The first bio-bibliography I ever bought was Glenn Lord’s The Last Celt: A Bio-Bibliography of Robert Ervin Howard. I had been reading any Robert E. Howard I could get my hands on at this point and wanted more information.

I bought the Berkley Medallion trade paperback that was the reprint edition. The book was first a hardback from Donald M. Grant Books in 1976. The Berkley paperback is from 1977. Glenn told me the Berkley paperback is rarer than the hardback!

The Last Celt is what I think a bio-bibliography should be. Here are the contents.

Introduction: E. Hoffmann Price

Foreword: Glenn Lord

I. Autobiography

The Wandering Years

An Autobiography

A Touch of Trivia

Letter: Robert E. Howard to Farnsworth Wright

On Reading– And Writing

II. Biography

Facts of Biography

A Biographical Sketch of Robert E. Howard by Alvin Earl Perry

Robert Ervin Howard: A Memoriam by H. P. Lovecraft

Lone Star Fictioneer by Glenn Lord

A Memory of R. E. Howard by E. Hoffmann Price

The Last Celt by Harold Preece

III. Bibliography

The Bibliography

Book

Fiction

Verse:   Title Index, First Line Index, Headings

Articles

Letters

Index by Periodicals

Translations: Books, Fiction, Verse, Heading, Articles, Letters

Unpublished Fiction

Unpublished Verse: Title Index, Headings

Unpublished Articles

Series Index

Lost Manuscripts

Unborn Books

Comics

Television Adaptation

The Junto

About the Author: Books, Amateur Publications, Robert E. Howard United Press Association, Articles,    Conan Pastiches

IV. Miscellanea

The Hand of Nergal

The Battle That Ended the Century

Pictures in the Fire

The Hall of the Dead

The Robert E. Howard Memorial Collection

Iron Shadows in the Moon

Letters

The Golden Caliph

R.E.H. as Mythical Dane

Cartoon from the Junto

Map of the Hyborian Age

A Robert E. Howard Photograph Album

A Gent from Bear Creek

Magazine Covers

Obituaries

I spent hours and hours going through the indices back in the day. I learned more about Robert E. Howard from The Last Celt than any other book. I now have both the hardback and paperback editions. I had Glenn Lord sign my paperback edition.  A note on the Berkley trade paperback. The spines on those get stiff and brittle and eventually crack. I pull out the hardback more than the paperback when looking something up. I know a guy who took his trade paperback apart, punched holes for a small binder, and has it in the binder. I just don’t pull that edition out anymore. That is a book that could use a reprint. It is from 1976 but still full of useful information all around.