Interview with Teel James Glenn,
author of
Death at Dragonthroat
Tales of a Warrior Priest
and Knight Errant

Do you recall how your interest in writing originated?

Writing has interested me as long as I can remember. Before I could put words on paper, I would act out stories. Before second grade, I progressed to illustrating comic books and finally filled spiral notebooks with ‘novels.’ I would often watch a TV show and say, “oh, that story would have been better if...,” and I’d be off on a storytelling jag. I always imagined re-creating the whole story – both text and images. I’d even choreograph the characters actions for film or stage. This ability has determined the course of my life and career.

How did you become involved with the martial arts and how does it inform your work?

I had very severe asthma and allergies as a child. Most of which I still have, but I just don't let them get in the way. I've been declared crippled twice by western medicine (bad knees, 911 lung). I just said, “hell no,” and went on. Because I was a sickly, I found my role models in TV and books. Conan, Tarzan, Zorro, Errol Flynn, Gene Kelly and Bruce Lee were my heroes. I read everything I could on them and then started writing.

Skip ahead twenty or so years when I took a staged combat class to research a swordfight for a book. The moment I held that fencing epee I knew it was the course for my life. I studied obsessively, and eventually studied with the guy who had been Errol Flynn’s stunt double for his last three pictures. Now, twenty-five years later, I’m a professional fight choreographer and stunt coordinator helping people develop into new Errol Flynns and Bruce Lees. I’ve fought my way through 40 Renaissance faires, countless Shakespearean plays and 60 movies. When I write about the fall off a charger or the impact of a sword blade on a shield, I’ve experienced it, not just read about it. Along the way, I’ve had to use my martial arts skills as a bodyguard and bouncer and even won a few dance contests.

I also studied under the guy who was the head of the Seoul military academy (the West Point of Korea). I have written the only English book on Japanese stage combat (publish date fall 2005). Life imitating art becomes life is my mantra.

What do you see as the influences in your writing?

I love many of the great storytellers. My main influences are Hawthorne, Poe, Robert E. Howard, Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Lester Dent. It’s an odd mix, but I think the thing that ties them together is the incredible power of their imagery. I also love Robert Parker’s Spenser books for their sitting-at-a-bar-telling-the-story quality. I employ that style in my contemporary work.

The other huge influence on my work is cinema. Many writers might shudder in horror at the thought of it, but one cannot bury your head in the sand -- film and TV is pervasive in our society. I try to make my work very cinematic, similar to the Burroughs and Howard stuff.

What are your current projects?

I have several screenplays in development (a film world term for limbo). My second book of heroic poetry is going to press. I have almost completed another novel and a collection of short stories set in the world of Death at Dragonthroat. 

Is there anything you find particularly challenging in your writing?

Making the characters realistic regardless of the world they live in. I always say I am just writing biographies of these characters. This attitude makes sure no character is just a story device. I cried when I had to kill a character in Dragonthroat, even though I knew before I put pen to paper that this person was going to die.

If you had to pick just one author as a favorite, who would it be and why?

I would probably have to say Robert Ervin Howard. I continually read his work for inspiration. His stories have a raw power, an immediacy that I have not found in any other author at this level. Not all his stories are good and he wrote some stinkers, but his Conan stories are great. He was a storyteller who took you to the shamans sitting around a campfire and that quality is what I hope to capture in my work.

What inspired you to write your novels?

I had wanted to pay homage to the works of Edger Rice Burroughs and Howard for a long time. I generally hate modern sword and sorcery pastiche because they are so patently derivative - the authors have clearly never lived in the world and are just redoing Lord of the Rings or second-rate Conan musclemen. When the protagonist T. K. Mitchell appeared in my head, I knew I had the right character. He was a bad boy trying to be a good guy in a world that just didn’t want to give him a break. Then he met Lord Erique Shoutte, a devout, yet fun loving priest who became his traveling companion. I wanted to know everything about their lives and found myself compelled to explore Altiva, the world they occupy.

Tell us a little about the world Altiva.

That’s a tall order. I have been writing stories about it for fifteen years. It is much like a real world in that it is very complex. It is a world of early renaissance culture, but without gunpowder. The planet had a high technology and then “time’s rhythm was fulfilled and all things fell.” It has a variety of religions and government styles, many of whom are in contention with one another. It also has wizard beasts to menace the heroes.

What is the book about and why should people read it?

If this were a movie pitch, I would say, “M.A.S.H. goes to Conan’s world” and leave it at that. It is the story of an old barfly hippie with some issues about life who falls into a world of violence and heroism, challenging his values. In addition, it is a murder mystery.

I love these characters, I tell my friends, “I have to get back to Altiva, I miss it.” I think it is a fun read, but not a farce.

Knight Errant
by Teel James Glen

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144 pages, 6" x 9"
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