Jump to content

Talk:Edgar Rice Burroughs/Archive 1

Page contents not supported in other languages.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Archive 1

Geography and History of Barsoom?

Burroughs' fictional geography and history is fairly detailed, much like Middle-earth in its complexity, though never set in maps as we find in Tolkien; I believe the same is true of Pellucidar and Venus. Would this make a worthy section/article? Martian chess, Martian marital law, all that stuff, too.Skookum1 06:23, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

Most if not all of Burroughs' worlds and lost lands were in fact mapped, both by him and others, and a good portion of these maps are available on the web. There are Wikipedia articles on Barsoom, Jetan (Martian chess), and Pellucidar (which includes Burrough's earliest map of a portion of that venue). -BPK2, 12/16/05.

Books

Did a minor edit on the Caspak series. There are only 3 books (actually, 3 parts of one long novel). Somehow Project Guttenberg has mis-labeled the 2nd work. --Emb021 15:44, 17 May 2005 (UTC)

Do we really need a link for every Venus book? Or for every Tarzan book, for that matter. I would think only a few of the most important books need a separate article. Rick Norwood 15:43, 9 January 2006 (UTC)
Good suggestion. I changed the Carson of Venus stub to a Venus series stub and created redirects from the other titles in the series. --Rewster 05:59, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

pagebypagebooks.com

I removed this from the external links because it is just one of dozens of sites which reproduce books online. In particular the link doesn't go to books by ERB, but is a general list of all the books at the site. It looks like site promotion (spam), click on it expecting info but ERB but instead get "100s of free e-books!" with banner adds. If you can say why this site is different and not redundant with more complete, specific and neutral collections, such as Gutenberg, and can find a way to link to just the books by ERB, it may be more acceptable. -- Stbalbach 14:14, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to add a link like:

to the External Links section. This links to a list of ERB works that you can download to read on a cell phone. I have read quite a few from this site and got a lot of value out being able to read the PD texts away from the PC.

The texts are Public Domain in the US, just like Project Gutenberg, they are packaged with the reader and available under a creative commons licence (share if (attribution, non-commercial, no derivative) ). The site is non-commercial without registration, subscription, or advertising. The texts as packaged together with the reader as a java program that runs on cell phones, this is a way for people to access the authors work that adds to the range in the existing external links (hopefully translating to more reading going on).

I checked WP:EL and the link seems appropriate:

  • What should be linked: '...should link to a site hosting a copy of the work if none of the "Links normally to be avoided" criteria apply.'
  • Links normally to be avoided: it seems only #8 might apply; 'Direct links to documents that require external applications (such as Flash or Java) to view the relevant content...'. The site lets you download java programs that only run on a J2ME environment, this means most/all current cell phones. So although they are limited to being read on a phone they do add an access method to all the others in the existing External Links, in the same way that LibriVox adds a format but requires an mp3 player.

Filomath 04:28, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Moon men.JPG

Image:Moon men.JPG is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images lacking such an explanation can be deleted one week after being tagged, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 23:27, 2 January 2008 (UTC)


I dont think the Mucker series as in The Mucker,The Return of The Mucker ect. Should be called a series b/c in guttenburg the mucker has in it also the return of the mucker and the oakdale affair does not even mention it the only character common to both books is bridge ben (talk) 14:12, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

E. R. Burroughs and C. S. Lewis, lost twins

They were born 23 years apart, but they sure look like twins. Das Baz, aka Erudil 18:04, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Audio books

There were links to Audiobooksforfree.com, but it has only Abridged audiobooks, while Librivox.org has them unabridged.--RicHard-59 (talk) 20:25, 17 May 2009 (UTC)

Ebooks

No need to emhasize on every book that material of ebook is in Project Gutenberg. --RicHard (talk) 20:38, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Issues with "Influence and Literary Merit" section

This section seems a little problematic to me since it part of it expresses opinion rather than fact. Also, a pretty big portion of it seems to have been copied and pasted from somewhere else without any citation.

