Tékumel’s creator M.A.R. Barker (“Phil Barker” at the time), Barker’s friend Miles Eaton, and science fiction author Lin Carter conducted a three-way correspondence from 1949 to 1950 when Barker was an undergraduate at the University of Washington. One hundred thirty-four pages of Eaton’s and Barker’s letters are preserved in Carter’s papers. (Carter apparently did not keep carbons of his outgoing letters.) Much in this correspondence is of interest to the Tékumel fan.  

Most of the letters are from Eaton. He seems to have become acquainted with Carter’s writings in science fiction fanzines and wrote an introductory letter to Carter dated July 12, 1949.  The correspondence shows that Eaton mentioned Barker to Carter in August 1949 and the first letter from Barker to Carter is dated November 25, 1949. How Eaton knew Barker, who was about 15 years younger,  is not entirely clear, but both lived in the Seattle area and were connected to the fanzine “Fanscient” edited by Donald Day. (An address stamp on some of the earlier letters shows that “Miles and Betty Eaton” lived in Fall City, Washington, though they moved to Portland in November 1950.)  Why the correspondence ended is not clear, but Carter served in the army in Korea 1951-1953.  

Who am I to judge, but Eaton seems to have been a bit of a dog. In some of the letters, he talks about how he does not work because he prefers a “Thoreauvian lifestyle” and lives off his wife’s waitress wages. He does not seem to have been able to follow his preference completely, however, because in other letters he describes working as a manual day-laborer.  Writing while his wife was pregnant, Eaton tried to involve Carter in a correspondence with some 19-year-old Japanese women, about whom he makes suggestive remarks. In another letter he talks about flirting with his sister-in-law.  Politically, he seems to have been fairly far left.  He says he spent World War 2 in a camp for conscientious objectors and that U.S. business interests in China led to the war against Japan, which was not a common view in 1949. 

Eaton was also opinionated about science fiction and writing in general.  He offers Carter and Barker copious advice on plotting, writing dialogue, and marketing to a contemporary audience. He was well read and In his letters, he types up many what would have been known at the time as “Oriental” poems by Arab, Afghan, Persian, Chinese, and Japanese authors.

Eaton was a big fan of Barker’s. He mentions Barker and Barker’s work repeatedly to Carter. He calls Barker a genius with an I.Q. of 140. He praises (sometimes in a roundabout way) Barker’s creative writing, illustrations, and worldbuilding, though he also says a dreamy vagueness rather than Barker’s concrete specificity is more to his own taste.  Eaton mentions in several letters that he and Barker were planning to collaborate on a story, but this never seems to have happened. 

Eaton marvels especially at Barker’s linguistic prowess. He reports that Barker, who was 20-21 at the time, wrote a story in original Hindi and then translated it into English to give to Eaton.  Eaton also calls Barker “the authority” on Chinese and alludes to Barker’s translating something from Chinese.  (I have seen no other reference to Barker’s knowing any Chinese language.)  Barker himself signs his name in Arabic along with the Arabic  for “In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful.” Barker did not convert and take his Muslim name until the following year  while he was in India on a Fulbright scholarship, but apparently was already interested in Islam.

Eaton was such a big fan of Barker’s that he taught himself some Tsolyáni or “Ts Solyani” as Barker called it then:

The inscription at the bottom is “Chàngadésha hikolel másun gual“ or “He/she is a soldier of the Emperor.” (I don’t want to be one of those guys who corrects your Klingon grammar but Eaton’s snippet has  errors. In the version of Tsolyáni that appeared in Barker’s grammar and dictionary in 1977, “Changadesha” should be “Changadeshakoi;” i.e., include the “noble” suffix. “Kolel” is a misrendering of Kólumel (Emperor) and “másun,” “to be,” is written in three separate letters rather than a connected initial-medial-final unit. Nonetheless, it’s some nice calligraphy and intelligible Tsolyáni. The inscription further up on the page is even more impressive: the name “Fu Shi” (transliterated as “Fu Hsi” or “Fu Shi’i” in most of the canon)  well-written in the Monumental Bednálljan script used for Classical Tsolyáni.  

Barker did not have as loquacious a style as Eaton, but like Eaton, Barker shared his views on writing and literature with Carter.  Barker above all else liked “scope,” by which he meant thick, detailed description. In a letter critiquing a piece by Carter, Barker writes: “The simple names and short descriptions of a few cities do not suffice to give the reader the feeling of glorious scope that they seem to imply.  A simple description of a marketplace as [Robert E.] Howard gives in his ‘Shadows of Zamboula’ will do more than all the short descriptions in the world.”

