The Worm Ouroboros
The Worm Ouroboros (1922) is a heroic high fantasy novel by Eric Rücker Eddison. so predates Tolkien’s work.
This cover is from the Ballatine Books Reprint in the 1960s, and the artist is Barbara Remmington.
The book describes the protracted war between the domineering King Gorice of Witchland and the Lords of Demonland in an imaginary world that appears mainly medieval and partly reminiscent of Norse sagas. A half-finished framing story describes this world as Mercury, though it is clearly a fantasy version of Earth. Read more at Wiki
This post has come via a library of Ballatine Book covers here: http://www.skwishmi.com/interests/baf.html Here you will find tons of other Art Nouveau and Psychedelic influenced book covers from the likes Bob Pepper, David Johnston, Ian Miller and more. Well worth a look.
This novel and art aside, the Ouroboros itself is a very interesting concept that’s spanned across cultures and through generations. The Ouroboros, the Worm, Serpent, or Dragon depicted devouring its own tail to form a Circle, often used to represent cyclicality or infinity. Read more here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ouroboros
8 thoughts on “The Worm Ouroboros”
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always thought that was pauline baynes !
Is it billy? as limited knowledge admin I’m not sure… I will look into this!!
Yea i wouldnt have thought this was bob pepper,great cover though. Also, just to give an ego boost, excellent blog youve got here, ton of great artists and images
Cheers Josh 🙂
that’s nice to hear…. Glad you enjoyed having a good look through!
Thank you for including my work on your site, the last piece “The Worm Ouroboros” is not mine, although it is similar to a cover I did for Paul Anderson’s “Saga of Kraki” in 1973.
Bob Pepper
Hey Bob,
honored to have you comment on your site! apologies I’d tagged this incorrectly….
I believe this is the “Saga of Kraki” cover your referring to:
http://www.sci-fi-o-rama.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/bob_pepper_saga_of_kraki.jpg
If I come across it I’ll be sure to add a new post !
cheers!!
I’m 99.999% sure this is Pauline Baynes. Ballantine brought out this edition after their huge success with the Tolkien books and their iconic Baynes covers. The style here is, to me, unmistakeably that of Baynes. I found this page while doing an image search for Bob Pepper, and it’s great to see him respond here!