Thursday, July 14, 2022

THE READING RHEUM: THE MAN OF BRONZE (1933)

 



One of the most interesting thing about Doc Savage's first novel is how much of the mythology was in place from the first. 

Naturally, I knew that author Lester Dent-- billed throughout the hero's pulp-magazine run as "Kenneth Robeson"-- established right away the backstory of Doc Savage and his "Fabulous Five" aides in basic nutshell-fashion, which "shells" he and other raconteurs would continue to re-use for most if not all subsequent stories. But I'm rather surprised to note that Dent articulated the idea of Doc's "Fortress of Solitude" in the first novel. In contrast to the use that DC's Superman made of the idea-- where the fortress was just sort of a "Superman museum"-- Dent's hero states that this refuge was "the secret of [Doc's] universal knowledge," because the hero needed intense "periods of concentration." One assumes that this concentration was the source of his polymath facility with all of the sciences, though a cynic might say that it was also a way of distancing himself from common humanity. 

BRONZE is also all about establishing the righteous quest of the six heroes, even if it's framed in somewhat juvenile terms, as Doc tells his men, "We first got together back in the War [i.e., World War One, though none of them ever seem old enough.] We all liked the big scrap. It got into our blood. When we got back, the humdrum life of an ordinary man was not suited to our natures." This account slightly skirts a separate motive, in which it's asserted that Doc's father, a rich philanthropist, subjected his son to intensive training in physical and mental development for the express purpose of having Doc become a world-beating do-gooder. In any case, at the beginning of BRONZE, Doc and his men learn that the senior Savage has been killed, thus giving the sextet a concrete case to investigate.

Not coincidentally, the solution to the elder Savage's murder also leads the six champions to an almost endless fortune in gold that funds Doc's endless supply of crimefighting toys. The heroes journey to Central America and find that their enemies are linked to a Mayan civilization that, in true Rider Haggard fashion, has remained intact and isolated from the vagaries of colonist incursions. Yet though that bald summary suggests that Doc and friends may take the form of "ugly Americans" joining in the colonial project, Doc himself is very outspoken about disagreeing with said project. 

It's a lousy trick for a government to take some poor savage's land away from him and give it to a white man to exploit. Our own American Indians got that kind of deal, you know.

When the good guys meet the Mayans, the natives are mostly well-bred and intelligent, including a sexy princess named Monja, who immediately falls for the unapproachable Doc Savage. The only exceptions are a corrupt warrior class who are behind various assassination attempts on Doc and friends, all with the long-range goal of taking control of the Mayan redoubt away from the rightful rulers. The villains are easily the weakest aspect of the novel, though it's an interesting sociological motif that Dent made ambitious professional warriors his bad guys, in marked contrast to the knightly purity of Doc's group. In the end, once the villains are defeated, the Mayan rulers become the de facto sponsors of Doc's war against evil. This sponsorship is certainly is a fate better than their getting annihilated just to make the hero look like a tough guy, which was a common fate for lost civilizations in thirties pop fiction, as seen in 1935's THE PHANTOM EMPIRE.

A minor surprise: I remember groaning when I watched a scene in the 1975 DOC SAVAGE film wherein Doc pays a sort of left-handed compliment to the beautiful female lead by telling her, "Mona-- you're a brick!" It was a corny line, but its derived from a scene in the book, where Doc says much the same thing to Monja. But it does have a little more psychological heft in prose. Doc is also a chaste knight who won't engage with the female sex to avoid threatening his mission, and since he's slightly aware of Monja's affections, he seeks to distance himself from the sexy young woman by treating her like one of the boys.

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