The Spawn of Dagon
short fiction 1938 Elak of Atlantis
Record
| First published | 1938 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | short fiction |
| Canon status | |
| Internal chronology | 2 |
Synopsis
In ancient Atlantis, the mercenary swordsman Elak and his companion Lycon are hired by a mysterious figure named Gesti to assassinate Zend, the powerful wizard who protects the continent from unnatural threats. Elak accepts the contract for its substantial payment, unaware that Gesti is not human at all but one of the Spawn of Dagon, a race of ancient, monstrous beings intent on destroying humanity and dragging Atlantis beneath the sea once Zend's protective power is removed. As Elak closes in on his target, the true stakes of the job -- and the inhuman nature of his employer -- come into focus, forcing him to choose between the payoff and the survival of the world he calls home, with Lycon's intervention proving decisive to the outcome.
Where it sits
- Universe: Elak of Atlantis
- Series: Elak of Atlantis core; position 2 of 4 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Henry Kuttner
Notes
- From the series record (Elak of Atlantis): All four stories were first published in Weird Tales (May-June 1938 through January 1941), each a self-contained novelette-length adventure; registered here as Core Canon under the same collection-as-Core exception this project applies to other pulp-era short-fiction cycles: the primary reading unit for this universe is the short fiction itself, later gathered into book form, not a novel.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings, but they resolve to the exact same sequence for this book, so one combined line is shown instead of two identical ones.
- Reading order, within the series Elak of Atlantis: position 2 of 4: previous Thunder in the Dawn (1938) · next Beyond the Phoenix (1938)
Sources
- Wikipedia: Elak of Atlantis
- The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction: Kuttner, Henry
- https://lovecraft.fandom.com/wiki/Spawn_of_Dagon_(short_story)
- https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Weird_Tales/Volume_32/Issue_1/Spawn_of_Dagon
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