"Likewise, Blacks (again, especially in the Tarzan novels, but also in the Mars series) ... are depicted sometimes as stereotypes and just as frequently as wise or valorous." The First Born of Barsoom are described by John Carter (a Virginian) as having noble, classic features and truly black skins. I don't think there's anything African or negroid about them, and they really don't belong, for better or worse, in a discussion of racial issues. WHPratt (talk) 19:15, 16 February 2009 (UTC)WHPratt

User:CommanderCool1654 (User talk:CommanderCool1654) 19:33, 25 October 2008 (UTC)

I've been doing a fair amount of research on Burroughs for the various Barsoom articles and so have come across useful sources for this section. Some of the stuff in this section can be referenced, but probably not all. I did a similar exercise on another page recently and it got too frustrating to try and reference material when you did not know where it came from, or whether it was a synthesis of sources ... original research if you like. The exercise in sourcing ended up being a complete rewrite and I suspect that is what would happen here too.
There is, btw, quite of lot of published commentary about racial issues in the Martian books, Tarzan and others, Burroughs own racial attitudes and his use of stereotypes. Mesmacat (talk) 01:21, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
This section reminds me of Lupoff's writing. Among other things, it seems to be written for someone who is familiar with Burroughs' work. The disparaging reference to Synthetic Men of Mars, for example, seems to assume that the reader knows that this is a bad book. (As a huge Barsoom fan, I actually like Synthetic Men a lot, even though I like it less than books 1-8 or 10. I could rewrite this passage and say that Synthetic Men is "a great book, but not quite as great as the other Barsoom books." Thathat would be just as POV as what's in there now.)
Of course, if the article were to state that fans and critics -- e.g., Lupoff -- hold that some of his later works, including Synthetic Men, were "pot-boilers" of inferior quality, that would be excellent and NPOV.
An even more interesting analysis would compare the different feel of his different series. I suspect that the average person who has read one or two ERB books assume that they are all the same, as seems to be suggested in this article. But if they are only familiar with John Carter and Tarzan, they would be astounded to discover in the Venus series that the hero avoids confrontation, and flees from trouble whenever possible.... John Carter singlehandedly restructured Martian politics, whereas Carson Napier explores Venus without leaving much of a footprint. Might be worth mentioning.
Also worth mentioning is the fact that since the mid-1920s, ERB has been lumped in with other science fiction writers (for better or worse), but in fact it's equally useful in literary terms to put him in the same category as Rider Haggard and other swashbuckling adventure-story writers of that era. — Lawrence King (talk) 05:57, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

'I don't think there's anything African or negroid about them, and they really don't belong, for better or worse, in a discussion of racial issues'. This seems a little problematic. We can hardly expect Burroughs to find African inhabitants of Mars but rather Martians. Burroughs does make skin colour an issue by delineating different colours for the martians. He make sit clear by implication that skin colour is irrelevant to other qualities - good or bad. He also gives a highly sympathetic picture of Apaches and cast them in heroic moulds and uses a Jew in Moon Maid in a heroic role. Tarzanlordofthejungle (talk) 08:32, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Influence and literary merit

