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Edgar Rice Burroughs

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Edgar Rice Burroughs
Edgar Rice Burroughs
Born(1875-09-01)September 1, 1875
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
DiedMarch 19, 1950(1950-03-19) (aged 74)
Encino, California, U.S.
Resting placeTarzana, California, U.S.
OccupationNovelist
NationalityAmerican
Period20th century
GenreAdventure novel, Lost World, Sword and Planet, Planetary romance, Soft science fiction, Westerns
Notable worksTarzan series, Barsoom series
Signature

Edgar Rice Burroughs (September 1, 1875 – March 19, 1950) was an American author, best known for his creation of the jungle hero Tarzan and the heroic Mars adventurer John Carter, although he produced works in many genres.

Biography

Burroughs was born on September 1, 1875, in Chicago, Illinois (he later lived for many years in the suburb of Oak Park), the fourth son of businessman and Civil War veteran Major George Tyler Burroughs (1833–1913) and his wife Mary Evaline (Zieger) Burroughs (1840–1920). His middle name is from his paternal grandmother, Mary Rice Burroughs (1802-ca. 1870).[1][2][3]

Burroughs was educated at a number of local schools, and during the Chicago influenza epidemic in 1891, he spent a half year at his brother's ranch on the Raft River in Idaho. He then attended the Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, and then the Michigan Military Academy. Graduating in 1895, and failing the entrance exam for the United States Military Academy (West Point), he ended up as an enlisted soldier with the 7th U.S. Cavalry in Fort Grant, Arizona Territory. After being diagnosed with a heart problem and thus found ineligible to serve, he was discharged in 1897.[4]

Bookplate of Edgar Rice Burroughs showing Tarzan holding the planet Mars, surrounded by other characters from Burroughs' stories and symbols relating to his personal interests and career
Typsescript letter, with Tarzana Ranch letterhead, from Edgar Rice Burroughs to Ruthven Deane, explaining the design and significance of his bookplate

Some seemingly unrelated short jobs followed. Some drifting and ranch work followed in Idaho. Then, Burroughs found work at his father's firm in 1899. He married childhood sweetheart Emma Hulbert in January 1900. In 1904 he left his job and found less regular work; some in Idaho, later in Chicago.[5]

By 1911, after seven years of low wages, he was working as a pencil sharpener wholesaler and began to write fiction. By this time Burroughs and Emma had two children, Joan (1908–1972), who would later marry Tarzan film actor James Pierce, and Hulbert (1909–1991).[6] During this period, he had copious spare time and he began reading many pulp fiction magazines. In 1929 he recalled thinking that

...if people were paid for writing rot such as I read in some of those magazines, that I could write stories just as rotten. As a matter of fact, although I had never written a story, I knew absolutely that I could write stories just as entertaining and probably a whole lot more so than any I chanced to read in those magazines.[7]

Aiming his work at these pulp fiction magazines, Burroughs had his first story, "Under the Moons of Mars", serialized in All-Story Magazine in 1912[8][9]

Burroughs soon took up writing full-time and by the time the run of Under the Moons of Mars had finished he had completed two novels, including Tarzan of the Apes, which was published from October 1912 and went on to become one of his most successful series. In 1913, Burroughs and Emma had their third and last child, John Coleman Burroughs (1913–1979).[citation needed]

Burroughs also wrote popular science fiction and fantasy stories involving Earthly adventurers transported to various planets (notably Barsoom, Burroughs' fictional name for Mars, and Amtor, his fictional name for Venus), lost islands, and into the interior of the hollow earth in his Pellucidar stories, as well as westerns and historical romances. Along with All-Story, many of his stories were published in The Argosy.

Tarzan was a cultural sensation when introduced. Burroughs was determined to capitalize on Tarzan's popularity in every way possible. He planned to exploit Tarzan through several different media including a syndicated Tarzan comic strip, movies and merchandise. Experts in the field advised against this course of action, stating that the different media would just end up competing against each other. Burroughs went ahead, however, and proved the experts wrong—the public wanted Tarzan in whatever fashion he was offered. Tarzan remains one of the most successful fictional characters to this day and is a cultural icon.

In either 1915 or 1919, Burroughs purchased a large ranch north of Los Angeles, California, which he named "Tarzana." The citizens of the community that sprang up around the ranch voted to adopt that name when their community, Tarzana, California was formed in 1927. [10] Also the unincorporated community of Tarzan, Texas, was formally named in 1927 when the US Postal Service accepted the name,[11] reputedly coming from the popularity of the first (silent) Tarzan of the Apes film, starring Elmo Lincoln, and an early "Tarzan" comic strip.

In 1923 Burroughs set up his own company, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc., and began printing his own books through the 1930s.

