Tarzan and the Green Goddess

 

Upon finishing Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez, I immediately began reading one of his earlier novels, In Evil Hour. We're told very early in the book that the story begins on October 4th - the feast day of St. Frances of Assisi - although we're not told the year, or the location of the events, for that matter. However, it's apparent that the story takes place in a small town somewhere in Latin America.

It begins with a character called "The Pastor" being murdered by one César Montero. After the arrest of Montero and the funeral of "The Pastor", the local priest, Father Ángel informs the owner of the movie house that it would not be appropriate to show a movie on the night of a funeral taking place in the town. Márquez tells us that the movie was Tarzan and the Green Goddess.

Naturally, I had to look online to find a copy of the movie. According to imdb.com, the movie was initially released in 1935 as a serial, The New Adventures of Tarzan, later to be edited in 1938 into a feature film. Fortunately for me, the movie is only slightly longer than an hour. Although the plot is standard for a serial of that era, the film is a bit strange, even for 1935.

In the film, Tarzan spends part of the time in his Lord Greystoke persona. For reasons that are never quite clear, Tarzan is in Guatemala, rather than Africa. He is part of an expedition that has set out to retrieve a lost Mayan idol called the Green Goddess. Just as we aren’t told how Tarzan came to Guatemala, we’re also not told how there came to be lions, giraffes, elephants, rhinos, and chimpanzees in the Central American country either.

The bizarre scenes continue to the end when Tarzan and his companions, George, Ula Vale, and Maj. Martling arrive at Greystoke Mansion. According to the Tarzan stories, Greystoke Mansion is located in Britain, but the costumes worn by Tarzan and his friends, as well as the locals living around Greystoke appear to be Germanic.......leading us to believe the mansion is in Germany, Austria or somewhere thereabouts.

I have to wonder why Márquez made the point of giving us the name of this film. It’s certainly not a classic movie.

The Tyranny of Cliches

I've been a fan of Jonah Goldberg for a long, long time. I read the first of his three books, Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning not long after it was published in 2008. Due to circumstances which I won't go into now, I've only recently downloaded (and read) his book from 2012, The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas .

The Tyranny of Cliches is ten years old, so naturally some of what's in the book is dated. In it's overall description of Liberals and Progressives, however, the book is still relevant today.

Of course, there is no mention of Donald Trump, but Goldberg was warning us of the dangers of populism in 2012. Anyone familiar with Jonah Goldberg knows he is no fan of Trump and he's resisted the call to jump on the populist bandwagon that far too many "Conservatives" have climbed aboard in this age of the Donald.

He's one chapter dealing with the question of science. Liberals like to claim that they're the ones who support science while the Conservatives fight against science, tooth and nail. I'll admit that there is a group of Conservatives who believe in a young Earth, with no evolution allowed; with Noah's ark and all the rest. I'm not one of those. As far as Democrats being the party of science, I've addressed that in a blog post - Isn't Biology "Science" Too?. As I wrote in that post:

Far too many folks, who believe themselves to be following the science, seem to ignore the science involving DNA. These people seem to forget "science" when science tells us that the human fetus is, well, a human. A human fetus can only grow to become a fully functioning human. A human fetus cannot magically transform into a dog, or cat, or dolphin or some alien life form. Killing a fetus in the womb is killing a human being. That is an undeniable scientific fact.
The DNA of the fetus also proves that the fetus is a separate and distinct individual and not a body part of the mother. Prematurely removing a fetus from a mother's body, by way of abortion, is not the same as removing an appendix.
While we're on the subject of DNA, examining the DNA shows that human beings come in only one of two genders. An individual's DNA and chromosomal makeup reveals whether the person in question is male or female. No matter how you may feel about whether or not you're in the "right body", your DNA reveals your gender.

Another chapter in Goldberg's book covers another subject which I've written about myself. Liberals and Progressives look down on traditional Christianity, but still looking to be "spiritual", they will claim to be Buddhists or adherents of other Eastern religions. However, in spite of the fact that traditional Buddhism doesn't permit abortion, when the Dalai Lama released his first book in Great Britain, his editors got him to water down his views on abortion so as not to alienate his potential buyers.

I could go on and on, but I'd rather leave the heavy lifting to Jonah Goldberg.It's well worth the read.