Talk:Tarzan of the Apes

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): 688GlRv, Kitkifwiki.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 10:44, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

There are no chimpanzees in the novel

This is a note for 217.129.67.28, who twice modified the article to indicate that the young Tarzan was attacked by a chimpanzee, citing his own memory of the novel. You are correct that Tarzan was attacked by a bolgani, but the word means gorilla in Mangani, not chimpanzee, as the actual text of the novel clearly indicates. You can confirm this in the Project Gutenberg etext linked to in the article. Not only was Tarzan never attacked by a chimp, but no chimpanzees are mentioned in the book. Thank you for your attention. BPK 06:10, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Wording

"So popular was the character..." doesnt that sound kinda weird? like it should be simply "the character was so popular." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.87.69.48 (talk) 19:50, 24 April 2008 (UTC) Ummm... no. "So popular was the character" sounds absolutely fine to me.

librivox recording

i'm a librivox volunteer, so i can't add this to the article, but if anyone else would like to, please feel free. it's a link to the free, public domain audio recording from librivox. incidentally, it's a fantastic reading, well worth a listen:

• Free audiobook from LibriVox

Mackinaw (talk) 00:03, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Plot hole

Tarzan learns how to read and write English using picture books he found in his parents cabin, but he doesn't speak English, therefore he cannot associate the written symbols to sounds. Yet he is able to write his own name, Tarzan, which he cannot have read on the books. StefanoC (talk) 09:03, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Quite right, though you may be interested to know that Burroughs eventually realized there was a problem and fixed it in the short story "The God of Tarzan" (part of the collection Jungle Tales of Tarzan), which describes the process by which Tarzan learned to read and right more fully. Turns out he devised his own sound associations for the symbols. Here's the relevant passage:

Of course he did not pronounce God as you or I would pronounce His name, for Tarzan knew naught of the spoken language of his English forbears; but he had a name of his own invention for each of the little bugs which constituted the alphabet. Unlike the apes he was not satisfied merely to have a mental picture of the things he knew, he must have a word descriptive of each. In reading he grasped a word in its entirety; but when he spoke the words he had learned from the books of his father, he pronounced each according to the names he had given the various little bugs which occurred in it, usually giving the gender prefix for each.

Thus it was an imposing word which Tarzan made of God. The masculine prefix of the apes is bu, the feminine mu; g Tarzan had named la, o he pronounced tu, and d was mo. So the word God evolved itself into bulamutumumo, or, in English, he-g-she-o-she-d.

Similarly he had arrived at a strange and wonderful spelling of his own name. Tarzan is derived from the two ape words tar and zan, meaning white skin. It was given him by his foster mother, Kala, the great she-ape. When Tarzan first put it into the written language of his own people he had not yet chanced upon either white or skin in the dictionary; but in a primer he had seen the picture of a little white boy and so he wrote his name Bumude-Mutomuro, or he-boy.

To follow Tarzan's strange system of spelling would be laborious as well as futile, and so we shall in the future, as we have in the past, adhere to the more familiar forms of our grammar school copybooks. It would tire you to remember that do meant b, tu o, and ro y, and that to say he-boy you must prefix the ape masculine gender sound bu before the entire word and the feminine gender sound mu before each of the lower-case letters which go to make up boy--it would tire you and it would bring me to the nineteenth hole several strokes under par.

So the name Tarzan "actually" wrote in Tarzan of the Apes would have been "He-boy," which he would have pronounced Bumude-Mutomuro! Perhaps it's just as well Burroughs hadn't worked this out yet when he wrote the earlier novel; having his characters work through the various complications would have been too complicated:

Jane: "So you're the mysterious He-boy."

Tarzan: "Bumude-Mutomuro, actually, but of course in Ape it would be Tarzan."

