Incidentally the narrator, Tan Hadron, tells us that his one-man scout flier " easily attains the speed of two thousand haads per zode" (about 300 miles per hour). It, and the flyer itself, imply a high level of technical achievement by the dominant red men of Mars. Let's look again at that passage I quoted.įirst, note the destination control compass (a pre-programmable steering-device for Barsoomian flyers). In fact, you're ignoring the huge risks that Burroughs runs as a writer. You, Stid, are trying to make out that there is no great mystery about the success of this series. Zendexor : No, I am not going to make points of that sort. Go on writing in that vein for ten books and you're bound to end up having created something fairly substantial. To the extent that he does make Barsoom solidly real in the reader's mind, it's because of that gift for narrative vividness.
#MAP OF BARSOOM FULL#
Stid : Let me guess: you're going to use this passage, and others like it, to make a point about the achievement of the series: namely that it's full of movement, adventure and excitement against a background which is colourful and (given he built it up in ten volumes) detailed enough for us to feel that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Hating and hated, ignorant of love, laughter or happiness, they lead their long, fierce lives, quarrelling among themselves and their neighbours and preying upon any chance adventurers who happen within the confines of their bitter and desolate domain. Down towards the lowest sea bottoms other ruins mark the tragic trail that that ancient civilization had followed in pursuit of the receding waters of its ocean to where the last city finally succumbed, bereft of commerce, shorn of power, to fall at last an easy victim to the marauding hordes of fierce, green tribesmen, whose descendants now are the sole rulers of many of these deserted sea bottoms. Even in their ruins there is a grandeur and magnificence that still have power to awe a modern man. Upon the edges of plateaus that once had marked the shore-line of a noble continent I passed above the lonely monuments of that ancient prosperity, the sad, deserted cities of old Barsoom. However, I set it roughly at a point about thirty degrees south latitude, thirty-five degrees east longitude, as I believed that Jahar lay somewhere to the south-west of that point.įlying at high speed I had long since left behind the cultivated areas near Helium and was crossing above a desolate and deserted waste of ochre moss that clothed the dead sea bottoms where once rolled a mighty ocean bearing upon its bosom the shipping of a happy and prosperous people, now but a half-forgotten memory in the legends of Barsoom. In the adventure upon which I had embarked the destination control compass was of little value to me, since I did not know the exact location of Jahar. Let me quote a three-paragraph passage from A Fighting Man of Mars.
We're given the known and the unknown, together, in the right degree of balance.
#MAP OF BARSOOM SERIES#
Emblematic of the series is that image of flight into mystery.Īnd yet it's not a blank mystery. " The thin air of dying Mars" - that's what is cleaved by the prow of your flier as you rise from the ground in search of adventure. In fact, the most vital issue remains to be addressed. Zendexor : Plenty remains to be said, I assure you. Stid : So much has already been written about them, that I question our ability to add anything useful to the sum of critiques.
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