[davem]

I've just started reading Moorcock's Elric stories, intrigued by this from Wikipedia:

Túrin shares some similarities with Michael Moorcock's Elric of Melniboné, who is also based on Kullervo. Both are anti-heroes who wield sentient black swords (both one of a pair — though this detail is not yet present in the earliest version of Túrin's story written in 1910s), unwittingly kill friends or lovers with them, and are killed by them. The first Elric stories were published before The Silmarillion, so the detail of the black sword(s) may have been conceived independently by both writers.

Haven't got very far yet, but another 'co-incidence' is that both Elric & Turin wear a dragon helm. The similarities are perhaps more on the surface than deep down, but they are odd. Of course, Moorcock had met Tolkien in the fifties, but I don't think there's any suggestion that they discussed Tolkien's mythology, so its not really likely that Moorcock learned anything of Turin.

I did find this discussion on Moorcock's Forum http://forum.barrowdowns.com/newrepl...ote=1&p=535567

Here are a couple of comments by Moorcock himself:

OK. Anderson's a definite influence, as stated. But oddly, the Kalevala was read to us at my boarding school when I was about seven. And, of course, Longfellow pinched the metre from the Finnish, as he stated.
What I haven't read, of course, is the Tolkien, though I believe he began the Silmarrillion earlier than parts of Lord of the Rings, at least. I have to admit here, too, that I haven't read large chunks of Lord of the Rings. I realised this after attending the final movie and realising I had no clear idea what was going to happen, though I remember skipping through the books looking for references to Golem, who could be said to be a much closer to Elric's precurser than any bloody fair-haired elf or other... However, from a very early age I was reading Norse legends and any books I could find about Norse stories, as well as hearing The King of Ireland's Son at the same school. I think the book which I read first was in a Scott Moncrieff series, which I think I've seen reprinted in relatively recent times. I also read a lot of metric romances and so on as a kid,
which would have contained many elements which influenced me. But one thing I'm pretty sure of, I was not in any way directly influenced by Prof. T I'm not familiar with arguments between Torky fans, either. But then they probably don't talk much about Jung, who would tell us all this stuff is from the common race memory, anyway. Early enthusiasm for The White Goddess and The Golden Bough must have had a good deal to do with it, too.

&

Yeah, old Johnny Tolkien was always ringing me up, desperate for a sequel to his top-selling fantasy trilogy. It was embarrassing, really. Those calls in the middle of the night, interspersed with the sound of a desperately puffed pipe as Allen and Unwin's deadline got closer and closer and the Inland Revenue started breathing down his neck. "Why don't you find some sucker to give you a few grand for the film rights," I told him. "Nobody'll ever make it and you'll be able to pay off the tax."
I understand that Silmarillion was written before LOTR, but I promise I didn't pinch Elric by climbing over his back fence and rifling through what I could find in his shed (isn't it strange how many writers work in sheds or converted garages ? My office at Lost Pines is a converted garage.)
Elric pretty much developed as I wrote him, so I'm not sure what process was going on there, except Finnish folklore (including Babi Yar) was read to us at my school when I was about seven, along with Padraic Colum's King of Ireland's Son. I suspect a common grounding and probably a fairly similar education is what turned out Tolkien, the 1918 war vet philologist and Moorcock, the 1945 survivor journalist... An enthusiasm for earlier trilogies by Eddison and the like might turn up some common stuff, too. Not being that familiar with Tolkien, but having read much the same kind of material, I'm not sure how many similarities there are. But it could be another reason I prefer Elizabeth Bowen's social fiction, for instance, to most fantasy -- just as Bowen loved horror fiction and Angus Wilson loved science fiction -- you admire the people who do what you have a hard time doing, from whom you can learn.

Very interested in his statement in the first response - considering his very negative comments on Tolkien's work:

"I have to admit here, too, that I haven't read large chunks of Lord of the Rings. I realised this after attending the final movie and realising I had no clear idea what was going to happen"