From Pirates to Pellucidar

Before I ever discovered Pellucidar, I was into pirates. In fact, one of my first memories is of reading my favorite book, Look Out for Pirates! aloud, to my brother, Mike. He was barely a toddler.

Whenever I leaned over the crib to show him the picture that went with the prose I was so enthusiastically reciting, he’d grab the book at try to throw it away. I guess he figured the only way out of this hellscape was to get his own books, so he was reading even earlier than me.

It was a big part of our childhood.

One of best days of the week was Saturday. I mean, that’s when the cartoons were on, so obviously. But after cartoons, that was the day we got to go to the Central Library for our weekly quota of new books.

The Central Library Was Happening

The building, which currently sits empty, is one of a handful of Queenston limestone buildings in London, Ontario. Built in an Art Deco style with Hellenistic flourishes, it was an early example of a library that was there to house books, but also to provide meeting rooms and public space for the community. I find it ironic as hell that there’s a mask of Socrates over the door, given his stance on the written word. (He was against it, especially as a mode of transmitting knowledge.)

Of course, at age ten, I had no idea who Socrates was. I was reading less mature fare.

Tarzan and Friends

Both Mike and I were into Burroughs (Edgar Rice, not William S.). At seven, he was precociously plowing through the Tarzan books. I was exploring Burroughs’s more esoteric stuff. The John Carter of Mars books, then I found the moon and Venus novels, and finally, I discovered the Pellucidar series. These are the ones set in the hollow center of the Earth, where prehistoric beasts still roam. Plato’s Republic, it was not.

Then something happened. It was probably the third book in the series, when I realized it. “This story isn’t really that different from the others.” I mean, yes, Tanar is at least a native of Pellucidar in this story, but it’s still the same pattern: Muscular hero rescues primitive babe and confronts evil overlords to save the day. (Sometimes he had to confront the evil overlords before he could save the babe).

Yes, I’d discovered that Burroughs was writing from a formula!

I kept reading them, though. The next one in the series actually had Tarzan as a protagonist, which I felt like I maybe shouldn’t read, because Tarzan was Mike’s guy, but I did.

The Formula, Oh, the Formula!

Still, it was impossible not to see the pattern, once I’d identified it. As I read the last few books in the Pellucidar series – there was binging long before Netflix – it just became more and more obvious.

But that was a good thing, because it meant I was ready to move onto other authors, and it really widened the field for what I was reading, including an author I was WAY too young to be reading: Philip Jose Farmer.

I’ll save that story for another time.

How about you? Did you ever have a reading epiphany? I love to hear stories from readers! I’ve opened up the comments, or you can always connect with me on Mastodon.

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