my feet I received my first Martian surprise, for the effort, which on
Earth would have brought me standing upright, carried me into the
Martian air to the height of about three yards.... Instead of
progressing in a sane and dignified manner, my attempts to walk resulted
in a variety of hops which took me clear of the ground a couple of feet
at each step and landed me sprawling upon my face or back at the end of
each second or third hop. My muscles, perfectly attuned and accustomed
to the force of gravity on Earth, played the mischief with me in
attempting for the first time to cope with the lesser gravitation and
lower air pressure on Mars. Edgar Rice Burroughs created one of the most
iconic figures in American pop culture, Tarzan of the Apes, and it is
impossible to overstate his influence on entire genres of popular
literature in the decades after his enormously winning pulp novels
stormed the public's imagination. A Princess of Mars, first published in
1917, is the first book in Burroughs' Mars series. Here, Earthman and
Civil War veteran John Carter finds himself mysterious transported to
the Red Planet, a world of strange men, vicious beasts, and beautiful
women in need of rescue. American novelist EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS
(1875-1950) wrote dozens of adventure, crime, and science fiction novels
that are still beloved today, including Tarzan of the Apes (1912), At
the Earth's Core (1914), A Princess of Mars (1917), The Land That Time
Forgot (1924), and Pirates of Venus (1934). He is reputed to have been
reading a comic book when he died.