Is this section worthwhile or should it be deleted? Can it be improved? Modernist (talk) 22:12, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't see any merit in it, other than in maybe 5% of the total. It totally lacks sources. And many of its statements are highly dubious.
For example, it seems to state that Burroughs influenced Brackett, Bradbury, and Moorcock, as proven by the fact that each of these three wrote a Burroughs pastiche at some point. I think that shows a lack of understanding of what literary influence is. Suppose you found out that Stephen King, in 1980, wrote a humorous ten-page pastiche of Jane Austen's novels. Would you therefore say that "Jane Austen was an influence on Stephen King"? Of course not. That would show that King had read Austen, and probably liked her work. I have no doubt that most science fiction and fantasy writers from the pre-Golden Age till the 1980s had read ERB and liked some of his stuff. But that's not what literary influence means.
Other statements are literary criticism, drowned in adverbs and adjectives. For example, the following sentence: "Certainly the most evident feature of Burroughs's novels is their frequently formulaic nature." What do the italicized words do? Even if ERB's works are formulaic, is that really evident? Is it the most evident feature? Is that certain?
I also have a problem with people today looking back in hindsight and calling ERB formulaic. Has the author of that piece read other novels written by American writers of ERB's era? Before the 1960s, a majority of feature films were Westerns. All of these look formulaic to us today, because they involved cowboys and damsels and scary Indians. Does that make them formulaic? Or does that just make them a genre?? If someday the genre of "mystery novel" becomes defunct, people who discover old mystery novels will claim they are formulaic because they always involve a detective, and at the end the criminal is unmasked. Formula? Or genre? In ERB's time, the hero was always male, he was brave and bold, and at the end he beat the bad guy. Formula? Or genre?
But the biggest problem is absolutely no sources. The writer cites The Moon Maid (which I've never loved, but I know many others do), Tarzan of the Apes, and a few other books "as evidence that Burroughs could indeed compose works of considerable quality when he took the time to do so." Even if we concede that the Wikipedia author is being NPOV to call these ERB's highest quality works, where is the evidence that these works "took more time" to write? For all I know, ERB's best stuff was written most quickly. (Heinlein's quality is higher on the books he wrote more quickly, to use one example.) — Lawrence King (talk) 02:58, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
Worst of all is his "Criticism" subsection. It is a long paragraph arguing that Burroughs' books are not racist, or sexist, or anything else bad. Why is this section called "criticism"? I presume it's because the writer is responding to criticisms that he has heard -- but he hasn't bothered to summarize the criticisms before refuting them. — Lawrence King (talk)
So should the section be junked altogether or can it be referenced and reworked? Modernist (talk) 03:25, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
If you want to rework it, please do. If anyone else wants to rework it, they should do so. I don't have time to do so, as it requires a lot of source work. If the only choices are Keep and Delete, I vote to delete. — Lawrence King (talk) 03:38, 9 April 2009 (UTC)
I have no interest...I'm gonna delete the section...Modernist (talk) 03:41, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Rather than just baldly stating 'racism', I think it would be more informative to mention the profound effect Burrough's 'Tarzan' series had on the popular Western view/stereotyping of Africa in the twentieth century, keeping in mind the fact that he never actually visited Africa (citation needed), and the inaccuracies he perpetrated (e.g. tigers in Africa). 93.96.142.159 Centrepull (talk) 22:35, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

With respect to the accusations that ERB's writing was formulaic, I have to say that Lawrence King's argument is poor (I am not saying that therefore ERB's writing is formulaic). While the Western is a genre, the Western as described above by Lawrence King

involving cowboys and damsels and scary Indians

is definitely formulaic. This is what makes many of the classics of the genre to be so called - they transcend or subvert the formula. By the late 60s the formula had been done to death, and this gave rise to 'The Wild Bunch', 'Little Big Man' etc. Similarly, mystery novels are a genre, but many of them are formulaic. LK has not made a point either way.

I have found some reputable quotes from the original Tarzan novel with respect to the influence of ERB's writings on the stereotypical Western view of Africa and Africans. E.g. [1]. I'm looking for a decent citation for this statement that ERB never visited Africa, as it doesn't seem clear whether he never visited Africa until he had written some of the novels, or indeed never visited Africa at all in his lifetime. Centrepull (talk) 16:06, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

As far as style goes I think we can safely assume that Burroughs did not influence Bradbury. Inspiration though is another matter. Bradbury states that he was heavily influenced by Burroughs as a child. Bradbury wrote Martian chronicles about Mars not Illinois. I'd agree that they can't be considered as coming from the same school of writing but in the sense that both were writers and both were in the speculative field of fiction influence is clear. Tarzanlordofthejungle (talk) 08:36, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Religion!

