Introduction
THE YELLOW COBRA. Featuring Dennis Dorgan. Published under Patrick Ervin. Howard sent Otis Adelbert Kline a finished typescript entitled “Sailor Costigan and the Yellow Cobra.” Kline received it on May 11, 1933.
This typescript was first corrected, and then later changed into the Dennis Dorgan story “Sailor Dorgan and the Yellow Cobra” by Patrick Ervin. It was sold to MAGIC CARPET MAGAZINE, but never published by them. The typescript at the Cross Plains Library is Howard’s, but correction tape has been used to change Howard to Ervin, Costigan to Dorgan, Mike to Spike, The Sea Girl to The Python, etc.) Still, later, a “clean copy” was produced that incorporated all the changes and corrections.
There is also an original Costigan typescript, titled “The Fangs of the Yellow Cobra.”
“A Korean Night” is a slightly different, earlier original draft of the Costigan version.
Cross Plains Library has an original draft of this story.
Alternate titles:
SAILOR COSTIGAN AND THE YELLOW COBRA, SAILOR DORGAN AND THE YELLOW COBRA, THE FANGS OF THE YELLOW COBRA, A NIGHT ASHORE, and A KOREAN NIGHT.
Published in:
- THE INCREDIBLE ADVENTURES OF DENNIS DORGAN, FAX, 1974
- THE INCREDIBLE ADVENTURES OF DENNIS DORGAN, Zebra, December 1975
- THE IRON MAN, WITH THE ADVENTURES OF DENNIS DORGAN, Ace, October 1983
- DENNIS DORGAN, NeO, July 1987 (French)
- REH: TWO-GUN RACONTEUR #15, The Black Coast Press, June 2011 (as “Sailor Costigan and the Yellow Cobra”)
- THE COLLECTED BOXING FICTION OF ROBERT E. HOWARD: FISTS OF IRON ROUND 2, REH Foundation Press, February 2014
