ADVENTUROUS LIVES

I’m out of Tarzan material for the moment, so I’d like to build on my earlier review of The White Headhunter. James Renton crossed the boundary from the rough, but relatively domesticated world of Western civilization to life as a tribal warrior in the Solomon Islands. Quite a few other people made the same trip. Here in Texas it was often children who were captured and adopted by Indians such as the Apache or Comanche. Some of these captive/adoptees left memoirs. Hence my review of Nine Years Among the Indians.

The image of a ordinary young person from the prosaic domesticated world of frontier farms and whaling ships (ok, it seems pretty wild compared to OUR era, but no doubt seemed ordinary at the time) entering into the heroic, individualistic life of a tribal warrior demands attention. Arguably, that fascination with the idea of the primitive (as distinct from the reality of tribal life, let me be clear) informs quite a bit of adventure fiction and especially sword and sorcery. So why not explore the reality of that world? It's as fascinating as anything you'd read in Thrilling Jungle Tales.

FLASHSHOT

You can still sign up for Flashshot in time to get my forthcoming micro-fiction. "A Visit to the Caucasus, 1839" will be e-mailed on Monday the 18th. For details go to http://www.gwthomas.org/subscribe.htm.

-Dave Hardy