A quick search has made me see that some mention he opposed organized religion, as I started reading Tarzan I wondered myself whether he was atheist, agnostic or held a deeply religious view (hat could, nonetheless, oppose organized religion) and I'm surprised it is not even mentioned in the article when I guess many fundies would have been offended by his wording and opposed him... Anyone knows better on his view on religion and any related criticism or polemics?Undead Herle King (talk) 04:50, 3 August 2009 (UTC)

  • Porges, Irwin (1975). Edgar Rice Burroughs. Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press. ISBN 4500-30482.
  • Holtsmark, Erling B. (1986). Edgar Rice Burroughs. Boston: Twain Publishers. ISBN 0-8057-7459-9.
There is material on this in the two texts above. My understanding was he was not anti-religious but suspicious of the potential for corruption and exploitation, something he saw as inherent to many organised religions. Mesmacat (talk) 05:17, 3 August 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the data, nonetheless I doubt I have the chance to find those books, however my call was for the article itself... Burroughs deserve a better article than a mere list of his works... And this is among the data that could be added for the better... Now, he was not anti-religious, but that is not the same as being religious, was he religious? what religion was he? There are many things to say about him taht could improve the article, I cannot I do not have books about him nor access to a library or similiar place where I can get books on him...Undead Herle King (talk) 05:00, 10 August 2009 (UTC)
I gather from my reading of various ERB biographies that the man was a political conservative and invariably supported Republicans. It is interesting that religion was not attached to conservatism as it is today (or at least in Burroughs' case). WHPratt (talk) 14:16, 12 November 2009 (UTC)
However, note the second novel in the Moon series. It's a fairly blatant anti-Communist polemic, with strong support for specifically Christian religion against state enforced atheism. There's even a positively portrayed Jewish character, perhaps anticipating later co-opting of Judaism and Jewish Americans by the religious right under the "Judeo-Christian" label. I think his work is split on this issue precisely because of the split in society and global politics that were occurring at the time he was writing. Although a man of "science" and "reason", and as such in favor of new ideas and new ways of thinking that replaced Christianity; he was also diametrically opposed to the beliefs of Communism, and so his world view grew to include Christianity as at least a necessary social good. --81.158.147.181 (talk) 18:19, 14 August 2010 (UTC)
The fact is, "The Moon Men" was originally "Under the Red Flag," a more straightforward speculation on Earth's political future. ERB added the Moon invaders angle and other science fictional stuff to get it published. WHPratt (talk) 13:22, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

He seems more of a Pantheist - he makes an almost constant critique of organized religion in almost every one of the speculative books. Tarzanlordofthejungle (talk) 08:41, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

Genealogy

Burroughs descended from somewhere in the neighborhood of 250 people living at the time of Edmund Rice. Do we understand him better by naming one of them, the father's mother's father's father's father's father's father's father and the generations connecting them? Did this descent affect his writings? Did he live a substantially different life for being descended from Edmund Rice through his son Edward than had he descended from one of his other sons, or not descended from Edmund at all? Alternatively, is Edmund Rice such a notable person in his own time that he, and none of Burroughs' other ancestors, merits special notice, as might be the case for George Washington? Is Burroughs in some sense the literary heir of Edmund Rice? Was Burroughs named (specifically) after Edmund Rice? No, No, No, No, No, and No. This is just indiscriminate genealogy chosen arbitrarily. Agricolae (talk) 03:23, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

