SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
Where the real sex feeling begins, timidity and distrust are its companions, heritage from old wicked days when love and violence went often hand in hand.-- THE LOST WORLD, p, 7
I've made a few random comments about Conan Doyle's LOST WORLD on this blog over the years. I recognized how Doyle had produced a seminal SF-idea-- that of prehistoric beasts surviving into modern times, even though a few earlier authors, such as Verne and Haggard, had contributed related notions. At the same time, I was rather conflicted about the novel's conclusion. I've frequently said that I don't reject out of hand stories that express controversial opinions on race and sexuality; these can be as "mythic," and sometimes more so, than stories that express "correct," theoretically more humane sentiments. But since LOST WORLD concludes with the modern-day explorers helping a tribe of Indian settlers in the Lost World wipe out a tribe of ape-men, I had to wonder whether or not Doyle's story reflected his real-life opinions on racial politics. I'd read a few accounts claiming that Doyle was ultra-conservative, and I'd seen occasional glimpses of such political leanings in his fiction. Was LOST WORLD meant to be a defense of imperialistic aggression?
I have glimpsed one online essay that makes the opposite claim, but I only spot-read a few sections of that article so that I wouldn't be unduly influenced. That caveat made, I'd already noticed a number of discontinuities in WORLD that argued that Doyle was playing a larger game than simply validating the status quo of his time. One such discontinuity is the opening quote, though I'll come back to that a little while after providing a quick summary of the novel's action.
The line about "real sex feeling" goes through the mind of young Irish reporter Ned Malone when he attempts to propose marriage to a woman named Gladys. Gladys refuses Ned, expressing the desire for a mate with some glorious record of accomplishments. Fortuitously, Ned's job causes him to cross paths with eccentric (and pugnacious) biologist George Challenger, who suggests that prehistoric creatures may still exist on a remote plateau in Bolivia. When Challenger gathers an expedition, he allows Ned to come along, as well as a rival scientist, Summerlee, and a far more experienced adventurer, Lord John Roxton, who in many ways exemplifies the pattern of male courage and fortitude to which Malone aspires. Suffice to say that the expedition finds the plateau, but they're marooned atop it by conniving guides. While trying to find a way off the escarpment, the Englishmen confirm that assorted prehistoric animals have indeed migrated here, particularly saurians and pterodactyls. The explorers also encounter two humanoid species, though contrary to later "caveman films," no one implies that the primitives evolved alongside the dinos; rather, both sets of humanoids migrated to the plateau at very different times. One group are simply a branch of an Indian populace native to South America, but the other tribe consists of "ape-men," who are explicitly compared to the evolutionary notion of "the missing link" between apes and men. When war breaks out between the two tribes, the Englishmen side with the Indians, and with their superior weapons they all but massacre the ape-men. That done, the heroes escape the Lost World and return to London, exhibiting to fascinated Londoners the proof of their findings: a live pterodactyl. However, during the time of Malone's long absence, the changeable Gladys has married another suitor, a solicitor's clerk with absolutely no claims to adventurous stature.
Though WORLD is not a comedy, it means something that Doyle frames its story of high adventure between a woman's capricious challenge and her equally capricious renunciation of her supposed standards for a mate. Moreover, even the early sections include some japes at the idea of racial purity. During Malone's first interview with Challenger, the irascible scientist claims to see a "suggestion of the Negroid" in Malone's skull. A page later, when Challenger speaks of a previous South American trip where he conferred with a tribe of Indians near the disputed territory, Challenger says that their mental powers had degenerated. Racial animus, right? Except that in the same sentence Challenger says that the Indians' mental acuity was "hardly superior to that of the average Londoner."
Somewhat later, Malone learns something of Roxton's history. The nobleman volunteered for the expedition because he's passionate about everything about South America, except one custom partly furthered by colonial Spaniards: that of slavery. Roxton has carried out a jeremiad against slavers, who according to him are all "half-breeds." Many racist authors have used the figure of the half-breed ti signify the evils of miscegenation, but Doyle doesn't seem concerned with that possibility, as he's focused purely upon the evil of Indians being enslaved. It's possible Doyle knew his readers might not accept all-white villains, and so used half-white, half-red ones instead. Still, the people being maltreated are full "red men," though it's true that many modern readers would be averse to Roxton performing the function of "white savior." Roxton's past crusade, by the bye, is responsible for getting the explorers stranded on the plateau, in that one of the bearers joins the expedition looking for a chance to avenge himself on Roxton for the latter having executed his relative.
To say the least, once Malone is stuck on the plateau with his three companions, he gets his "baptism of fire" in spades. Doyle keeps his tone varied, including some superb "sense of wonder" scenes as the explorers take in the Edenic wonders of the primitive domain, as well as many moments of comedy. But the Lost World is a land of almost constant danger, where the strong devour the weak with no reservations. Fittingly, Malone is the first to encounter one of the ape-men while climbing a tree for scouting purposes. Though the single ape-man flees, he brings his people later while Malone is off exploring, and the brutes make an unprovoked attack, capturing Challenger, Summerlee, and Roxton. Roxton escapes, finds Malone, and the two of them use their firearms to assault the ape-tribe in order to free the two remaining prisoners.
This escapade is also not without comedy, given that Challenger, who has a hirsute, apelike appearance for an Englishman, is seen to be the spitting image of the ape-men's ruler. However, Roxton's crusade against injustice has been ignited once again, for during captivity he witnessed the true degeneracy of the anthropoids, as they amused themselves flinging Indians off a nearby cliff. And thus the Englishmen lead the Indians in a major assault upon the missing links, with only a few women and children surviving the violence. Challenger celebrates the victory, saying that "upon this plateau the future must ever be for man." Malone, detailing the many horrors he witnesses on both sides of the conflict, thinks to himself, "It needed a robust faith in the end to justify such tragic means." This is the climax of the novel and everything that follows is just a long coda.
With all this plot-action explicated, I can return to Malone's curious expression at the book's opening. Long before he meets Challenger, much less any of the missing links the scientist resembles, the reporter is aware of what happened in the "old wicked days." Malone is of course not directly referencing the clash of civilizations as Challenger is. Yet what does he mean by saying that "love and violence went often hand in hand?" He *might* be thinking that in the wicked days men just took women as they pleased and the women had nothing to say about it. Then again, men competed with other men over women, and so that may be the real "violence" being associated with "love"-- which could well mean more like not romantic love, but the consummation of sexual union predicated on the rule of the strong, which primitive women may have accepted for the same reasons Gladys expresses. Gladys does not ask Malone to fight any other suitors for her favor, but arguably her whole fantasy of his winning some great glory translates into the same thing: she'll yield him sex if he distinguishes himself with acts of bravery-- which usually must be backed by violence. Of course, she's playing with Malone because she doesn't really want him, and the actual denouement suggests that she might have wanted a mild-mannered type all the time, and she gave Malone a formidable task to get rid of him.
Thus, my verdict is that, even if Doyle's characters may make remarks moderns would deem problematic, the writer has given those characters a lot more "wiggle room" than any doctrinaire racist would. Doyle is at least partly serious about stating that all human endeavor comes down to these ongoing civilization-clashes. Yet the unison of love and violence in human nature is not limited to any particular subdivision of humankind. Doyle's constant comparisons between his contemporaries and primitive peoples establish that he believes that all humankind is implicated in the struggles of Eros and Thanatos, and that recognizing this is the true "challenge" one derives from a visit to the Lost World.
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