And let's not forget that Tarzan's first human language ended up being French, and he couldn't really communicate with Jane until he had learned English as well... BPK (talk) 15:32, 28 January 2009 (UTC)

Phillip Jose Farmer notes that Tarzan could have not known how to write his own name, but suggests that Greystoke probably wrote "I am White-Skin of the Apes," as that was the literal translation of his "mangani" name. WHPratt (talk) 19:20, 16 February 2009 (UTC)WHPratt

Farmer obviously forgot about, or discounted, Burroughs' account in Jungle Tales of Tarzan, above. But in any case, where Burroughs and Farmer conflict, you have to go with Burroughs as the authority, since it's his character. BPK (talk) 05:52, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Radio Show

I can't find any information on Wikipedia about the various Tarzan of the Apes radio shows (of the 1930s and 1950s, I believe). I don't have expertise in this area, but if anyone out there does it would be nice to see this information added. Cancilla (talk) 16:15, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

• This article is just about the first novel. Type in just "Tarzan" and that article (or one about Tarzan in various media) will have a slight bit of the info you're looking for. Sir Rhosis (talk) 20:44, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Film adaptations

Under the section describing the film adaptations of the novel, it reads that the 1999 Disney animated feature Tarzan was a "direct to video" film, which is not true - it was a very successful and critically acclaimed animated film. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.250.102.70 (talk) 01:08, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• That is not referring to the Disney version, but another 1999 animated film, which indeed was direct-to-video. Follow the link to see the difference. Sir Rhosis (talk) 20:03, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Tarzan's Portrayal Moved Here

I removed this section from the article to here. The whole section is just an essay on character/author motivations, and reads like a critical essay, was wholly unscourced (except for book quotes), and was mostly OR. It was added some years ago, as a whole by a single editor, megreilly3060, who it seems is no longer current under that name. It was touched up by a couple editors over the years, but I was surprised it was still basically intact. I figured I would paste the current version here, so it could be discussed, and decided what, if anything, should be kept.

Text-

Tarzan's portrayal

In the novel, Tarzan is portrayed as the epitome of man, standing apart from 'civilized' society. Instead of disadvantaging him, this social construct imbues him with an inherent strength that exceeds that of any other character in the novel. This strength is shown reflected in his physique, mental and emotional ability, and personal essence. Burroughs created an exceptional example of an idealized, fierce-yet-noble, iconoclastic male figure—with few physical or psychological flaws. As a result of the rigors of being raised in a great-ape tribe, Tarzan's scantly-clad, supernatural physique gives him a godlike stature.

" His straight and perfect figure, muscled as the best of the ancient Roman gladiators must have been muscled, and yet with the soft and sinuous curves of a Greek god, told at a glance the wondrous combination of enormous strength with suppleness and speed".

In the novel, Tarzan is described as a Caucasian male who is extremely athletic, handsome and tanned, with grey eyes and long, black hair. Tarzan's ability to swing through the trees, sleep on tree branches, and hide behind jungle brush allow his physical self to be conditioned in a superhuman way. The way he was raised not only shapes his physical sense, but also his sense-of-self. Burroughs depicted society as robbing people of one of their most important features: their intimate relationship with nature, and through it, a deeper understanding of themselves as members (instead of masters) of it.

"But, be that as it may, Tarzan would not ruin good meat in any such foolish manner, so he gobbled down a great quantity of the raw flesh.., And then Lord Greystoke wiped his greasy fingers upon his naked thighs and took up the trail of Kulonga, the son of Mbonga, the king; while in far-off London another Lord Greystoke, the younger brother of the real Lord Greystoke’s father, sent back his chops to the club’s chef because they were underdone, and when he had finished his repast he dipped his finger-ends into a silver bowl of scented water and dried them on a piece of snowy damask".

This passage depicts a comparison scene of Tarzan and his cousin, William Clayton (Lord Greystoke), who was eating pork at the same time under vastly different circumstances and codes of etiquette. Tarzan, believing that wasting fresh meat was morally wrong, ate all that he could, whereas, Lord Greystoke would rather reject good meat than eat something not cooked to his liking. Furthermore, Burroughs goes on to describe the way in which both men ended their respective meals—Tarzan simply wiping his fingers on his thighs, versus Lord Greystoke engaging in an elaborate hand-washing exercise. The passage represents differences in perceived masculinity: that Tarzan's masculinity is part of his human essence, whereas Lord Greystoke's "manhood" is inferior by comparison, due to its need to be supported by complexity, formality, and accessories. Burroughs' point is that human society is sabotaging, self-limiting, and even toxic, to an individual’s own essence. Lord Greystoke is still a man, yet manifests "feminine" qualities, which arise at times when they should not, obscuring the fact that a man should eat meat, raw or cooked, to sustain his individual self. Yet Clayton's qualities exist because he was raised and conditioned in a human society where norms (e.g., etiquette, table manners)--not nature—define the social class in which one was raised and thus determine a man's essence. Tarzan, on the other hand, is outside of human society and has not been shaped by societal rankings or classes.

