published in the May 1932 issue of ''Weird Tales''.  This genre acted as a bridge between his early "weird" stories (a contemporary term for horror and fantasy) and his later straight western tales.<ref name="Finn 2006 192">{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|p=192}}</ref><ref name="Burke ¶ 41">[[#CITEREFBurke|Burke]] (¶ 41)</ref>

He tried writing detective fiction but hated reading mystery stories and disliked writing them; he was not successful in this genre.<ref name="Lord 1976 77" /><ref name="Finn 2006 192" /> More successfully, in late 1933 Howard took a character conceived in his youth, [[El Borak]], and began using him in mature, professional tales of World War I-era Middle Eastern adventure that landed in ''[[Top-Notch Magazine|Top Notch]]'', ''[[Complete Stories (magazine)|Complete Stories]]'', and ''[[Thrilling Adventures]]''.  The 1920s version was a treasure-hunting adventurer but the 1930s version, first seen in "[[The Daughter of Erlik Khan]]" in the December 1934 issue of ''Top-Notch'', was a grim gun-fighter keeping the peace after having gone native in [[Afghanistan]].  The stories have a lot in common with those of [[Talbot Mundy]], [[Harold Lamb]] and [[T. E. Lawrence]], with Western themes and Howard's hardboiled style of writing. As with his other series, he created another character in the same vein, [[Kirby O'Donnell]], but this character lacked the grim, western elements and was not as successful.<ref>{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|pp=201–203}}</ref><ref>[[#CITEREFBurke|Burke]] (¶ 18)</ref>

In the years since Conan had been created, Howard found himself increasingly fascinated with the history and [[Folklore|lore]] of Texas and the [[American Southwest]]. Many of his letters to [[H. P. Lovecraft]] ran for a dozen pages or more, filled with stories he had picked up from elderly [[American Civil War|Civil War]] veterans, [[Texas Ranger Division|Texas Rangers]], and [[Settler|pioneers]]. His [[Conan the Barbarian|Conan]] stories began featuring western elements, most notably in "[[Beyond the Black River]]", "[[The Black Stranger]]", and the unfinished "[[Wolves Beyond the Border]]". By 1934 some of the markets killed off by the [[Great Depression|Depression]] had come back, and ''Weird Tales'' was over $1500 behind on payments to Howard. The author therefore stopped writing weird fiction and turned his attentions to this steadily growing passion.<ref>{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|pp=171–175, 197–201}}</ref>

The first of Howard's most commercially successful series (within his own lifetime) was started in July 1933.  "Mountain Man" was the first of the [[Breckinridge Elkins]] stories, humorous westerns in a similar style to his earlier Sailor Steve Costigan stories and again featuring an exaggerated, cartoonish version of Howard himself as the main character.  Written as tall tales in the vein of Texas "Tall Lying" stories, the story first appeared in the March–April 1934 issue of ''Action Stories'' and was so successful that other magazines asked Howard for similar characters.  Howard created Pike Bearfield for ''Argosy'' and Buckner J. Grimes for ''Cowboy Stories''.  ''Action Stories'' published a new Elkins story every issue without fail until well after Howard's death.  At Kline's suggestion, he also created ''[[A Gent from Bear Creek]]'', a Breckinridge Elkins novel comprising existing short stories and new material.<ref name="Burke ¶ 41" /><ref name="Lord 1976 79">{{Harvtxt|Lord|1976|p=79}}</ref><ref>{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|pp=204–208}}</ref>

Conan remained the only character that Howard ever spoke of with his friends in Texas and the only one in whom they seemed interested.  It is possible that Breckinridge Elkins and the other characters in his stories were too close to home for Howard to be entirely comfortable discussing them.<ref>{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|p=208}}</ref>

In the spring of 1936, Howard sold a series of "spicy" stories to ''[[Spicy-Adventure Stories]]''.  The "spicy" series of pulp magazines dealt in stories that were considered borderline softcore pornography at the time but are now similar to romance novels.  These stories, which Howard referred to as "bubby-twisters", featured the character Wild Bill Clanton and were published under the pseudonym Sam Walser.<ref name="Lord 1976 76" /><ref>{{Harvtxt|Finn|2006|p=210}}</ref>