Barker talks about his own work in some of the letters.  He occasionally speaks of having sent a manuscript or enclosing a draft that is not preserved in the Carter archive.  Reading through all the letters, I find allusions to the following: 

• “The Petal Throne,” a story that appears here and is canon Tékumel;
• “And the Strong Shall Inherit …,” a story that was published in an edited version in Fanscient and is discussed here;
•  “Captive of the Ssu,” a story named in the letters about which I have no further information;  
• “For His Own Good,” a story named in the letters about which I have no further information;   
• “Bahadur,” a work mentioned in the letters that is either a story or a poem and either an original work or a translation;
• the Ts Solyani Grammar and Monumental Ts Solyani script;
• an illuminated royal deed to Do Chaka; and
• a map of some part of Tékumel.

In addition, Barker includes two brief pieces of creative writing in the letters themselves. The first is a letter from the Mihálli Fu Hsi ( also transliterated as “Fu Shi” or “Fu Shi’i” in other parts of the canon) to Carter. Fu Hsi, who appears in the later novel Man of Gold and many other places, is visiting earth.

“In the name of the Emperor and the Imperium, Greetings!

Fu Hsi, Lord Chancellor of Yan Kor, to Lin, ruling in St. Petersburg.  […]

It is being with a pleasanting feeling that I am being in writing to yourself thereto.  It is my friend Mr. Barker, who is the servant of my highest pleasures since he was being my friend, whom is telling to myself the pleasantries of your little world thereof.  In returning, it is that I shall speak to yourself at length of your gentles and glories of my world of Ts Solyani thereof it.  Most wonderfully is it!  When I was being upon a child thereon, my progenitor (we are not having fathers and mothers and sex in Mihalli therein) senting myself to the emperor of the Ts Solyani the great ones thereto, saying it: Go and becoming nothing but mighty, powerful, and glory, my off sprang. Thus did I going to Bey Sy, which is being the most beautifully and gloriest of cities in all the land. A thousand ten towers of white stones thereof, a hundred red roofs of slate stones, the color and confusioning of the docks by the river — these was I upon seeing

with my wideful eyes. Oh. I was indeed in amaze. Therein Bey Sy did I meeting the Baron Aid, a fellow coming from Saa Allaqui, a littlely northerly countryly in the mountainous therein. He and I the two of us grewing up in this place as warriorly men and devoutish followers of the Seal thereof. Fighting we did and much of it thereof in the battles against the Muugalangi, the Shens, the evilish folk people of the northern places therewith. Ah. Jolly it was being. But the Baron my friend becoming-enamoured with a girl therwith who must to the palace of the Seal go from whence none return. Her name being Yilrana was, and she drew him to revolting upon the Seal with the armies beneath-his-commanding there beneath. Sorry day. He was defeated by Nichene thereby and upon the hills of Saa Allaqui dwelt for many years therefore. I remained in Bey Sy and served both him and the Seal and well managed did I it this ticklish task. The Baron and his jolly friend Ascar of Livyanu went out upon adventuring thereupon and sought out the lands beneath the wickedly Shens, just the two of them were there being. While it was that they wandereding thusly, the Ts Solyani drove out upon Yan Kor and took Yilrana this girl prisoner and slewing her by tormentations upon the fields of battleing in seeing of the trooping soldiers in the interior of the last remainings citadel thereof. Oh sorry afternoon. It was indeed. I came away from this Seal therefrom who permitting this horrorly thing to be did and went to seeking out the Baron and Ascar. Ascar and myself journeyed back into the Ts Solyani and raising up a great army thereup. Coming then the Baronly friend, we advanceding were upon Bey Sy. Back were we driven. Now then it is being that you are upon knowing the rest of this tale thereupon, for it is telling it well Mr Barker, who has being the servant of my highest pleasures since he was my friend.”  

