The Isle of the Torturers
"The Isle of the Torturers" is a short story by American author Clark Ashton Smith as part of his Zothique cycle, and first published in the March 1933 issue of Weird Tales.
Title page of "The Isle of the Torturers" as it appeared in Weird Tales, March 1933. Illustration by Jayem Wilcox.
Clark Ashton Smith was an American writer and artist. He achieved early local recognition, largely through the enthusiasm of George Sterling, for traditional verse in the vein of Swinburne. As a poet, Smith is grouped with the West Coast Romantics alongside Joaquin Miller, Sterling, and Nora May French and remembered as "The Last of the Great Romantics" and "The Bard of Auburn". Smith's work was praised by his contemporaries. H. P. Lovecraft stated that "in sheer daemonic strangeness and fertility of conception, Clark Ashton Smith is perhaps unexcelled", and Ray Bradbury said that Smith "filled my mind with incredible worlds, impossibly beautiful cities, and still more fantastic creatures".
Smith in 1912
Smith as depicted in Wonder Stories in 1930
"The Hunters from Beyond", one of Clark Ashton Smith's best-known stories, was first published in the October 1932 issue of Strange Tales.
First edition
