Tarzan had renounced his right to the woman he loved, and civilization held no pleasure for him. After a brief and harrowing period among men, he turned back to the African jungle where he had grown to manhood. It was there he first heard of Opar, the city of gold, left over from fabled Atlantis. It was a city of hideous men—and of beautiful, savage women, over whom reigned La, high priestess of the Flaming God. Its altars were stained with the blood of many sacrifices. Unheeding of the dangers, Tarzan led a band of savage warriors  toward the ancient crypts and the more ancient evil of Opar.

CHAPTERS

I. The Affair On The Liner
II. Forging Bonds of Hate and ------?
III. What Happened in the Rue Maule
IV. The Countess Explains
V. The Plot That Failed
VI. A Duel
VII. The Dancing Girl of Sidi Aissa
VIII.The Fight in the Desert
IX. Numa "El Adrea"
X. Through the Valley of the Shadow
XI. John Caldwell, London
XII. Ships That Pass
XIII. The Wreck of the "Lady Alice"
XIV. Back to the Primitive
XV. From Ape to Savage
XVI. The Ivory Traders
XVII. The White Chief of the Waziri
XVIII. The Lottery of Death
XIX. The City of Gold
XX. La
XXI. The Castaways
XXII. The Treasure Vaults of Opar
XXIII. Fifty Frightful Men
XXIV. How Tarzan Came Again to Opar
XXV. Through the Forest Primeval
XXVI. The Passing of the Ape-Man

THE RETURN OF TARZAN REVIEW BY DOC HERMES

From 1913, where it appeared as a seven part serial beginning with the June issue of NEW STORY MAGAZINE, this is great stuff.  So much happens in this book, yet it never feels dense and the pages practically turn themselves. After starting off with a few of the stale, tired entries from the second half of the series, reading one of the first dozen Tarzan books is a refreshing reminder of why Edgar Rice Burroughs was such a major writer of adventure fiction.

THE RETURN OF TARZAN contains some of the most important moments of the canon. Tarzan marries Jane after much agita and suffering (their love seems genuine and poignant here, strange considering how they seem to drift apart later). He meets the noble Waziri, becomes one of them and eventually their chief. He discovers Opar, first of the many lost cities he will find scattered around Africa, and here he tangles with that other woman in his life, La (I had forgotten that La and Jane had met and that in fact La was about to carve Jane`s giblets when Tarzan interfered; another good reason not to let your girlfriends cross paths). Where TARZAN OF THE APES ended on a wonderfully melodramatic note of romance and self sacrifice, THE RETURN OF TARZAN sets up the framework for the rest of the series. 

What I enjoyed most about this book was how complex and introspective Tarzan himself is. After TARZAN AT THE EARTH`S CORE, all those amnesia inducing concussions seemed to have left the Apeman rather dim, a sullen brute moping around with not much on his mind. Here, though, he`s a creature unique in the world. Even though he seems to be able to get along perfectly well wherever he finds himself, Tarzan is also never entirely at home anywhere, always an outsider and a strange one. (His physical abilities help him dominate civilized society through action and charisma, while his intelligence and inventiveness helps him
take over when back in the jungles; it`s a neat twist.) 

The book gives the Apeman some lengthy episodes in Paris and Algeria; I really would have liked to have seen Burroughs do more of this, rather than dragging out the warring pair of hiden cities one more time. Tarzan in Paris, smoking cigarettes and sipping absinthe* as he enjoys the nightclubs  and museums, is a great reminder our hero has spent considerable time cultivating that thin veneer of sophistication he likes to shed when provoked. He`s not simply enduring civilization grudgingly, either. ("In the daytime he haunted the libraries and picture galleries. He had become an oniverous reader...." determined to learn as much history and culture as he could.) This is after all a man who as a boy taught himself to read just out of sheer curiousity and determination. We find out in a later book he has learned Latin so he can enjoy the classics.

Tarzan gets caught up in a mildly sordid domestic scandal, thrashes ten tough Apaches in a terrific scene, fights a pistol duel he doesn`t expect to survive, and in general has a lively time. Then, of all things, he becomes an investigator for the French Foreign Legion (posing as an American big game hunter!) and finds himself running around Algeria after possible traitors. Here, our hero befriends a sheik and fits in so happily with a crew of tough desert Arabs that he is tempted to stay with them permanently. It`s one of the most interesting  and yet least remembered episoes in the Apeman`s exploits. (It would have been great if Burroughs had later written Tarzan joining up with a bunch of real Apaches, wandering the Yukon or heading up the Amazon to tangle with the Jivaros. Throwing different challenges at the Apeman, even for only half a book, might have kept the series fresh.)

Two thirds of the way through the book, the Apeman is given the heave ho over the rails of a ship off the African coast and just happens to swim ashore within spitting distance of the cabin where he was born. Imagine that. Burroughs uses up a writer`s career allotment of coincidence right here, as virtually everyone important to the saga somehow ends up on that spot: Jane and her unfortunate fiancee William Clayton, her addled father, her friend Hazel Strong, even Paul D`Arnot (Even Tarzan is confounded by all this. "Paul! In the name of sanity what are you doing here?"). 

A little hard to believe, but if you`re going to read more Edgar Rice Burroughs (or pulp fiction in general), get used to having one-in-a-million chances lying thick on the ground. Probably, with more planning time and care, Burroughs could have come up plausible ways to drag all these characters together at just the right time. But what the heck, that wasn`t the kind of story he was telling. It`s meant to be a rollercoaster of thrills and chills, where you just hang on and enjoy the ride.

It`s interesting, too, that as much as he loves being back in the jungle, the animals don`t particularly care that Tarzan has returned. When he finds his tribe of great apes, they don`t really remember him at first; although the apes accept him back and get to admire the way he finds food, they`re not wild about Tarzan and certainly didn`t miss him. ("But who or what of all the myriad jungle would there be to welcome his return? Not one. Only Tantor, the elephant, could he call friend. The others would hunt him or flee from him as had been their way in the past.")

The weakest part of the book in my view is the Russian spy, Nikolas Rokoff. Like Dan Backslide, he`s a coward, bully, cad and thief. Rokoff is so completely vile and unpleasant that he stops seeming to be a human being and ends up being almost amusing as he doesn`t miss a single chance to harass and annoy everyone. And Tarzan keeps letting him go with stern warnings! (Well, in the next book, though, Rokoff pays off his bad karma.) The ill fated William Clayton, who mean well and does his best but who just isn`t up the trials he must face, comes across as believable and very human in contrast. He, Tarzan and Jane all make their decisions (in the tangled mess of who is going to get married and who inherit the Greystoke title) with such thoughtfulness and concern with right and wrong that they all deserve to be rewarded.