The Emperor of Dreams is a collection of fantasy author and poet Clark Ashton Smith

Clark Ashton Smith

Clark Ashton Smith was a self-educated American poet, sculptor, painter and author of fantasy, horror and science fiction short stories. He achieved early local recognition, largely through the enthusiasm of George Sterling, for traditional verse in the vein of Swinburne...

's short tales arranged in chronological order. It was published by Gollancz

Gollancz

Gollancz often refers to the British publishing house Victor Gollancz Ltd.Gollancz, a family name originating from the Polish town Gołańcz , is mainly known as the name of a prominent British Jewish family, including:* Sir Hermann Gollancz , rabbi* Sir Israel Gollancz , scholar of...

 as the 26th volume of their Fantasy Masterworks

Fantasy Masterworks

Fantasy Masterworks is a series of fantastic fiction classics started by Millennium and continued by Gollancz , as a companion series for their SF Masterworks line.- Published titles :-External links :...

 series. The collection contains stories from Smith's major story cycles of Averoigne

Averoigne

Averoigne is a fictional counterpart of a historical province in France, detailed in a series of short stories by the American writer Clark Ashton Smith. Smith based Averoigne on the actual province of Auvergne.- History :...

, Hyperborea

Hyperborean cycle

The Hyperborean cycle is a series of short stories by Clark Ashton Smith that take place in the fictional prehistoric setting of Hyperborea . Various elements in Smith's cycle have been borrowed by H. P. Lovecraft, most notably the "toad-god" Tsathoggua...

, Poseidonis

Atlantis

Atlantis is a legendary island first mentioned in Plato's dialogues Timaeus and Critias, written about 360 BC....

, and Zothique

Zothique

Zothique is an imagined future continent featured in a series of short stories by Clark Ashton Smith. Zothique is also the title of the cycle of tales which take place there. In terms of number and extent, the Zothique cycle is the largest collection of stories written by Smith...

. Most of the stories originally appeared in the magazines The Fantasy Fan, Weird Tales

Weird Tales

Weird Tales is an American fantasy and horror fiction pulp magazine first published in March 1923. It ceased its original run in September 1954, after 279 issues, but has since been revived. The magazine was set up in Chicago by J. C. Henneberger, an ex-journalist with a taste for the macabre....

, Overland Monthly

Overland Monthly

Overland Monthly was a monthly magazine based in California, United States, and published in the 19th and 20th century.The magazine's first issue was in July 1868, and continued until the late 1875. The original publishers, in 1880, started The Californian, which became The Californian and Overland...

, Strange Tales of Mystery and Terror, The Magic Carpet, The Auburn Journal, Stirring Science Stories, The Arkham Sampler

The Arkham Sampler

The Arkham Sampler was an American fantasy and horror fiction magazine first published in Winter 1948. The magazine, edited by August Derleth, was the first of two magazines published by Arkham House. The cover design was prepared by Ronald Clyne and was printed in alternating colors for the eight...

, Saturn

Saturn (magazine)

Saturn was a short-lived bi-monthly, digest sized science fiction magazine published by Candar Publishing out of New York. It produced only five issues from 1957 to 1958 as a science fiction magazine before changing to a detective magazine and then to a horror magazine specializing in weird...

and Fantastic Universe

Fantastic Universe

Fantastic Universe was a U.S. science fiction magazine which began publishing in the 1950s. It ran for 69 issues, from June 1953 to March 1960, under two different publishers. It was part of the explosion of science fiction magazine publishing in the 1950s in the United States, and was moderately...

.

Contents

• "On Fantasy"
• "Song of the Necromancer"
• "The Abominations of Yondo"
• "The Ninth Skeleton
  The Ninth Skeleton
  "The Ninth Skeleton" is a short story written by Clark Ashton Smith. It was first published in the September 1928 issue of Weird Tales.-External links:* * at The Eldritch Dark...
  
  "
• "The Last Incantation"
• "A Rendezvous in Averoigne"
• "The Return of the Sorcerer"
• "The Tale of Satampra Zeiros
  The Tale of Satampra Zeiros
  "The Tale of Satampra Zeiros" is a short story written in 1929 by Clark Ashton Smith as part of his Hyperborean cycle, and first published in the November 1931 issue of Weird Tales...
  
  "
• "The Door to Saturn"
• "The Gorgon"
• "The Weird of Avoosl Wuthoqquan"
• "The Nameless Offspring"
• "The Empire of the Necromancers"
• "The Hunters from Beyond"
• "The Isle of the Torturers"
• "The Beast of Averoigne"
• "Genius Loci"
• "Ubbo-Sathla"
• "The Kiss of Zoraida"
• "The Seed from the Sepulcher"
• "The Weaver in the Vault"
• "The Ghoul"
• "The Charnel God"
• "The Death of Malygris"
• "The Tomb-Spawn"
• "The Seven Geases"
• "Xeethra"
• "The Dark Eidolon
  The Dark Eidolon
  The Dark Eidolon is a sword and sorcery short story by Clark Ashton Smith, forming part of his Zothique cycle of stories. It was first published in Weird Tales in 1935 and has been variously republished, notably in the anthology The Spell of Seven, edited by L...
  
  "
• "The Flower-Women"
• "The Treader of the Dust"
• "The Black Abbot of Puthuum"
• "Necromancy in Naat"
• "The Death of Ilalotha"
• "The Garden of Adompha"
• "Mother of Toads"
• "The Double Shadow"
• "The Coming of the White Worm"
• "The Root of Ampoi"
• "Morthylla"
• "An Offering to the Moon"
• "The Theft of Thirty-Nine Girdles"
• "Symposium of the Gorgon"
• "Told in the Desert"
• "Prince Alcouz and the Magician"
• "A Good Embalmer"
• "The Mortuary "
• Afterword: The Lost Worlds of Klarkash-Ton, by Stephen Jones
  Stephen Jones (author)
  Stephen Jones is an editor of horror anthologies, and the author of several book-length studies of horror and fantasy films as well as an account of Lovecraft's early British publications....