Book – Tarzan of the Apes

Tarzan of the Apes (1912) and The Return of Tarzan  (1913) by Edgar Rice Burroughs – A tiny baby is left in the wilds of the African jungle following the death of his parents.  He is adopted by a she-ape and raised among the great apes of Africa.  He will grow to manhood with incredible physical strength to go along with great intelligence.  When he finally comes into contact with his own kind, Tarzan discovers that he is the long-lost heir of an English Lord.  He will explore the “civilized” world before returning to the jungle.

There are very few more iconic literary figures than Tarzan.  None may be better known.  Through 24 books, plus movies, radio dramas, comics, animated features, stage productions, and television, the “Lord of the Jungle” has had an incredible staying power.  This is Burroughs most popular work, though it is consistent with his general writing style.  The stories are serial melodramas aiming more at the action and adventure than any great literary standards.  He wrote his other classic series, the Barsoom books (John Carter of Mars) during the same years that he produced the Tarzan stories.

These two books represent the best of the longer series.  Even contemporaneous critics noted that the stories very quickly devolved into cardboard characters and predictable plots.

It’s another instance where you may think you know this character front and back only to get a bit of a surprise when you go back to the original.  A lot of what we “know” about Tarzan is influenced by later interpretations.  There is no “Me Tarzan, You Jane” moment.  In fact, Maureen O’Sullivan’s classic Jane Parker in the MGM movies with Johnny Weismuller would have made short work of the delicate, fainting Jane Porter of the books.

The casual attitude of white, male superiority seen in parts of these books would have been a perfectly normal attitude at the time of the books creation.  They will grate on modern readers sensibilities, but they don’t dominate the stories.  As the series went on Burroughs’s attitude seemed to ease.  He does note in one of the later stories that Tarzan didn’t think much of white men or black men.  Only his friends were of any concern to the jungle king.

It can be argued that Tarzan might be the first “superhero”.  Endowed with both superhuman strength and great intelligence, he does a certain amount of righting wrongs and punishing bad guys, the traditional pastimes of the superhero.

Why I Liked It – Vivid storytelling

Why You Will Like It – A quintessential action/adventure story that swings right along (sorry, couldn’t resist)

The antiquated social standards bugged me enough to keep me from pushing up a little more.

Rating – ***1/2  Worth A Look