I still don't see, 1) why a genealogy from a colonial immigrant is important for a 20th century author, when it provides the slightest useful context, but rather seems intended solely to demonstrate a descent from an otherwise random immigrant in which an editor appears to have taken a special interest; and 2) if there is to be genealogy, why this one specific colonial ancestor is to be shown to the exclusion of all others? Yes, the author's middle name came from the surname of his grandmother Mary Rice, who happened to be the great-great-great-granddaughter of that immigrant, but that hardly makes Edmund Rice the most important ancestor of the writer. ERB also descends from John Tilley, Alice Thompson Freeman, Thomas Buckminster, Benjamin Cooley, etc., not to mention his Burroughs immigrant ancestor. Edmund Rice is just one among a long list, neither notably more important in his own time, nor notably more relevant to the author. What happens when an editor with a particular interest in, say, immigrant William Rockwell decides to mention him on the pages of every one of his descendants? Or Thomas Blodget? There is nothing about this connection that merits special mention. It all seems both WP:UNDUE and WP:INDISCRIMINATE. Agricolae (talk) 03:00, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

Dr. Farmers: The Burroughs immigrant Ancestor appears to be George Burroughs of Salem a contemporary of Edmund Rice (1638) and I'm trying to nail down that connection fairly firmly as the evidence chain broken at a Burroughs ancestor in the Warren, MA in the mid-1700s. The point being that both Burroughs and Rice names have early Massachusetts Bay Colony roots in America & that is of interest. Innapoy (talk) 13:18, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Do you have a reliable source that regards this connection as being of interest? If not, I think it should be removed. Incidentally, please don't call Agricolae's deletion "vandalism"; you may not agree with it but he explained his reasons for it. It's just a difference of opinion. Mike Christie (talk – library) 13:24, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
Okay, it is a difference in opinion and I relent. This is not worth the aggravation...as I took this up as a *relaxing* pastime...bah! I'll buy the scrapping of the genealogical chart as smacking of to many 'begats', but I'm not prepared to buy that the Burroughs and Rice Massachusetts Bay immigrants are not relevant. So like many forms of differences of opinion, the most persistent are the winners. Congratulations, Dr. Farmers. I will note however, that if your argument is taken to its logical conclusion, there is no room for ANY sort of highly specialized esoterica at all within the system. What a shame...precious few interested. Innapoy (talk) 17:39, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
All you give to support the relevance is that you aren't prepared to buy that it's not, with no reason, evidence or criteria that would make it so. Relevance is not the default position, so it will take more than a bold assertion to demonstrate it. Agricolae (talk) 20:01, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
Clearly the early colonial origins of the two surnames for a major literary figure is relevant and self-evident. It is an a priori sort of like "Cogito ergo sum". But as I said, you win due to your superior persistence in this matter and higher status on the Wikipedia pecking order.Innapoy (talk) 22:21, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
There's no pecking order here; it's just that editors who have become familiar with Wikipedia's policies, and who follow them, tend to get support from other editors. We all have our opinions, but the policies trump them. In this case the question is whether the link is notable, and I can assure you that if you can find a reliable source that mentions this connection it will be much easier to persuade editors to add it. There are a couple of other considerations here, including whether this is original research, or if you are depending on primary sources, but if you find sources that discuss this connection it would make a big difference to this debate. Mike Christie (talk – library) 23:40, 4 February 2011 (UTC)
There is no set policy on genealogy, and so we must fall back on the general policies of notability, discrimination and due weight (along with the prohibition against original research, even by synthesis). Nothing is self-evident. You cannot even assume reciprocity (e.g. it may be notable that ERB is one of the descendants of Edmund Rice, worth mentioning on Rice's page, while not being notable that Edmund Rice is one of the ancestors of ERB, worth mentioning on this page). The relevant question, then, is what weight do scholars of ERB give to his descent from Edmund Rice? I have never seen it mentioned, let alone highlighted, in his biographies. Agricolae (talk) 01:06, 5 February 2011 (UTC)

"Minidoka," the first substantial piece of fiction written by Edgar Rice Burroughs

In Irwin Porges’s mammoth, authorized biography of Edgar Rice Burroughs, I ran across information regarding Burroughs’ first work of fiction, a story called “Minidoka,” written before he wrote “Under the Moons of Mars” (that is, A Princess of Mars). What follows below is the relevant passage, excerpted from page 89 (Chapter 5) of the third printing, Brigham Young University Press, 1976 hardcover of Irwin Porges’s Edgar Rice Burroughs: The Man Who Created Tarzan. The period referred to is 1903-1904, when Burroughs was with his brothers, who were conducting dredge-mining operations for gold and silver in the Idaho/Oregon area of the Snake River. “Ed” is Edgar, and the Raft River is a branch of the Snake River in SE Idaho.

