Pellucidar
Pellucidar is a fictional continent devised by Tarzan author Edgar Rice Burroughs , which is located on the inner surface of the hollow sphere of the earth. Burroughs takes up the theory of the hollow earth . The seven-volume cycle is one of the author's best-known works.
description
In contrast to the outside world, the land-water ratio of the area in Pellucidar is exactly the opposite. The land area is over 123,110,000 square miles, while 41,370,000 square miles is occupied by oceans. The world is illuminated by a small sun, which is exactly in the center of the earth's hollow sphere and which never changes its position. So there is eternal day in Pellucidar. The exception is a small region that lies in the shadow of a small, geostationary moon of the sun and is therefore called the land of terrible shadows. Despite the small size of the sun, it is strong enough to ensure a rich life in Pellucidar. Due to the concave curvature of the inner surface of Pellucidar, there is no horizon line there. Everything you see in the distance seems to be higher up and is lost in a layer of haze at an even greater distance.
action
The hero of the stories is the rich heir David Innes, who, together with his friend Abner Perry, who constructed a mechanical mole, sets out on a journey into the interior of the earth in order to find new deposits of anthracite coal. However, due to a design flaw, they are unable to change direction with their drill, so they drill 500 miles deep through the earth's crust. There you suddenly come across a fantastic world full of prehistoric life. On arrival, the two friends meet a people from the Stone Age with whom they feel so comfortable that they decide to stay. At the same time, the desire awakens in them to civilize the people of Pellucidar and to bring them the technical achievements of the people of the outside world. To this end, David Innes takes another trip back to the outside world to come back with all sorts of important things.
publication
1914 was published in All-Story Weekly magazine, the first part of the cycle, At the Earth's Core (dt. In Earth's core), which in 1915 the first sequel Pellucidar in All-Story Cavalier Weekly followed magazine. The first book editions appeared in 1922 and 1923. It was not until 1929 that Burroughs had the third part of Tanar of Pellucidar (Eng. Tanar of Pellucidar) follow, this time in the Blue Book Magazine . Immediately afterwards followed with Tarzan at the Earth's Core (Eng. Tarzan at the center of the earth) the sequel, which at the same time also continued the Tarzan cycle and linked both worlds with one another. The book editions followed as early as 1930. It was not until 1937 that the fifth part, entitled Back to the Stone Age , appeared, first in Argosy Weekly magazine and immediately afterwards as a book . In 1942, Burroughs had four more short episodes appear, of which Return to Pellucidar (dt. The return to Pellucidar), Men of the Bronze Age (dt. The people from the Bronze Age) and Tiger-Girl (dt. The tiger girl) in Amazing Stories magazine and Savage Pellucidar were reprinted in Amazing Stories Quarterly magazine. All of these stories did not appear in book form until 1963 under the heading Savage Pellucidar . In 1944 Burroughs wrote the last part of the Pellucidar cycle with Land of Terror , which was immediately published in book form.
reception
In 1924 the Russian geologist and geographer Vladimir Obruchev wrote his novel Plutonia , which has some parallels to the Pellucidar books by Burroughs.
In 1976, the first Pellucidarroman was filmed under the title The Sixth Continent by Kevin Connor .
With the exception of the fourth volume, Tarzan at The Earth's Core , in which the Tarzan and Pellucidar cycles overlap, the Pellucidar books were not yet available in German. In 2018 there were two translations of the first volume independently of one another. Under the title "Bestiarium Pellucidaris", a reference work on the forms of life in the inner world was published in 2019 with assignment to the corresponding paleontological forms of life in the real world.
bibliography
- Novels
- 1 At the Earth's Core (4 parts in: All-Story Weekly, April 4, 1914 ff .; also: Lost Inside the Earth , 1929)
- German: At the center of the earth. Kranichborn, 1997. Also called: The sixth continent. Translated by Helmut W. Pesch . Apex, 2018, ISBN 978-3-7467-6743-7 . Also as: an odyssey through the inner world. Translated by Hendrik Többens. Többens, 2019, ISBN 978-3-00-061749-2 .
- 2 Pellucidar (5 parts in: All-Story Cavalier Weekly, May 1, 1915 ff.)
- German: Pellucidar. Kranichborn, 1997. Also as: Return to Pellucidar. Translated by Helmut W. Pesch. Apex, 2018, ISBN 978-3-7467-6744-4 .
- 3 Tanar of Pellucidar (6 parts in: The Blue Book Magazine, March 1929 ff.)
- German: Tanar von Pellucidar. Kranichborn, 1997.
- 5 Seven Worlds to Conquer (6 parts in: Argosy, January 9, 1937 ff .; also: Back to the Stone Age )
- German: Back to the Stone Age. Kranichborn, 1997.
- 6 Land of Terror (1944)
- German: Land of Terror. Kranichborn, 1997.
- 7 Savage Pellucidar (1941)
- German: Wildes Pellucidar. Kranichborn, 1997.
- Short stories
- Men of the Bronze Age (in: Amazing Stories, March 1942 )
- The Return to Pellucidar (in: Amazing Stories, February 1942 ; also: Return to Pellucidar , 1969)
- Tiger Girl (in: Amazing Stories, April 1942 )
- Savage Pellucidar (1963, in: Edgar Rice Burroughs: Savage Pellucidar )
- Three Science Fiction Novels (collective edition from 1–3; 1963)
