TARZAN Lord of the Jungle (#11) - Edgar Rice Burroughs

 

It's a testament to my commitment to my craft and mission (kidding) that I actually finished this novel in what had to be one of the most difficult times of my life in recent memory.  Based on my last Tarzan post, I was almost a third of the way thru #11 in early December, which means I probably started it in late November. And I finally reached the end this past Tuesday (Jan 27), approximately two months later.  There was a long pause amidst Christmas, my mother-in-law's celebration of life service, New Years, and lots of "time off" [NOT a vacation] that included cleaning and packing not only my entire collection but also helping with the rest of the contents of my house as well.  As I mentioned yesterday, there are still things to be done, but not nearly as much is left, so I can enjoy a slight reprieve. That said, my thoughts on this novel will be a bit briefer than normal due to the long time span.

First, you may notice in the picture above how shiny and shimmery the book looks inside its plastic 2-mil "crystal clear" bag.  All my paperbacks are similarly housed in my secret $500/month three-room (unit) library (storage place) along with most of my other books and toys.  We went through so many BCW bags from paperback size, to manga size (for fat 'backs), to comic book size, to magazine size, to book size, to treasury size, and finally to Life magazine size.  We vacuumed the book edges for any "bad" dust before sealing them in with tape (and odd sizes require extra folding and taping).  Each time you tape, it takes a tiny bit of skin off; taping again and again creates small microcuts that are excruciating when the Clorox wipe fluid seeps into them.  This was all done in a house without heat except for a few small space heaters.  I even pulled my first-ever 24-hour day, and came close to a second where I was up for over 36 hours with only a 45-minute "nap" during that time frame.  Like I said, it was a lot and all-consuming.  But doesn't it look nice inside the bag?  The bags also make it easier to pack in the watertight bins (when they arrive on time and undamaged). What we spent on cleaning and packing was expensive, but less than a tenth of what we were quoted by a pack-out service that would have charged us over $50K to do the job for us!!  Still, it beats throwing out everything, which I feared (a couple of times) was going to have to happen.

Okay, back to Tarzan #11.  We've another Boris Vallejo cover, whose figure work is outstanding, although I don't like all the white space on this one.  This image actually does occur in the book, which is great, but Neal Adams' unpublished version would've been more representative.

Source: https://www.erbzine.com/mag36/tzna21.jpg

Notice the difference?  One is Tarzan pitted against Jungle animals (he's actually saving the ape from the snake).  The other is Tarzan encountering a descendant of a lost group of Crusaders (from the actual Crusades).  Now the first image fits better with the title "Lord of the Jungle", but the second image gives you a preview of what actually takes place in the majority of the book - a near total hijack of the Tarzan narrative in favor of an American tale.  Said American, being James Blake (later Sir James Blake), the pistol-packing, princess-wooing black knight (not the one depicted above), who succumbs (I thought there was an "r" in that word) to the ancient civilization he encounters while lost in the jungle.  Oh, Tarzan is involved at the beginning and end, but he's secondary in the middle - just moving the plot pieces along until the final culmination. It felt more like a secret pilot for a new spin-off series than a Tarzan novel.

That's not to say the story makes for poor reading.  It was enjoyable despite the numerous "Zounds" and my personal circumstances. But I really finished it more for curiosity's sake and completism, rather than just because I liked it "okay".  And I really didn't want to be thrown off my plan to read and review ALL the Tarzan novels.  I've completed 9 of the 24, and attempted to read one other, so I'm just shy of 50 percent.  I made a special trip to storage on Thursday, checking out the latest volume (#12), which I haven't started yet.  I hope to go forward from here through #24 (minus the ones already read), and then restart at #1 to finish the series off (#1, #2, #3, #4, #7 & #8).  We'll see.  If emptying out my entire house didn't derail me, only bad storytelling or something more interesting could knock me off the Tarzan wave.  Time will tell.  If I do take a break before I read them all, I will still plan to finish one day.

Thanks for going on the ride with me.

Until next time...