“...important evidence reveals that during this period or shortly thereafter he made his first creative venture into the field of fiction, improvising a delightfully fanciful story titled ‘Minidoka 937th Earl of One Mile Series M. An Historical Fairly Tale.’ The recent discovery of this unnoticed manuscript clearly established that it antedates the story assumed to be Burroughs’ first--‘Under the Moons of Mars.’

Handwritten on odd sheets of paper including the backs of letterheads of the Yale Dredging Company, Minidoka, Idaho; photo bills from the stationery store at Pocatello; and letterheads of the American Genealogical Society, 1102 Woman’s Temple, Chicago, the story is composed of eighty-two pages. The Burroughs handwriting, unmistakable, sweeps across the pages in a hasty scrawl, as though his pen were dashing to keep pace with the ideas that tumbled forth. Yet, despite the apparent haste, there are not many corrections. The first part of the story is somewhat scratchy, with lined-out phrases and with sentences and words inserted or changed; but the author’s imagination soon breaks free, and the incidents, as improbable as any ever created, soon flow along with only brief and minor corrections.

‘Minidoka’ is a captivating, highly imaginative fairy story that presages the Edgar Rice Burroughs talent that was to flower ten years later. Idaho was naturally the setting for the fairy tale, and Ed created two imaginary kingdoms separated by the Raft River and ‘forever at war.’ The tone of the writing is of course humorous and satirical, and in the opening Ed pokes fun at the Irish.” — Preceding unsigned comment added by Confusedparticles (talk • contribs) 23:55, 30 May 2013 (UTC)

Almost all of the reference to Burroughs influenced media in this section relate to the Mars books. Most of these and considerably more are covered in the influences section in the Barsoom article. There are a great number of Tarzan influences which are not here and you could probably find more influences upon other texts as well. Any thoughts on whether the stuff in this section is too specific to be here? Mesmacat (talk) 04:09, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

See Don't Go Near the Water (novel). Burroughs figures as a background celebrity in one of the stories. Perhaps this should be added to the article section. WHPratt (talk) 20:39, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Influence and Legacy

I am surprised that an article about a prominent author says NOTHING about his influence and legacy. Apparently there used to be such a section, but it was deleted. But I still think there needs to be a discussion about how he transformed the genres he worked in, how he influenced and inspired future generations of writers, etc.

But also important for ERB are the folks who were inspired to become scientists from his stories. I know that Carl Sagan and Jane Goodall were both inspired to become scientists from reading ERB, and I think there are others. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 35.12.24.89 (talk) 11:59, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

rounding off

"...and earned Burroughs US $400 (roughly the equivalent of US $8779.47 in 2009)."

Such a precise number is not the "rough equivalent" of anything. I've edited this to $8800. WilliamSommerwerck (talk)

I know this is an old topic (since the above phrase isn't in the article anymore), but the inflation template can be used. This:
${{Inflation|US|400|1912|fmt=c}}
Which would render as:
$12,629
In fact, since that information seems to have been deleted, I added it back in. — Frεcklεfσσt | Talk 15:31, 3 June 2014 (UTC)

help

does anyone know how tall edgar rice burroughs was?

According to his driver's license reprinted in Irwin Porges' biography, he was 5'10", 195 lbs.Carolann Wright (talk) 07:19, 29 March 2015 (UTC)

Hello fellow Wikipedians,

I have just modified one external link on Edgar Rice Burroughs. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:

When you have finished reviewing my changes, please set the checked parameter below to true or failed to let others know (documentation at {{Sourcecheck}}).

