As far as cultural icons go, Tarzan is right up there with other literary behemoths of roughly the same vintage such as Sherlock Holmes, Dracula and Superman. First swinging his way in the popular consciousness via a pulp-fiction magazine story in 1912, Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Tarzan has gone on to be the focus of twenty-five books by Burroughs himself and several other novels [both authorised and otherwise] by various authors, not to mention the mass of films, series and other merchandise in which the King of the Apes has also featured. Tarzan is in fact one of those characters who everyone seems to know about even though very few people know that the actual, the original, material from which the legend grew. In an effort to address this issue, Oxford University Press have reissued this delightful hardback edition of Burroughs’ Tarzan of the Apes so that readers might enjoy the classic origin story of Tarzan as well as come to appreciate the complex backdrop of colonial appropriation, literary heritage and nostalgic yearning from which he emerged.

John and Alice Clayton, more formally known as Lord and Lady Greystoke, were an English couple who suffered great misadventure and were marooned in the western jungles of equatorial Africa. While there they produced a son, named him John Clayton, and then fairly promptly expired. The boy was adopted by a she-ape named Kala, was now known as Tarzan [which apparently means "white skin" in ape talk) and was raised in understandable ignorance of his human heritage. As he grows older, Tarzan feels increasingly isolated from his peers due to their obvious physical differences. One day he discovers the old cabin that his human parents had lived in during their jungle days and, through books that are left there, Tarzan [having taught himself to read] learns that there are others like him. As he is leaving the cabin, Tarzan is attacked by a huge gorilla but manages to kill him using his father’s knife. Tarzan’s growing hunting prowess begins to earn him the enmity of Kerchak, the ape leader.

Eventually, a group of black Africans settle in the area and one of their hunting groups kills Mala. After avenging himself on the killers, Tarzan maintains an antagonistic relationship with the group. Subsequently, a group of white travellers are marooned on the coast. Tarzan at first observes them from a distance but eventually becomes acquainted with Jane Porter, William Cecil Clayton [yes, unwilling usurper of Tarzan’s inheritance] and French Naval Officer Paul D’Arnot. With the help of D’Arnot, Tarzan begins to unravel the mysteries of his origin, to decide what his future should hold and what part exactly Jane Porter should play in it.

Tarzan of the Apes is certainly a complex and contradictory product of its time. At the beginning of the novel John and Alice Clayton are travelling to Africa so that John could begin employment with the British Colonial Office. His tasks were to include “a thorough investigation of the unfair treatment of black British subjects by officers of a friendly European power.” Clayton’s work could be said therefore to involve assisting the liberal democratic government of the time to correct the lingering wrongs of slavery and racism in colonial Africa. However, Burroughs’ descriptions of the Africans who settle near to the land inhabited by Tarzan and the apes are fairly condescending and offensive. The Africans are portrayed as being savage and cannibalistic while at the same time ignorant and childlike. Even though some of the most unacceptable passages from Burroughs’ original work have been expunged from this edition, there are still many uncomfortable moments. Tarzan himself utters more than a few racist comments [he is also a rather blatant sexist] that are bound to render him rather unsympathetic to the modern reader. It is hard to know whether such ideas were truly the belief of Burroughs or whether he was just pandering to the attitudes of his time. Although the instances of racism and sexism are jarring, the story at the heart of Tarzan of the Apes is captivating and worthy of being read and enjoyed. Although it is worthwhile to be prepared for comments and incidents that are unpalatable, modern readers should still tackle the Tarzan novels and perhaps recognise them as a window into society of the time in which they were written.

It is not only Burroughs’ treatment of the Africans which is contradictory. The character of Tarzan himself goes through a number of dramatic changes, at least some of which will be surprising to readers more familiar with the Disney version of the story than the original material. Burroughs seems to use the growth of Tarzan as an analogy to evolution. Although while young Tarzan is viewed as inferior by his ape family due to his inability to climb and hunt at the same level as his “cousins”, when he reaches adulthood Tarzan is portrayed as being superior to his adopted family due to his ability for critical thought and the intelligence that must be somehow inherent in his humanity. While Tarzan is able to reason and use tools that the apes could never master, he still revels in violence and takes enjoyment in killing. Despite being far more “civilised” than the apes, he still displays the more base of human characteristics. Towards the end of Tarzan of the Apes, Tarzan changes character rather rapidly as D’Arnot helps him to learn the ways of the European gentleman. He actually ends up resembling more an international playboy spy than a naïve, uncouth ape-man. Think James Bond in his tuxedo rather than Johnny Weissmuller in his loincloth. Just like the evolution of the story behind Tarzan of the Apes, the evolution of Tarzan himself takes many surprising twists and turns.

Still a masterpiece of a pulp adventure story, Tarzan of the Apes is an exciting if flawed novel. While Burroughs does indulge in some highly inaccurate flights of fancy and relies heavily on some very improbable coincidences, the story of Tarzan is one that has captured the public’s imagination for nearly a century. Although the story might not be one that modern readers can fully recognise nor indeed fully support, Tarzan of the Apes is an important milestone for the adventure genre and is still worthy of being read.

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