Is Sword & Sorcery outdated? And how can it move forward?

[JMack]

That's a very interesting view of Howard's "racism, sexism", etc.  You make me want to go back and read some more to see whether I align with your argument.

Hmm. Soon...

[Yora]

It's not so obvious when you just grab a Conan story or two. Some of the things he wrote in correspondence with other writers provide a lot of context to how he was thinking about those things. With that in mind, the stories look quite different from first impressions.

I recommend reading the hilariously titled stand-alone story Pigeons from Hell. Widely considered one of his best and with some interesting examinations of both women and blacks in early 20th century Texas.

Here's a pretty good, extensive article on the subject.

Women have always been the inspiration for men, and just as there are thousands of unknown great ones among men, there have been countless women whose names have never been blazoned across the stars, but who have inspired men on to glory.  And as for their fickleness– as long as men write the literature of the world, they will rant about the unfaithfulness of the fair sex, forgetting their own infidelities.  Men are as fickle as women.  Women have been kept in servitude so long that if they lack in discernment and intellect it is scarcely their fault.

[eclipse]

I think "traditional" S&S is outdated, but so is a lot of traditional Epic or Heroic Fantasy. I don't think there's anything inherent in S&S that makes it hard to update to the modern era

Is Epic fantasy really outdated? seems to be a new trilogies released each month to me anyway.