Dragon Teeth

Dragon Teeth is a novel by the American author Michael Crichton , published posthumously in 2017 from his estate by HarperCollins . 2018 the book was published as a translation of Klaus Berr in the Random House publishing group belonging Karl Blessing Verlag in Munich in German.

Thematically, Dragon Teeth is an adventure novel that takes up the rival activities of the paleontologists Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh in the context of the confrontation that became popular as Bone Wars towards the end of the 19th century. He builds on historically real people, places and events and places them in the context of a novel about the fictional expedition photographer William Johnson.

content

The rivalries between paleontologists Othniel Charles Marsh (left) and Edward Drinker Cope (right) became known as " Bone Wars " and form the background of the story.

General and formal structure

The novel Dragon Teeth is an adventure novel that is based on historically real people and events. After a short introduction, it is divided into three content-related parts, which are also structured into several chapters with headings:

• Part 1: The expedition to the west
• Part 2: The Forgotten World
• 3rd part: dragon teeth

The entire book is rendered in the past tense from the position of an omniscient narrator. The story and the narrator accompany the main character William Johnson, a student from Yale who, after betting, joins a geological expedition of Professor Othniel Charles Marsh and travels with him to the as yet unpopulated western United States . In addition to him and other fictional characters, there are several real people who Johnson meets and with whom he interacts on his journey. These are primarily the paleontologists Marsh and Cope, as well as Charles Hazelius Sternberg , who had worked with both. There are also the young writer Robert Louis Stevenson , the founder of Salt Lake City Brigham Young , the General of the US Army Philip Sheridan , George Armstrong Custer , the brothers Morgan and Wyatt Earp and the gunslingers "Wild Bill" Hickok and Jack McCall .

action

Charles Hazelius Sternberg belongs to Edward Drinker Cope's expedition group in the novel.

The focus of the novel is on Yale student William Johnson, who mostly spends his college days having fun and getting into trouble with it. In 1876, following a bet with a fellow student, he joined an expedition of the paleontologist Othniel Marsh as a photographer, who wanted to search for dinosaur bones in the western United States. The region in Montana and Wyoming was marked at this time by conflicts with Indians who defend their land against the encroachment of white settlers and gold diggers and wage war against the army of the United States. The Sioux in particular, under the leadership of war chief Sitting Bull , are on the warpath and rule the prairie regions where Marsh wants to search for fossils. Johnson joins the expedition despite his family's concerns, but the extremely suspicious Professor Marsh thinks he is a spy of his rival Edward Drinker Cope and treats him accordingly with suspicion.

After Marsh's expedition group had already reached Cheyenne , the latter left Johnson behind. He is visited by Cope, who offers him to join his expedition. Johnson accepts the offer and, together with Cope, his assistant Sternberg and the rest of the expedition members, travels westward via Salt Lake City to Fort Benton on the Missouri River in the US state of Montana . Once there, the group learns of the outcome of the Battle of Little Bighorn , in which the Sioux, led by Sitting Bull, defeated the 7th US Cavalry Regiment under Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer and killed more than 300 soldiers. Despite the warnings from the soldiers in Fort Benton, Cope and his group as well as the Indian guide Little Big Wind and the cook Cookie decide to go further into the prairie and look for fossils in the Judith Basin . After a few incidents, such as a meeting with an Army group they believe to be arms smugglers and a stampede in a herd of bison, they finally arrive in the wasteland on the Judith River , where they come across a migrant Crow camp . They are initially critical of them, but behave peacefully and finally let the geologists dig in the area.

The focus of the novel is on finding the teeth of the Brontosaurus , the "dragon's teeth".

Cope and his people begin their excavation work and relatively soon they can find and excavate fossils of dinosaurs and other animal groups. After a few days, Johnson and Little Big Wind discover that Professor Marsh is chasing after the group and has poisoned the drinking water from their water source. When asked about this, Cope decides to invite Marsh to dinner and to set a trap for him with the help of a forged skull. When Marsh falls for the feint and is caught trying to enter the camp at night and examine the skull, he is caught and driven away by the geologists. Cope expands his search and, despite further warnings about the Sioux moving north, sets off with the group in the highlands to dig there too. Shortly before they want to dismantle their camp, Johnson and Cope make the most important find of the expedition: huge teeth, which the professor recognizes as the largest known dinosaur teeth and assigns them to the previously unknown Brontosaurus . Shortly afterwards, they load their finds onto the wagon and take one half to Cow Island for shipping, but have to leave the other half behind for a second recovery. Since Sternberg is ill, Johnson offers to fetch the remaining boxes together with the student Toad and the coachman Cookie and Little Big Wind. On the way they are deceived by Cookie, who, together with Little Big Wind, leaves behind for fear of the Sioux Johnson and Toad, now visible through columns of smoke. Both Cookie and the students Little Big Wind returns to are attacked by the Sioux. Cookie makes it to Cope's camp, but dies of his wounds there. Cope assumes that the other participants in the rescue are also dead, and sends a corresponding telegram to Johnson's father.

