Elric of Melniboné
… and other avatars of Moorcock’s Eternal Champion

Elric is an icon of fantasy fiction, the protagonist of Michael Moorcock’s epic sword-and-sorcery tales.

As with Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser I came to these rather late, in about 1989, some years after being introduced to the characters through my FRPG-playing friends at University. The stories are regarded as re-defining the genre and remain some of my favourites!

Elric of Melniboné is a direct parody of Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Cimmerian: instead of a mighty thewed barbarian warrior who fights his way to the throne of Aquilonia, Elric is a weak and sickly but highly cultured emperor who throws the throne of Melniboné away.

Moorcock says, “I decided I would think up a hero as different as possible … and use the narrative as a vehicle for my own ‘serious’ ideas. Many of these ideas, I realize now, were somewhat romantic and coloured by a long drawn-out and … tragic love affair … which was confusing and darkening my outlook.” (“The Secret Life of Elric of Melniboné”, Camber #14 1964)

Where a conventional fantasy hero rescues fair maidens from evil villains, fights against evil wizards, and saves his home country from invaders, Elric slays his true love, is himself a wizard in league with the demon lord Arioch, and leads invaders to lay waste to Melniboné.

Elric is an albino and, while Moorcock might by criticised for erroneously conflating Elric’s albinism with his physically frailty, it creates a vivid dramatic image:

It is the colour of a bleached skull, his flesh; and the long hair which flows below his shoulders is milk-white. From the tapering, beautiful head stare two slanting eyes, crimson and moody, and from the loose sleeves of his yellow gown emerge two slender hands, also the colour of bone, resting on each arm of a seat which has been carved from a single, massive ruby.

― Elric of Melniboné (1972)

Elric is the tool of his evil, sentient sword Stormbringer, which is itself a parody of the normal swords-and-sorcery weapon. In Stormbringer, Elric finds the energy he needs, but at a terrible price – Stormbringer drains the souls of those it slays and gives part of their life force to sustain Elric.

Stormbringer is willful: it is by no means Elric’s minion:

This sword here at my side…
Keeps calling me its master, but I feel like its slave

(“Black Blade” by Blue Öyster Cult).

Moorcock again: “… the sword Stormbringer… symbolized my own and others’ tendancy to rely on mental and physical crutches rather than to cure the weakness at source. To go further, Elric, for me symbolized the ambivalence of mankind in general, with its love-hates, its mean-generosity, its confident-bewilderment act. Elric is a thief who is himself robbed, a lover who hates love. In short, he cannot be sure of ther truth of anything, not even his own emotions and ambitions.”

“Elric” is a form of the Old Norse “Ælfric” which means “elf ruler” – and, indeed, Melnibonéans are somewhat like elves, but more like the amoral Ska in Jack Vance’s Lyonesse books than J. R. R. Tolkien’s numinous peoples.

Melnibonéans are normally elegant but cruel, mostly devoid of sentiment and the gentler passions: alone among them, Elric has modern sensibilities. He is an intellectual scholar, prone to self-pity and despair, who is compelled to frightful action by his own dark fate rather than through any desire for riches or glory.

As the saga progresses, Elric’s allegiance turns from Chaos to Law. He eventually comes to hate all gods for their manipulation of mortals and hopes for a world without gods to make a misery of human lives. At the end, he dies attempting to bring such a world into being.

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