LETTERS to the BURROUGHS BULLETIN
In Tarzan the Untamed and Tarzan the Terrible, Burroughs refers to the Congo Free State as existing then (1908). Actually, since 1908, the Congo Free State was replaced by the Belgian Congo. Also, throughout the Tarzan novels, we see references to Bara, the deer, and the ape-man often wears a deerskin loincloth. But the zoologists say that deer actually exist only in north Africa. The tiny chevrotain, or "mouse deer"of West Africa (Tarzan's native domain), is not a true deer.
Regarding Mr. Atamian's admirable and deeply scholarly The Origin of Tarzan, I have only a few differences. Page 88: "Du Chaillu believes there are no gorillas south of Sette Cama ... not south of the Congo River which is too far south by nearly 300 miles from Sette Cama, let alone 300 miles south of the farther Congo River." But, as the enclosed copy of the map from The Apes by Vernon Reynolds, 1967, shows, gorrilas in Tarzan's early life did live south of the Sette Coma. I maintain that my location of Tarzan's birth site is correct. Besides, Lord Greystoke told me where he was born and raised.
Philip Josť Farmer