A secondary example of this phenomenon is when Tarzan made the decision to leave his tribe but was unsure if he should kill his enemy, the current great ape tribe leader, Terkoz. “‘If I kill him,’ thought Tarzan, ‘what advantage will it be to me? Will it not but rob the tribe of a great fighter? And if Terkoz be dead, he will known nothing of my supremacy, while alive he will ever be an example to the other apes’”. This passage highlights Tarzan's ethical dilemma regarding a sworn enemy, Terkoz. Tarzan may not like him, but does not want to punish or impose injustice upon him. This social confrontation is comparable to human society where we have a justice system that will punish criminals for their crimes. Tarzan understands that merely killing Terkoz would hurt Tarzan's own long-term self-interests. “But deep in the minds of the apes was rooted the conviction that Tarzan was a mighty fighter and a strange creature. Strange because he had had it in his power to kill his enemy, but had allowed him to live – unharmed”. Tarzan knows within himself that killing Terkoz will not make him feel better. If anything, he inherently knows that it is wrong to kill solely because one can. Instead, Tarzan decides to make an example of out his enemy and take the "high road". Tarzan's removal from society, one in which "justice" and punishment are synonymous (and therefore, often result in "inustice" in the name of short-sighted, socially-approved vengeance), is what enables him to make this distinction. His relationship with nature enables him to know the difference between right and wrong, to see how he is interconnected with others, and to think strategically/wisely. Tarzan is meant to represent the essential, natural man. He depicts the true human essence that is inside every individual, but that is constrained by the various short-sighted rules of "civilization".

I'm currently watching this page. Thank you.( Sorry for any formatting errors, its been... a long time since i edited wikipedia!) Moss Ryder (talk) 08:58, 8 July 2016 (UTC)

Identifying Sources Assignment

We are writing the article Tarzan of the Apes.

We could write a Background section based on Taliaferro's Tarzan Forever and Watson's "Tarzan the Eternal." This section could examine literary influences on Burroughs, the personal life of Burroughs, and the motivation of Burroughs to write Tarzan of the Apes. The sources seem to emphasize Burroughs' interest in classical epic literature, such as the Aeneid, the difficulties which he experienced in trying to find an occupation which would help him to provide for his young family, and his attempt to write books despite his belief that they were low-quality and trashy.

We could write a Critical Reception section which examines recent journal articles. Because the criticism on the book seems extensive, perhaps we could focus on summarizing the main critical controversies. These controversies seem to cover race and sexuality as themes in Tarzan of the Apes. These themes seem to fit better in a Critical Reception section than in a Themes section because modern critics notice these themes. Readers of the book when it came out in 1912 would not have noticed these themes as much as modern critics because societal values, including those regarding race and sexuality, change over one hundred years. Although race and sexuality technically are themes, we probably should address them as Critical Reception before anyone tries to incorporate them into a larger and more comprehensive section of themes. If we address only the articles, Coghlan's "Absolutely Punk," Oklopčić's "Adapting the Adapted," and Tuhkanen's "Grotesquely Becoming;" as well as Vernon's book On Tarzan, we will summarize only a small portion of critical reception. We seem much less capable of writing a Themes section which encapsulates critical reception along with early twentieth-century views, themes which Burroughs consciously included, and the general themes of the text.