As it is being that you are upon interest of the linguistical of these place thereof. I am being now in Yan Kor therein, and the Baron is sending you a letter in Ts Solyani therein, for he speaks not Englishly words. This letter’s translationing and its speaking-in-Tsolyani-but-writing-in-Englishly-words therein are coming to yourself thereto from Mr. Barker, who is being the servant of my highest pleasures since he was my friend. As is yet also a vocabulary. The grammatical speeching is to yourself thereto coming from Miles Eaton therefrom, we hope. This letterly thing is being a letter of introductory from the Baron to yourself thereto, and it is an antique habitualness of the Ts Solyani to decorate up their letters thereup. I am tryinged to persuaded him from this barabariosness of decorating, but he is living among the Ts Solyani too lengthily. It is scowled upon to do this in Yan Kor therein, for only the softish ones of the Southerly parts doing this are. We being northerish are strengthy, not fopply weaking ones. Please to return my letter with one of yourself therewith soonly, and we shall be exceedingably in joyishness.

Glory to yourself!

 Tusmidalimra Gaprukoi (your friend)

        Fu Hsi

In another letter, Barker writes about the “Ancient Temple of Ksárul.”  

Beyond red Fasiltum lay darkness, obscure in the cold winds of the northern deserts, waiting the light of knowledge and seeing it not. Somewhere the Dragon Lords lay quiescent, and the whispering ruins of Old Jakalla brooded upon their past glories by the sea.  During the darkness an unknown architect built the glowering pile forever to be known as Ksarul — a name which mothers whisper to their children to quiet them, a name so feared that it became part of the language of the Golden Age, signifying terror of the worst kind. No man nor nonhuman has ever seen the secrets of Ksarul, for there are no roads leading there, and the desert hills are bare and cold. Those who have seen it from afar describe the sculptures which adorn its walls and shudder; those who have dared to step within the first labyrinth return not again. In its antique vastnesses the legends have it that the once-great Dragon Lords bide their time in bitter solitude, awaiting the day when once again the world is ripe for their cruel picking. Legends have it too that here dwell the remnants of the servants of the Kings of the Triangle, fearsome and undying. No army, no king, no man nor demon set foot within it, and those who feel the wet fingers of the northern winds at eventide shudder and make the sign of Light, for that way lies Ksarul, black temple of the barbarous ages.

Eaton’s and Barker’s letters offer clues about the state of Tékumel in 1949-1950. Most striking is how much of Tékumel was already complete. Barker says in a letter dated December 27, 1949 that as a child he carved 700 wooden figures related to Tékumel and wrote “hundreds of pages” of comic book stories. Barker said he just needed “a little time to copy it in a more adult form from the childish writings I did many years ago.”  In the same letter, he tells Carter he is about to send Eaton a grammar of Ts Solyani and the script of monumental Tsolyáni (i.e. Classical Tsolyáni). Barker modestly says that only a few (!) of the languages are complete: “Ts Solyani, Muugalangi, Livyani, Yan Koru, etc.” The rest, he says, are just misty ideas.  

Barker also in several letters mentions place names and other details that would reappear in the 1970s: “… give me a month or less and you shall have a chart of the imperial lands and domains from N’lyss to the Haida Pakalani and from Jannu to the City of the Shens.  This I do swear by Vimuhla, the God of Fire and War and by Avanthe, Goddess of Love and Beauty.”  In the same letter, he mentions “the Mihalli, the Cyrstalli, the unknown Hlyss on their dreadful island, or the Pachi Lei.”

Thus, much of Tékumel was already elaborated in 1950, the letters also show that the world had evolved somewhat by the publication of Empire of the Petal Throne in 1975. Primary plotlines like the rebellion of Baron Ald and the death of Yilrána were present in the earlier work though with some differences or additional details. For example, I don’t recall in the later work that the root of Ald’s original rebellion was saving Yilrána from becoming an Imperial concubine or that when Yilrána was killed at Ke’ér Ald had been on an underworld adventure with a Livyáni named “Ascar.” Other details, of Tékumel changed more. For example, the “city” of the evil Shen transforms into a set of countries of not particularly evil Shen.

Barker also hints in the correspondence that his “dream world” was the product of a lonely childhood.  “My dream world started when I was six years old and has continued ever since in more or less force.  In recent years, however, its strength has been dimmed by college life and by the realization of a few basic principles of psychology that made me realize that a dreamworld wasn’t necessary to be happy in — I could adopt a philosophy that would make me happy in the world, barring real misfortune.”

In sum, the letters are a fascinating glimpse of Barker in the months before he went to India.  They offer proof of Tékumel’s South Asian and Near East roots, but also show much of, but not all, the world was fixed in Barker’s mind based on his readings as a child and in college.  His later travels abroad cemented and embroidered the mythos, but Barker, an only child to older parents who often moved, had already dreamed up much of the world as a way to seek refuge from the loneliness of his childhood.