Tarzan of the Apes (Tarzan) (alkuperäinen julkaisuvuosi 1912; vuoden 1990 painos)

I used to watch Johnny Weissmuller as Tarzan each Saturday afternoon on TV as a child and I loved that show! When I came across the first Tarzan book free on Kindle years ago I thought I would like to read it. Not so much! The book is entirely different than the television show; much more violent and much less believable. In the book Tarzan kills plenty and also learns to speak French! At the end of the book, Tarzan finds out that he really is the heir to the Lord Greystoke fortune, but forgoes claiming it. I'm not sure that I ever saw that in the television shows. I had read that the probable locale for this story was the horn of Africa (Somalia, Eritrea, etc.). However, once reading it, I'm not so sure, although no place I can trace is mentioned. All in all, I found the book to be too far-fetched to entertain me. 338 pages ( )

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I read some books because they have entered the culture, spawning multiple versions of themselves in other media and I just want to find out what the original story and concepts were and if they were any good. Examples would be Frankenstein and Dracula. Tarzan is also such a one.

It was interesting to discover that Tarzan was indeed raised by apes, but not any real species, instead by a made up one existing somewhere between gorilla and human in capabilities and appearance. Also interesting to discover that Burroughs wrote 22 sequels!

It's a fast paced and easy read but I'm not inclined to hunt down even the first of those sequels... ( )

It's really difficult to get past the fringe-inducing white superiority porn. Burroughs is also a writer fond of using twenty words where one will do, and the plot is so full of convenient coincidences you have to roll your eyes. But... some of the action scenes are pretty great, and Burroughs does know how to build suspense with carefully timed scene breaks. I will also say that the actual conclusion of the book suprised me and was far more satisfying than I had guessed it could be even a few pages from the end. ( )

A wonderful, exciting adventure. A great character. A little hint of racism woven into the story perhaps. But it still thrilled me. ( )