ERB's plots often hinge upon murder or death-as if death itself was perhaps the most vile or frightening thing in ERB's mind. The best and the worst of humankind-for the attributes of all the characters of Barsoom are human and the motivations which govern their actions are all-too-human as well. I believe ERB wrote about Earth in allegories of Barsoom. This warfare was different from the long decades of warfare in the American west where small groups of Indians tied up vast numbers of Army troops, even though the violence of those military engagements was just as extreme and exaggerated as any wars before or since.
Before World War I was over a staggering loss of life had occurred, not to mention poisoned resources, destroyed animals and livestock and plants. By the time the Caspak trilogy was serialized that great war had munched tens of millions lives. When the Mad King (in two parts) was written, Europe was on the brink of war. The threat of an even larger conflict loomed on the near horizon by the end of Warlord. When Burroughs wrote A Princess of Mars, some very large scale wars had been recently fought. Barsoom ranks numero uno re: murder and mayhem with the "eternal war" on Poloda as a close second.
One might suggest that warfare or physical danger is when human drama is most heightened, but to decimate whole civilizations novel after novel, and so adroitly that finer sensibilities are rarely disturbed, is a hallmark of Ed Burroughs' writing. For all the beautiful prose and fantastic worlds, ERB's major characters are rather blood-thirsty-even Milquetoast Waldo Emerson Smith-Jones! Ed's heroes never seemed to have twitching consciences and I have always wondered why. They must destroy another human being and in the real world that is not an easy thing to live with, though it is, sadly, often easy to accomplish in the heat of battle.
BARSOOM NUDE SERIES
Not shown in the Barsoom series is the mental anguish that all soldiers endure to be victorious. If we were to apply the "body count" logic of the tv-for-children censors, ERB would rank with Hitler and Stalin for filling mass graves. To some they appear a little contrived and hokey given the increasing strangess of naming conventions by fantasy writers in recent years, but in 1911-1920, names like Hor Vastus, Thuvan Dihn, Gahan of Gathol, Thuvia, etc, were quite exotic-yet familiar and easy to pronounce. Like all the other races of Barsoom, the Okarians are forever at war with all peoples as a matter of survival on this world of dwindling resources.ĮRB's Barsoomian names roll off the tongue. They have an advanced science based on electromagnetics. The north pole is the land of the yellow race, the Okarians. Burroughs has major fun debunking Martian religions as represented by the First Born Issus and the tenets of the Holy Hekkadors of the Therns. The south pole is ruled by the Therns (a white race) and the First Born (a black race).
Quite human in appearance, though the female lays eggs rather than giving birth of infants, it is among these peoples that John Carter gains acceptance which matches his admiration for their finer qualities. Hereditary enemies of the green martian is the red man. These creatures, averaging 14-15 feet in height, often take a deserted, ancient city as a gathering point, tribes up to 60,000 strong with a possible world population of 5 millions.
Hordes of nomadic green martians rule the dead sea bottoms. Though Barsoom is smaller than Earth, it has more land surface than the third planet! Ed Burroughs populated this vast desert world with some of the oddest and most interesting alien races ever to spring forth from his fertile imagination. At one end of the spectrum is a science so evolved that it exceeds anything on Earth, yet at the other it is a world of savage barbarity unlike anything found on our planet. A BARSOOM GLOSSARY BARSOOMIAN FLIERS BARSOOMīereft of once mighty oceans and a natural atmosphere, Barsoom is a world of strange and dangerous contradictions.
0 kommentar(er)