This message was posted before February 2018. After February 2018, "External links modified" talk page sections are no longer generated or monitored by InternetArchiveBot. No special action is required regarding these talk page notices, other than regular verification using the archive tool instructions below. Editors have permission to delete these "External links modified" talk page sections if they want to de-clutter talk pages, but see the RfC before doing mass systematic removals. This message is updated dynamically through the template {{source check}} (last update: 5 June 2024).

  • If you have discovered URLs which were erroneously considered dead by the bot, you can report them with this tool.
  • If you found an error with any archives or the URLs themselves, you can fix them with this tool.

Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 05:52, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

Lead section to provide accessible overview

While ERB is indubitably notable, I think all will agree that's almost entirely due to the characters and scenes in his stories and books. His personal history was mundane, he established no enduring institutions, his influence on style and content in popular fiction was modest, and he served the community in no other significant capacity than as a writer.

The previous single-sentence lead was originally written by User:TwoOneTwo in 2003, expanded by User:CommanderCool1654 in 2008, and clarified by User:RandyKryn in 2009. It was a bald description (American writer best known for his creations of the jungle hero Tarzan and the heroic Mars adventurer John Carter, although he produced works in many genres.) which identified two of his best-konwn products, but did little to describe their importance to Twentieth-Century America.

I chose to better identify the genres in which Burroughs wrote. Then I added Pellucidar to Mars as ERB places. Finally, I focus on the level of renown established by ERB's most widely-known character. Comparing Tarzan to some of the leading characters in other well-known series should provide sufficient perspective to most readers.

Ethnic laundry (talk) 00:03, 30 September 2017 (UTC)

Tarzana

I reverted the edit of anon user 207.225.233.198 who stated that Tarzana was named after Burroughs character and not the other way around. I did research on it and even included a link to the debunking of the theory; Tarzana was around longer than "Tarzan" was. If there's credible evidence that Tarzana was named after Tarzan or Burroughs ranch, I'd back down. But for now, it only looks like an urban legend (which Snopes.com refutes). Granted not all the debunkings on Snopes are accurate, but if there is any evidence rather than rumor that Tarzana is named after Tarzan, I'd like to see it.

I'd be more inclined to believe the change had it been made by a logged-in user rather than an anon. :-S — Frecklefoot | Talk 15:34, Aug 9, 2004 (UTC)

You need to read a bit more carefully, I think: Snopes' "debunking" of the claim that Tarzana was named after Tarzan is in the hoax section, which also "debunks" such wild claims as that Mister Ed was a horse and that mobile homes are so called because they can be moved around. The hoax section's explanation page confirms that Tarzana was indeed named after Tarzan.
You could also have tried reading Wikipedia's own entry on Tarzana, California, which was written entirely by a logged-in user.
--Paul A 06:14, 24 Aug 2004 (UTC)

You are 100% correct. I was duped by a false entry. I promise to read Snopes stuff more carefully next time. :-S — Frecklefoot | Talk 15:11, Aug 24, 2004 (UTC)


According to the Tarzana Chamber of Commerce, the city was named after Tarzan. www.tarzanachamber.com/

Wait. Since when can't mobile homes be moved around?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:CF99:2080:A919:5697:7BCA:1CCC (talk) 01:06, 6 March 2018 (UTC)

"Inferior"/"superior"

Modernist, apparently unlike you, I have read the reference. For your convenience, here is a publicly available version: [2] I don't know how anyone could come to the conclusion that anything in here supports the interpretation that His views held that Anglo-Saxons were inherently inferior - Burroughs was a good old-fashioned Anglo-Saxon supremacist, as just about any Victorian novelist. In case the full article is too much for you here's a quote:

In describing Tarzan’s response to his encounters with the Anglo-Saxon world, he wrote: ‘‘It was the hallmark of his aristocratic birth, the natural outcropping of many generations of fine breeding, an hereditary instinct of graciousness which a lifetime of uncouth and savage training and environment could not eradicate’’ (Burroughs, 1992, p. 277).

