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 Personal
Glimpses of World-Famed Southlanders
Los Angeles Times ~ October 27, 1929
LEE SIDE O' L.A. By Lee Shippey
Edgar Rice Burroughs might be called the literary critics' best
friend. For fifteen years they have taken great delight in ridiculing his
Tarzan
of the Apes and its large family of thirty-one children. One London
critic declared Burroughs must have the mind of a child, as no one else
could vision such romantic and wildly improbable stories. And others all
over the world have broken into print with similarly unkind assertions.
In fact, if it weren't for such writers as Burroughs, some literary critics
never could break into print.
And so great has been the influence of their criticisms that up to date
"Tarzan" has only been translated into sixteen foreign languages, including
Arabic and, of course, the well-known Scandinavian. All the other
best sellers of fifteen years ago have faded and gone like the last rose
of summer and "Tarzan" is left blooming alone. It still brings in a goodly
revenue twice a year, has been reprinted and reprinted and now is being
condensed into a "strip" for more than seventy five big newspapers.
Never Saw A Jungle
This author of one of the greatest jungle stories ever written never
saw a jungle, except, possibly, a few glimpses of the jungle of Chicago.
He was born in the Windy City in 1875 and developed his romantic imagination
as a department manager for Sears Roebuck & Co. Then, however, instead
of going into the advertising department, he tried gold mining in Oregon,
was a cowboy in Idaho, a soldier in Arizona and a policeman in Salt Lake.
He returned to Chicago in 1912 as a department manager for A.W. Shaw &
Co., the publishers of that highly romantic magazine, System. And then,
for relaxation he spent his evenings and Sundays writing Tarzan of the
Apes, the story of the orphaned baby of an English nobleman who was
stolen by a fierce tribe of apes and grew to manhood thinking himself only
a freakish and unusual ape, speaking their "language" and living their
life. Then he is again thrown into contact with Europeans, the call of
blood proves stronger than the habits formed by environment, human instincts
more noble than those of most men and women reared in an environment of
culture inspire him to heroic deeds and magnanimous sacrifices, and in
both West Africa and Europe his life is one of thrilling adventures and
breathless suspense's.
We summarize the story because, a movie having been made of it, countless
people have it all wrong.
Makes No Pretenses
Ten years ago Burroughs bought the Otis ranch at Reseda, which he has
renamed Tarzana. He doesn't try to produce much on the ranch except two
novels a year, but that crop never fails. His office is a pretty cottage
shaded by a huge black walnut tree, on Ventura Boulevard. As we entered
it the first things which caught our eyes were book-lined walls; the next,
huge bearskin rugs and a great tiger skin draped over a table.
"Did you shoot these?" we asked.
"I brought them down," he replied, with charming and disarming frankness,
"not with one volley, but with one volume." They're gifts from Tarzan admirers.
I'm really too fond of animal life to be much of a hunter. I carry a gun
while riding about the ranch, but only because I'm my own ranger. I wouldn't
use it, but it makes me look official. There are coyotes and rabbits and
birds on this ranch which know me by sight and won't take flight at my
approach. Every morning I take a long ride on my horse, the Senator, often
getting off to walk a mile or two for exercise. Then I strip to the
waist and take a sunbath while I plot my day's work, and then come here
and speak it into a dictaphone. I don't pretend to be literary --
don't want to be. I just write for a living and enjoy it. It gives me more
freedom than any other occupation would. I can work when and where and
how I want to, live where I want to and write what I want to. I don't want
to write stories to make people think, but merely to give them relaxation.
I'm satisfied to let them think for themselves."
The Birth of Tarzan
"How did you happen to write 'Tarzan'?"
"I've been asked that hundreds of time and ought to have a good answer
thought up by now, but haven't. I suppose it was just because my daily
life was full of business, system, and I wanted to get as far from that
as possible. My mind, in relaxation, preferred to roam in scenes and situations
I'd never known. I find I can write better about places I've never seen
than those I have seen."
"Have you traveled much since winning success?"
"Yes, indeed. With my tow sons, I've traveled all over California. With
a bed-wagon trailer hitched to our car, we've had some great trips about
this State. We have three children, a married daughter, a 20-year-old boy
at Pomona and a 16-year-old boy in the Van Nuys High School. We're prouder
of them than of all my books. They're fine children and they were reared
on 'Tarzan.' I couldn't keep them from reading it. They almost know
some of the books by heart. So I feel sure the bodies won't do youngsters
any harm. My boys and I love to work together, too. We have a workshop
in which we make lots of things and an old truck in which we go up into
the hills, and bring down gravel and stones from our quarry. I always write
in riding togs and most of the time wear clothes suited to outdoor work
or play.
Grown-Up Fairy Stories
Burroughs has the bald head of a business man, but the fine figure of
a conditioned athlete. He is devoted to his family and affable to everyone,
but most of the time he prefers to be alone, carried by his imagination
to realms he has never seen or even realms that never were on land or sea.
He enjoys every day's work, for what is he doing but telling grown-up fairy
stories to himself? And so he lives most pleasantly and does so much
work he can hardly keep track of it.
"How many novels have you written this year?" we asked, as we were leaving.
He thought a minute, then turned to his secretary.
"Ralph," he said, "how many books have I written this year, two or three?"
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