Wyatt Earp assists Johnson in his escape from Deadwood and accompanies him and his cargo to Cheyenne.

Little Big Wind forces the students in the nightly pursuit to drive the fully packed car over the highland edge into the wasteland and thus outrun the Sioux. Toad is killed and both Johnson and Little Big Wind are injured, but the Sioux actually break the chase. Little Big Wind suspects that they will not take them up again until the next day and he urges Johnson to flee to Deadwood in South Dakota in the Black Hills by car, since this direction is the least predictable for the Indians. He himself dies of his injuries on the journey and Johnson reaches the gold rush wounded with his car and the bodies of his two companions. Due to financial difficulties, he is forced to stay in Deadwood for several weeks and earn money as a photographer. The rumors about his supposedly valuable cargo grow and he comes into conflict with a group of gunslingers led by Black Dick Curry. They try to rob him and after Johnson shoots Black Dick's brother in a burglary in the dark, Black Dick challenges him to a duel. Under the guidance of Wyatt Earp , he survives the duel and wounds his opponent, but then decides to leave Deadwood as quickly as possible. He can hire Wyatt Earp and his brother Morgan as escort. Wyatt Earp demands half of the fossils in payment, which Johnson finally agrees. As anticipated, they are ambushed by Black Dick Curry on the journey to Cheyenne, but thanks to the Earp brothers they arrive safely at their destination.

In Cheyenne they meet again with Marsh, who had heard of Johnson and his fossils in Deadwood. Wyatt Earp offers Marsh the sale of his fossils, but hesitates in the negotiations until Johnson can exchange the fossils for stones. He finally brings the right fossils to Cope in Philadelphia, and then goes back to Yale to go to university and collect his betting debts.

Background and reception

The novel Dragon Teeth was written by Michael Crichton back in 1974, but his widow Sherri Crichton did not discover the early work until 2008 in his estate and had it published in 2017. The American author wrote it several years before he wrote the science thriller Jurassic Park , published in 1990 . Although both works deal with the fossils of dinosaurs, they are thematically structured very differently; in the publication Dragon Teeth was referred to as the "origin of Jurassic Park" and also described accordingly, the German translation is subtitled "How it all began".

Michael Crichton (2002)

Published in the novel is a note by Michael Crichton on the manuscript in which he described the creation. So the novel is actually based on the real argument between Cope and Marsh. The text was created at the suggestion of the paleontologist and curator Edwin Harris Colbert at the American Museum of Natural History , who referred Crichton to the "Bone Wars" and proposed a novel about the two adversaries. In addition to his references, Crichton mainly used the description of Cope's expedition by Charles Hazelius Sternberg in his The Life of a Fossil Hunter and therefore constructed the fictional story of William Johnson. Nearly all of the historical events depicted in 1876 are based on historical facts, with the exception of Marsh's expedition, who did not travel to the west with a group of students that year. Cope's expedition that year was successfully completed, and all of his fossils were brought across the Missouri to Philadelphia. According to Sternberg, Cope had indeed found the first teeth of the Brontosaurus , which however was described by Marsh in 1879 and whose skeleton was reconstructed at Yale.

According to a review of the novel on Deutschlandfunk Kultur , Dragon Teeth is “a daring mix of western and science thriller”. The author Irene Binal sums up: “ None of this is perfect, even if Crichton tells with a lot of humor and commitment. The characters remain rather pale, historical excursions are too long and the plot lacks depth despite all the tension. "Dragon Teeth" is still worth reading: as an early science thriller by an author who at least co-founded this genre, and as a fast-paced adventure story that guarantees a few hours of reading fun. "

expenditure

The novel Dragon Teeth was published posthumously in 2017 from the estate of Michael Crichton at HarperCollins in New York City . 2018 the book was published as a German translation of Klaus Berr at the Random House publishing group belonging Karl Blessing Verlag in Munich.

Text output

• Michael Crichton: Dragon Teeth . HarperCollins, New York 2017, ISBN 978-3-89667-623-8 .
• Michael Crichton: Dragon Teeth. How it all began . Translation by Klaus Berr, Karl Blessing Verlag, Munich 2018, ISBN 978-3-89667-623-8 .

supporting documents

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e} Presentation of content based on: Michael Crichton: Dragon Teeth. How it all began . Translation by Klaus Berr, Karl Blessing Verlag, Munich 2018, ISBN 978-3-89667-623-8 .
2. ↑ Matt Margini: The "Westworld" Echoes of Michael Crichton's Posthumous "Dragon Teeth". The New Yorker, July 6, 2017; accessed on October 1, 2019.
3. ↑ ^{a b c} Michael Crichton: "Author's Note." In: Dragon Teeth. How it all began . Translation by Klaus Berr, Karl Blessing Verlag, Munich 2018, ISBN 978-3-89667-623-8 ; Pp. 311-313.
4. ↑ ^{a b} Irene Binal: Michael Crichton: "Dragon Teeth - How It All Began". Fast-paced adventure story about the “bone wars” on deutschlandfunkkultur.de, October 6, 2018; accessed on October 1, 2019.