Now please point out to me, using this source, and preferably without all-caps shouting, how the harebrained formulation currently in the article could be anything other than a typo or old vandalism. A case could be made that for a shortened His views held that English nobles made up a particular elite among Anglo-Saxons, which is something that he is directly quoted for multiple times in this source; sidestepping the issue of how he viewed the common Britisher in comparison to that. But there's no evidence for His views held that Anglo-Saxons were inherently inferior. Go. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 16:49, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

@Modernist: okay, one more of these, and I will just assume illiteracy and/or general incompetence on your part. Reference as used in the article: [3] Identical copy of the same on Researchgate, as provided above: [4]. A little less attitude, a little more basic reading comprehension, pal? --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 19:09, 26 September 2020 (UTC)
  • This:[5] by David Smith and Alison L. Mitchell; is not this - [6] - Edgar Rice Burroughs’s Venus, Part 2: Lost on Venus, by Ryan Harvey, August 30 2011, Black Gate Magazine which is the reference - reference #41 in the article.

and For what it's worth - I actually agree with you regarding Burrough's racism; however if you want to change this article I suggest you re-edit that section and include what you consider to be a better source...Modernist (talk) 23:21, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

@Modernist: this is getting ever more bizarre. The entire content of the paragraph, with the exception of the last sentence, is sourced to the other reference (which you would know if you had read it yet). What you are proffering there is a book review that makes a few additional glosses on the topic, and is used to source one sentence only. Everything above, including all the Tarzan and Pirate Blood stuff, is in the Smith & Mitchell article. So, that's a miss. But then let us, for the sake of argument, assume that the book review actually is the source in question - where in the text is the justification for His views held that Anglo-Saxons were inherently inferior? I'm still waiting for that (but not much longer).
My suggested edit, following the sources provided, is to drop that unjustifiable statement. But that approach so far seems to be foundering on your revert button reflex. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 23:49, 26 September 2020 (UTC)
  • I have removed, "whom Burroughs clearly presents as inherently inferior, even not wholly human", as this seems contradicted by Tarzan#2, The Return of Tarzan:

At dawn the hunters were off. There were fifty sleek, black warriors, and in their midst, lithe and active as a young forest god, strode Tarzan of the Apes, his brown skin contrasting oddly with the ebony of his companions. Except for color he was one of them. His ornaments and weapons were the same as theirs—he spoke their language—he laughed and joked with them, and leaped and shouted in the brief wild dance that preceded their departure from the village, to all intent and purpose a savage among savages.

I read no superiority in the above, and the Waziri tribe becomes one of Tarzan's many recurring allies of the series. In the trope/meme of the time, they were "noble savages". I interpret "savage" as "not civilized", which can mean simply, "not living in a city" (whence the Civilization games' heavy city focus); in other words, merely descriptive and true, not pejorative. ERB's Martian series also has races of various colors; it's an easy descriptor.
I don't dispute that ERB divided humans into races nor his belief in the then-popular eugenics, but he was not EEEvil, just reflecting his own (and possibly his readers') culture. We can all only write within our cultures, and popular writers even more so.
I encourage statements about why ERB wrote as he did, if well-supported by multiple authoritative sources. Wikipedia should not be pushing one author's viewpoint, and surely after a century, multiple sources about such a popular author should be easy.Laguna CA (talk) 01:13, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
I'm sorry, but the statements in these sections are based on secondary and tertiary sources (published analyses of Burrough's works), which are referenced there. WP has a strong preference of such sources over personal interpretations of source material (see WP:SECONDARY, WP:OR) and that is what we follow. I daresay it is pretty easy to find single text passages that contradict any individual thing a commentator says about an author's work as a whole, or to come to a different conclusion as a reader, but that does not invalidate the primacy of such sources for what we state in articles. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 07:00, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Edgar_Rice_Burroughs/Archive_1&oldid=1253121367"