We could write a Popular Reception section based on Watson's "Tarzan the Eternal" and Speelman's "The History of Tarzan in Comics." Because "Tarzan the Eternal" comes from a the mainstream Smithsonian magazine and "The History of Tarzan in Comics" comes from a mainstream website, Cosmic Alliance, we could include material which seems relevant to popular culture. Because they come from a history-oriented source and a comics-oriented source, respectively, they provide different views on separate topics. The Smithsonian article seems more general and about Burroughs as a person, and the Cosmic Alliance article seems to specify styles of art in which illustrators tried to express the action and excitement of Tarzan of the Apes.

Should we focus more on writing a comprehensive section, such as Critical Reception, or should we write a little in several sections?

How many pages of the sources should we read?

Would anyone like to comment on the plan of action or the following bibliography? The proposed bibliography follows:

• Coghlan, J. Michelle.  “Absolutely Punk: Queer Economies of Desire in Tarzan of the Apes.” Must Read: Rediscovering American Bestsellers: From Charlotte Temple to The DaVinci Code, edited by Sarah Churchwell and Thomas Smith.  London, England: Continuum, 2012, pp. 175-195.
• Oklopčić, Biljana.  “Adapting the Adapted: Adapting the Adapted: The Black Rapist Myth in E.R. Burroughs' Tarzan of the Apes and Its Film Adaptations.”  Anafora, vol. 4, no. 2, 2017, pp. 313-331.
• Speelman, Tom.  “The History of Tarzan in Comics.” Cosmic Alliance, 8 July 2016, http://comicsalliance.com/history-tarzan-comics/
• Taliaferro, John.  Tarzan Forever: The Life of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Creator of Tarzan.  New York: Scribner, 1999.
• Tuhkanen, Mikko. “Grotesquely Becoming: Tarzan’s Queer Hominization.”  Diacritics, vol. 44, no. 1, 2016, pp. 26-58.
• Vernon, Alex.  On Tarzan. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2008.
• Watson, Bruce.  “Tarzan the Eternal.”  Smithsonian, vol. 31, no. 12, Mar. 2001, 62-72.

Ncanty (talk) 01:42, 20 April 2018 (UTC)

• Berglund, Jeff. “Write, Right, White, Rite: Literacy, Imperialism, Race, and Cannibalism in Edgar Rice Burroughs Tarzan of the Apes.” Studies in American Fiction, vol. 27, no. 1, 1999, pp. 53–76. doi:10.1353/saf.1999.0011
• Newsinger, John. “Lord Greystoke and Darkest Africa: the Politics of the Tarzan Stories.” Race & Class, vol. 28, no. 2, 1986, pp. 59–71. doi:10.1177/030639688602800204
• Griswold, Jerry. “The Legend and Literature of Tarzan.” John Hopkins University Press, 20 July 2016. www.press.jhu.edu/news/blog/legend-and-literature-tarzan
• Hillman, Bill. “Tarzan of the Apes.” Official Edgar Rice Burroughs Tribute Site. www.erbzine.com/mag4/0483.html

KSterli2 02:58, 20 April 2018 (UTC)

I like all of the ideas in your plan of action. Given the time we have for the assignment, you might start with the Critical Reception since those are articles which you could read in their entirety. I worry about the Background section if it requires you to read entire books, something you won't have time for. If you find it easy to read more selectively, however, that would still be an option.

Would love to hear what other editors think, too...

Aschuet1 (talk) 16:48, 20 April 2018 (UTC)

The article has now been updated! In contrast to the original plan, we wrote a Themes section, and not Critical Reception, as our sources were better suited for this after all. KSterli2 01:30, 3 May 2018 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kitkifwiki (talk • contribs)

We wrote Background and Themes. Would anybody comment on ways in which we could improve? Thank you. 688GlRv (talk) 17:18, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Final Contributions Assignment

Suggestions for Further Improving the Article

• According to the Wikipedia Manual of Style/Novels, character sections could benefit from brief summaries of each character, especially if the plot section does not cover the personalities or roles of all of the characters. A more comprehensive character section would improve the quality and depth of the Tarzan of the Apes article. In addition, if the links currently under “African Animals” are included in the descriptions for those characters, the “Animals” section would be redundant and could be deleted.
• A Style section might benefit from information in the following biographies on Burroughs, and possibly from histories of mainstream fiction during the early twentieth century in America.

