Swordsmen and Sorcerers' Guild of America

The Swordsmen and Sorcerers' Guild of America or SAGA was an informal group of American fantasy authors active from the 1960s through the 1980s, noted for their contributions to the "Sword and Sorcery" kind of heroic fantasy, itself a subgenre of fantasy. When it developed a serious purpose that was to promote the popularity and respectability of Sword and Sorcery fiction.

According to Lin Carter, the guiding force behind the group, SAGA was founded in the mid-1960s by the trio of himself, L. Sprague de Camp, and John Jakes out of a shared interest in the then-neglected subgenre of heroic fantasy. Originally it was little more than an in-group, with members gathering for drinks at science fiction conventions and bestowing pompous, complicated titles on each other. Carter was named "Purple Druid of the Gibbering Horde of the Slime Pits of Zugthakya," de Camp "Supreme Sadist of the Reptile Men of Yag," and Jakes "Ambassador-without-Portfolio to the Partly Squamous, Partly Rugose Vegetable Things of the South Polar City of Nugyubb-Glaa." Membership was soon extended to other authors sharing their taste for fantasy, such as Michael Moorcock, who was styled "Veiled Thaumaturge of the Mauve Barbarians of Ningg". The group remained fairly informal, with few expectations of its members; Moorcock has noted he "wasn't really an active member."

Several sword and sorcery anthologies edited by L. Sprague de Camp for Pyramid Books and Putnam from 1963 to 1970 featured stories by SAGA members along with other, usually earlier fantasists. Most noteworthy may be The Spell of Seven (Pyramid Books, 1965), in which four of the seven pieces were by members. Another early anthology including works by members of the group was Swords Against Tomorrow (Signet Books, 1970), a paperback original edited by Robert Hoskins. It comprised one novella and three novelettes by SAGA members and a novelette by Leigh Brackett. SAGA later showcased the work of its members in the Flashing Swords! anthology series edited by Carter and published by Dell Books from 1973 to 1981.

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