Koch Brothers

A Princess of Mars was written in 1917, during this time period there was not a lot of Sci-Fi fantasy books or stories, and nor were they very popular. This book was looked at as pulp fiction because it was like nothing anyone had really read; therefore no one had anything to compare it to. Also, instead of looking at the qualities of the book, which make it literature, they looked at the book as more of a comic. To them, this was a ridiculous story solely for entertainment. Which in turn may have made Edgar Rice Burroughs be taken less seriously as an author, when compared to other authors of his time. The language in this book may have also been unfamiliar to those who read it. Again, without much exploration into the imaginary realm of fantasy, the people of his time who read this probably couldn’t connect well with his monsters, martians, mars, etc. The language and description of mars as in the book, and its inhabitants, could only be imagined, and because of the lack of this type of writing, people wouldn’t have any other personal way of relating these descriptions to things they’d read of otherwise, specifically through literature. Nowadays there is so much to compare books to. When people think Martian, countless images may pop into their head, and all because of the surplus of fantasy and imagination that this generation has produced. This makes descriptions of far off worlds and unimaginable beasts far easier to imagine, making the book an easier read, and easier to relate to. Along with relation to the book and what was acceptable, this book had a lot of violence in it! Such detailed violence and descriptions of gore was not exactly what people were used to, nor what people necessarily wanted their kids being exposed to. This may have worsened people’s opinions of the book and made them less likely to take it seriously. Whereas, again, nowadays we are accustomed to such violence, in fact, we indulge in them. Detailed violence and war scenes pull