Fenton, Robert W. (1967). The Big Swingers. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.

Hart, James David (1950). The Popular Book: A History of America's Literary Taste. University of California Press.

Lupoff, Richard A. (2005). Master of Adventure: The Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs. University of Nebraska Press.

Taliaferro, John (1999). Tarzan Forever. New York, NY: Scribner.

The following source might list other sources which could provide historical, literary context: Perkins, George B. (2002). HarperCollins Reader’s Encyclopedia of American Literature. New York: HarperResource.

A future editor probably would want to expand beyond these sources, especially in the history area.

• The Background section which we began could use more details. Future editors could include information such as the magazine publisher’s expectations, the amount that it paid Burroughs, and the process through which Tarzan of the Apes was published in the form of a novel. Perhaps knowing about the reaction of Burroughs’ wife and children to the story before it was published would be helpful.

This link from the main page covers the history of publication in novel form: ERBzine 0483: Publishing History

• Burroughs’ use of copyright, sales from Tarzan and related projects, and the growth of Tarzan across multiple medias could improve the Adaptations section.
• A Reception section would be an excellent addition. Sometimes, sources on Burroughs generalize about reception; many claim that the story was extremely popular without referencing reviews of it. Newspapers, specific reviews, sales statistics, or advertisements for the story would all be useful for writing this. The Adaptations section might also benefit from reviews.

The Process of Writing the Article

The group interpreted Wikipedia guidelines regarding scholarly language differently. One member leaned towards not referencing sources directly; she thought that this would help us to avoid argumentative language and original research. The other member leaned towards referencing sources in order to avoid plagiarism and to alert readers that we were not writing original research. We tried to mention the names of the sources in order to clarify language, and to avoid mentioning the names when that would seem repetitive.

One group member preferred short sentences. She thought that they conveyed ideas directly. The other member preferred longer sentences that tied ideas together, which she thought helped to summarize. We tried to give each other room to write according to individual styles; however, we simultaneously communicated about sentences which we found confusing. Because we communicated, the editing process happened without conflict. Rather than experiencing conflict, we understood the editing process on Wikipedia thoroughly because we asked questions, wrote individually, and edited each others’ writing.

One group member tried to write in the way in which many Wikipedia articles seem to articulate information. The other tried to write based on specific guidelines from Wikipedia. We found flexibility in writing based on the guidelines. Different styles exist on Wikipedia because each editor thinks differently; because the guidelines are flexible and we respected our individual interpretations, we were able to write an article that conformed to both our styles and Wikipedia’s directions. Our participation in writing this article allowed us not only to form part of Wikipedia, but for Wikipedia guidelines to form our our writing processes, our writing products, and our understandings of writing themselves.

We thank each other for writing, and for reading each other’s writing. Thank you to Aschuet1 for instruction in and outside of classes. We thank our peers, Lhovey2 and Jessehersh, for reviewing the first draft. And thank you to Wikipedia for the opportunity to learn about writing an online encyclopedia.

NAME

Due perhaps to the Alexander Skarsgard film "The Legend of Tarzan," some people believe that Tarzan's "civilized" name is John Clayton III. In the novel "Tarzan of the Apes" he is specifically referred to as the second John Clayton. See Chapter XXV, where the following line (a diary entry by John Clayton, Tarzan's father) appears: "Somehow, even against all reason, I seem to see him a grown man, taking his father's place in the world—the second John Clayton—and bringing added honors to the house of Greystoke."

I will give the various editors of this article time to see this before I insert this reference into the article and correct it. Thanks. Sir Rhosis (talk) 21:18, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

• No problem; I think you should just edit the line to your best ability; so it reads correctly...Modernist (talk) 22:09, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Infobox Info

All information in the infobox pertains only to the publication of the story as a book. Thus the publication date should be 1914, though the story appeared in magazine form in 1912. We can either differentiate the two, or leave it to the coorect book publication year of 1914. Sir Rhosis (talk) 22:36, 24 September 2020 (UTC)