RafeeqMcGiveron.com
  • Home
  • My Writings
    • Novel: Student Body >
      • Student Body: Sample 1
      • Student Body: Sample 2
      • Student Body: Sample 3
      • Student Body: Sample 4
      • Student Body: Sample 5
      • Student Body: Sample 6
    • Literary Criticism and Reviews >
      • On Robert A. Heinlein
      • On Ray Bradbury
      • On Other Authors
      • Goodreads Reviews
    • Advising/Teaching
    • Poetry
    • Memoir
    • The Bibliophile's Personal Library
    • Have You Ever Been to an Irishman's Shanty?
    • Letters from Gregory Road
  • Heinlein Cover Art
    • Pulp Magazines
    • Earlier Adult Works
    • Scribner’s YA/Juveniles
    • Serialized Novels
    • Collections/Anthologies
    • Later Works
    • On Heinlein
  • Other SF Art
    • Big Illustrated Books >
      • Flights of Fancy
      • The History of SF
      • Science Fiction/Science Fact >
        • Children's
    • Vintage Hardcovers
    • Paperbacks, Etc.
    • Pulp Magazines
  • Blog
  • Links
    • In the News

Review: Arthur Conan Doyle, The Lost World

9/1/2014

0 Comments

 
Picture
About a year and a half ago I picked up a 1963 Pyramid printing of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s 1912 The Lost World,  and I finally got around to reading ’er.

Really, it was quite a fun read.  Below is a review I did at Goodreads:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1042538401.

Rafeeq






Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 1912 The Lost World is, for its period, a very nice five-star adventure story. While the very beginning, with its seemingly conventional sentimental claptrap of competing for a lady's approval, is perhaps the weakest part of the tale, we soon get down to treacherous Amazonian jungles, conniving betrayals, and prehistoric beasts galore--and the close of the novel reveals that, as conventional sentimental claptrap goes, the author actually is a jolly good sport about poking mocking holes in it.

The tale begins when the narrator, Edward Malone, an Irish rugby champion and now earnest young reporter for the Daily Gazette, desireth for the purposes of marriage the hand of Miss Gladys Hungerton. This coolly superior icon of desirable young womanhood, however, is swayed neither by words nor by flowers but by deeds. Heroism is required, she preaches from the comfort of an English drawing room. Only a hero can win her, for only then can she be "what [she] should like to be,--envied for [her] man."

This may not be the deepest or most flattering thing a girl has ever told a suitor, but 'tis enough to send the love-struck newspaperman to attempt the closest thing he can to heroism: interviewing the imposing Professor Challenger. Challenger, after all, already has violently assaulted several who doubted his stories of finding during his most recent expedition to South America a seemingly inaccessible plateau in the depths of the jungle, along with the sketchbook of a dead American artist depicting pterodactyls and other Jurassic beasties. When the bristly Challenger speaks at the Zoological Institute, he of course is denounced as a charlatan, and it is agreed that a mission shall set out to the Amazon to prove orthodoxy still correct. Professor Summerlee, Challenger's most vociferous critic, calls for volunteers to join him, and Malone literally jumps to his feet, followed by adventurer and big-game hunter Lord Roxton. Miss Hungerton's suitor will have his heroism, apparently, or die trying.

Adventure ensues. Really, the standard travelogue of the deep Amazon, replete not only with danger but also with both beauty and wonder, is a fine read, and it is spiced with the amusing conflicts of the exquisitely arrogant Challenger and the equally determined, if more restrained, Summerlee. Once the explorers surmount the seemingly unclimbable plateau--and, naturally, are trapped upon it--we will see rookeries of huge pterodactyls, great iguanodons and freshwater sea monsters, unclassifiable dinosaurs like giant toads, and even savage "missing link" ape-men. That 1300 rounds of rifle ammunition listed in the supplies definitely will come in handy, eh, what?

This book is not necessarily the place to turn for modern paleontologic or evolutionary theory, of course, nor is it for modern race relations. The trope of "faithful Negro"--who calls his British employers "Massa," no less--versus sinister and sneaky "half-breed" is painful, but it should not be a surprise, given the time of writing. In terms of outmoded ideas, however, at least when what I might call something of the intellectual narrative frame closes, the notion of jousting for a fair lady's honor takes a lovely little drubbing.

Most importantly, though, despite occasional scientific or ethnographic shortcomings inherent to its era, The Lost World simply is a fun and entertaining adventure, and even more than a hundred years later it still remains well worth reading.

1 September 2014

0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Author

    Author of several dozen pieces of literary criticism, reference entries, and reviews; novel Student Body; memoir Tiger Hunts, Thunder Bay, and Treasure Chests; how-to The Bibliophile's Personal Library; humorous Have You Ever Been to an Irishman's Shanty?​; some poetry; and quite a bit of advising/Banner training materials.

    Archives

    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    July 2021
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    February 2020
    September 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    November 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    October 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013

    Categories

    All
    A.J. Donnell
    Anthony Boucher
    Astounding Science Fiction
    Book Review
    Chesley Bonestell
    Clifford Geary
    Curious Books
    Darrell K. Sweet
    Edd Cartier
    Ed Emshwiller
    Fahrenheit 451
    Fred Freeman
    Goodreads
    Hal Clement
    Hannes Bok
    Hubert Rogers
    Jack Finney
    Jim Burns Art
    Kelly Freas
    Larry Webb
    Lester Del Rey
    Michigan Transfer Agreement
    Philip K. Dick
    Pulp SF
    Ray Bradbury
    Reading Place Charlotte
    Reading Place-Charlotte
    Richard M. Powers
    Robert A. Heinlein
    Rolf Klep
    Salem Press
    Salem Press
    Schuler Books
    Scribner's
    SF Art
    Steele Savage
    Student Body
    Vincent Di Fate
    Virgil Finlay

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.