Back to the Stone Age
Dust-jacket illustration of Back to the Stone Age
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| Author | Edgar Rice Burroughs |
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| Illustrator | John Coleman Burroughs |
| Cover artist | John Coleman Burroughs |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Series | Pellucidar series |
| Genre | Adventure novel |
| Publisher | Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. |
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Publication date
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1937 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback) |
| Pages | 318 pp |
| Preceded by | Tarzan at the Earth's Core |
| Followed by | Land of Terror |
Back to the Stone Age is a novel written by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the fifth in his series set in the interior world of Pellucidar. It first appeared as a six-part serial in Argosy Weekly from January 9 to February 13, 1937 under the title "Seven Worlds to Conquer." It was first published in book form in hardcover by Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. in September, 1937 under the present title, and has been reissued a number of times since by various publishers.
The story reveals the fate of Wilhelm von Horst, the lost member of the previous book’s outer world expedition to Pellucidar, which had been led by Jason Gridley and Tarzan to rescue Pellucidarian emperor David Innes from the Korsars. The action begins by recapping the incident in which Gridley, von Horst, and Tarzan’s Waziri warriors, led by Muviro, are caught up in and separated by a horde of saber-toothed tigers’ cooperative hunt. Now on his own, von Horst quickly becomes lost, links up again with the Waziri by accident, and gets lost again when he foolishly goes out hunting on his own.
In the most powerful sequence in the book, von Horst becomes prey himself when a Trodon, or pterodactyl, carries him off to its nest in the crater of a dead volcano. The explorer is left poisoned and paralyzed together with other victims, all of them intended as a living larder to feed the creature’s young as its eggs hatch. Von Horst passes the time by getting to know a fellow paralytic, the native warrior Dangar of Sari, a member-tribe of Innes' empire. From him, the outer worlder gradually learns the Pellucidarian language. Fortunately for von Horst his clothing prevented him from receiving a full dose of venom, and he recovers from his paralysis in time to save Dangar from the next hatchling. Shooting the immature trodon, he makes a long strap from its hide, lassos the parent on its next return, and after allowing it to fly off just past the lip of the crater, shoots it in turn. After securing the free end of the strap to the still paralyzed Dangar, he uses it to climb out of the trap, pulling his companion up after him. In the forest at the foot of the mountain he constructs a treehouse to serve them as a secure base while Dangar recovers.
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