Problem: Louis "Louison" Bobet (pronounced [lwi.zo bo.be]; 12 March 1925 - 13 March 1983) was a French professional road racing cyclist. He was the first great French rider of the post-war period and the first rider to win the Tour de France in three successive years, from 1953 to 1955. His career included the national road championship (1950 and 1951), Milan-San Remo (1951), Giro di Lombardia (1951), Criterium International (1951 & 52), Paris-Nice (1952), Grand Prix des Nations (1952), world road championship (1954), Tour of Flanders (1955), Criterium du Dauphine Libere (1955), Tour de Luxembourg (1955), Paris-Roubaix (1956) and Bordeaux-Paris (1959).

Louis Bobet was born one of three children above his father's baker's shop in the rue de Montfort, Saint-Meen-le-Grand, near Rennes. His father gave him a bicycle when he was two and after six months he could ride it 6 km. Bobet's father was also called Louis and the son was called Louison - little Louis - to avoid confusion The ending -on is a diminutive in French but outside Brittany Louison refers more usually to a girl. He was known as Louis in his early years as a rider, even as a professional, until the diminutive Louison gained in popularity.  His sister played table tennis, his brother Jean football, although he also became a professional cyclist. Louison played both table tennis and football and became Brittany champion at table tennis. It was his uncle, Raymond, who was president of a cycling club in Paris who persuaded him to concentrate on cycling.  Bobet's first race was a 30 km event when he was 13. He came second in a sprint finish. He raced in his local area and won four events for unlicensed riders in 1941. He qualified for the final of the unofficial youth championship, the Premier Pas Dunlop in 1943 at Montlucon and came sixth. The winner was Raphael Geminiani, who would become a professional team-mate and rival.  Bobet is said to have carried messages for the Resistance during the second world war. After D-Day he joined the army and served in eastern France. He was demobilised in December 1945.

What led to him being able to ride the bicycle at such an early age?

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Problem: Robert Ervin Howard (January 22, 1906 - June 11, 1936) was an American author who wrote pulp fiction in a diverse range of genres. He is well known for his character Conan the Barbarian and is regarded as the father of the sword and sorcery subgenre. Howard was born and raised in Texas. He spent most of his life in the town of Cross Plains, with some time spent in nearby Brownwood.

In August 1930 Howard wrote a letter to Weird Tales praising a recent reprint of H. P. Lovecraft's "The Rats in the Walls" and discussing some of the obscure Gaelic references used within. Editor Farnsworth Wright forwarded the letter to Lovecraft, who responded warmly to Howard, and soon the two Weird Tales veterans were engaged in a vigorous correspondence that would last for the rest of Howard's life. By virtue of this, Howard quickly became a member of the "Lovecraft Circle", a group of writers and friends all linked via the immense correspondence of H.P. Lovecraft, who made it a point to introduce his many like-minded friends to one another and encourage them to share stories, utilize each other's invented fictional trappings, and help each other succeed in the pulp field. In time this circle of correspondents has developed a legendary patina about it rivaling similar literary conclaves such as The Inklings, the Bloomsbury Group, and the Beats.  Howard was given the affectionate nickname "Two-Gun Bob" by virtue of his long explications to Lovecraft about the history of his beloved Southwest, and during the ensuing years he contributed several notable elements to Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos of horror stories (beginning with "The Black Stone", his Mythos stories also included "The Cairn on the Headland", "The Children of the Night" and "The Fire of Asshurbanipal"). He also corresponded with other "Weird Tale" writers such as Clark Ashton Smith, August Derleth, and E. Hoffmann Price.  The correspondence between Howard and Lovecraft contained a lengthy discussion on a frequent element in Howard's fiction, barbarism versus civilization. Howard held that civilization was inherently corrupt and fragile. This attitude is summed up in his famous line from "Beyond the Black River": "Barbarism is the natural state of mankind. Civilization is unnatural. It is a whim of circumstance. And barbarism must always ultimately triumph." Lovecraft held the opposite viewpoint, that civilization was the peak of human achievement and the only way forward. Howard countered by listing many historical abuses of the citizenry by so-called 'civilized' leaders. Howard initially deferred to Lovecraft but gradually asserted his own views, even coming to deride Lovecraft's opinions.  In 1930, with his interest in Solomon Kane dwindling and his Kull stories not catching on, Howard applied his new sword-and-sorcery and horror experience to one of his first loves: the Picts. His story "Kings of the Night" depicted King Kull conjured into pre-Christian Britain to aid the Picts in their struggle against the invading Romans, and introduced readers to Howard's king of the Picts, Bran Mak Morn. Howard followed up this tale with the now-classic revenge nightmare "Worms of the Earth" and several other tales, creating horrific adventures tinged with a Cthulhu-esque gloss and notable for their memorable use of metaphor and symbolism.  With the onset of the Great Depression, many pulp markets reduced their schedules or went out of business entirely. Howard saw market after market falter and vanish. Weird Tales became a bimonthly publication and pulps such as Fight Stories, Action Stories and Strange Tales all folded. Howard was further hit when his savings were wiped out in 1931 when the Farmer's National Bank failed, and again, after transferring to another bank, when that one failed as well.

Is the Lovecraft Circle responsible for helping him?

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