Burroughs divorced Emma in 1934 and married the former actress Florence Gilbert Dearholt in 1935, the former wife of his friend, Ashton Dearholt, and Burroughs adopted the Dearholts' two children. This couple divorced in 1942.[12]

At the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, Burroughs was a resident of Hawaii and, despite being in his late sixties, he applied for permission to become a war correspondent. This permission was granted, and so he became one of the oldest war correspondents for the U.S. during World War II. After the war ended, Burroughs moved back to Encino, California, where, after many health problems, he died of a heart attack on March 19, 1950, having written almost seventy novels.[13]

Selected bibliography

Main article: Edgar Rice Burroughs bibliography

Barsoom series

Main article: Barsoom

Tarzan series

Main article: Tarzan

Pellucidar series

Main article: Pellucidar
Book Cover: Pirates of Venus

Venus series

Main article: Venus series

Caspak series

Moon series

  • The Moon Maid (1926) (aka The Moon Men)
    • Part I: The Moon Maid
    • Part II: The Moon Men
    • Part III: The Red Hawk

These three texts have been published by various houses in one or two volumes. Adding to the confusion, some editions have the original (significantly longer) introduction to Part I from the first publication as a magazine serial, and others have the shorter version from the first book publication, which included all three parts under the title The Moon Maid.[14]

Mucker series

Other science fiction

Jungle adventure novels

Western novels

Historical novels

Other works

  • Burroughs is mentioned in the classic 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird in the first chapter: " Routine contentment was: improving our treehouse that rested between giant twin chinaberry trees in the back yard, fussing, running through our list of dramas based on the works of Oliver Optic, Victor Appleton, and Edgar Rice Burroughs."
  • In Rainbow Mars by Larry Niven, several different fictional Martian races appear, including a people who are a combination of the Red Martians of Edgar Rice Burroughs and those by Ray Bradbury, and another who are unmistakably Burroughs' big fierce Green Martians.
  • Season 1, Episode 29 of Disney's The Legend of Tarzan animated series, Tarzan and the Mysterious Visitor, illustrates Burroughs as a struggling writer who travels to Africa after learning about Tarzan in the hopes of getting inspiration for a new novel. (Notably, though, the real Burroughs never set foot in Africa.) The character is only referred to as "Ed" throughout the episode and his true identity isn't revealed until his name is shown on his book.
  • The Marvel Comics book Excalibur created by Chris Claremont and Alan Davis paid a tribute to the John Carter stories in issue #16 and 17. The story was billed on the cover of issue #16 as "Kurt Wagner Warlord of ?". The series added a further tribute with issue #60 and the story "Braddock of the jungle".
  • In Frank Frazetta's Creatures published by the Frazetta Comics imprint at Image Burroughs appears as a member of a group of supernatural investigators led by former US president Theodore Roosevelt.
  • In Rocky II, Rocky reads "The Deputy Sheriff of Comanche County" to Adrian while she is in a coma.
  • In Richard Bachman's short story "The Long Walk" the character named Olson introduces himself to Gary Barkovitch and says, "I'm John Carter", "My home is Barsoom, Mars."
  • In the TV series ER, the character played by Noah Wyle is usually called simply Carter, but his full name is John Carter. The creator of ER and Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton, has cited the work of Edgar Rice Burroughs as an early influence, thus this homage.[citation needed]
  • In the TV series Babylon 5, a character in season 2 named Amanda Carter — a Martian citizen and advocate of Mars' independence from Earth — is revealed to have had a grandfather named John who was a pioneer colonist on Mars. This has been confirmed by the series creator J. Michael Straczynski as a reference made by the episode writer Larry DiTillio to John Carter of Mars.[15]
  • In the 2012 Disney film John Carter, Daryl Sabara portrays Burroughs as a young man. In the film (as in the book) Edgar is the nephew of John Carter who after passing left him his belongings including a journal with his adventures on Mars.

Books on Edgar Rice Burroughs

See also

References

  1. ^ Edmund Rice (1638) Association, 2010. Descendants of Edmund Rice: The First Nine Generations.
  2. ^ "Edmund Rice Six-Generation Database Online". Edmund Rice (1638) Association, Inc. Retrieved 27-January-2011. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
  3. ^ Note: For a comprehensive treatment of the ancestry of Edgar Rice Burroughs, refer to Schneider, Jerry L.. 2008. The Ancestry of Edgar Rice Burroughs Booksurge LLC, Charleston, SC. 296pp. ISBN 978-1-4357-4972-6
  4. ^ Slotkin, Richard (1998). Gunfighter Nation. University of Oklahoma Press. p. 196. ISBN 0-8061-3031-8.
  5. ^ Holtsmark, Erling B. (1986). Edgar Rice Burroughs. Boston: Twain Publishers. pp. 3–4. ISBN 0-8057-7459-9.
  6. ^ Holtsmark, p. 5
  7. ^ Burroughs, Edgar Rice (October 27, 1929). "How I Wrote the Tarzan Stories". The Washington Post and the New York World (Sunday supplement) via ERBZine.com. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  8. ^ ERBzine, Volume 0419 -"A Virtual Visit to The Nell Dismukes McWhorter Memorial Edgar Rice Burroughs Collection", with photographs.
  9. ^ Zoetrope: All-Story: Back Issue
  10. ^ Tarzana Community Profile, Retrieved July 4, 2012.
  11. ^ Holtsmark, pp. 9–10
  12. ^ Holtsmark, pp. 12–13
  13. ^ Holtsmark, pp. 13–15
  14. ^ ERBzine
  15. ^ J. Michael Straczynski, (1994), "JMS usenet posting", rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated. Retrieved August 23, 2007.
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