Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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44 of 45 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Enjoyment in this Classic Adventure Story, June 12, 2000
Reading "King Solomon's Mines" reminded me of the joke about the guy who sees his first Shakespere play, and when asked what he thought of it, said, "real good, but so many cliches". So it is with this classic adventure story: so much of the action and plot devices were similar to what I remembered from other adventure stories (and comic books and movies), yet Rider Haggard came decades earlier. Here is one of the prototypes (along with Robert Louis Stevenson's "Treasure Island", written just a few years earlier) of the modern adventure-action story. There is lots to admire in this well crafted story: great action, excitement, characters, and exotic locations. If there's a kid you know that only wants to watch television or play video games, read this book with him or her. It shows what words on a page can do in the imagination of the reader.It is also interesting to see the book in its historical perspective. "King Solomon's Mines", 1885, records European ignorance of and fascination with Africa, which was still partly (as Joseph Conrad later called it in "Heart of Darkness") a blank area on the map: The source of the Nile had been discovered only two decades earlier; Henry Stanley and Richard Burton were still living, the memories of David Livingstone and John Speke were still fresh; and the Berlin Africa Conference was taking place just as the novel was going into print. If that's not of interest to you, skip it. Want to curl up with a good book? Here's one for you and your kids.
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17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
In it's class, five stars!, January 29, 2000
I formerly rated this one at only four stars since it lacks "gravitas" and is basically a pure, escapist tale. I thought that made it too light for the heady draught of five star-ism. But on reflection I think I was too harsh. The book does have staying power in my memory. So here goes.
Surely a classic, this was Haggard's first foray into the literary field -- to prove he could do it better than some of his contemporaries. Having spent time in South Africa as a minor civil servant, he drew on his experiences of that land to impart a feel for the country in this short, but by no means small, tale of treasure hunting and adventure among unknown and exotic peoples. This is the story of an over the hill "white hunter" taken into the service of two English gentlemen seeking the brother of one of them, who had disappeared years before on the edge of a great desert in vain (or perhaps not so vain) pursuit of the fabled mines of King Solomon. Along the way they are joined by an enigmatic native guide who is much more than what he seems as they stumble across previously unexplored (at least by Europeans) tracts of Africa and into a lost nation related, apparently, to the Zulus of southern Africa whom the English of that day so feared and respected. Drawn at once into the internal politics of these people and overawing them w/their European technology, they are soon in deadly peril from the cruel king of that country and the evil sorceress who conspires behind his throne.
But there's no use telling too much of a tale like this in a review -- the interested reader is urged to read it for him or herself. It's adventure in strange parts, for those with a taste to see how the great ones, like Haggard, did it.
SWM
The King of Vinland's Saga
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9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A true classic, November 28, 2001
I was required to read King Solomon's Mines at school (about three thousand years ago), and was delighted to see that there's a new edition in the Oxford World's Classics series. And indeed this is a true classic adventure, somewhere between Treasure Island and Around The World in Eighty Days. Though some of the language may now seem a little stereotyped and cliched, it was certainly not that way when it was written over 100 years ago, and the real cliches are resident with modern imitations, like Indiana Jones. However, since imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, I guess we shouldn't complain.Sir Henry Rider Haggard (1856-1925) is best known for his African adventure novels, notably King Solomon's Mines and She (1886). Their strengths are that they are not only undeniably amongst the most exciting and thrilling adventures ever written, but that they capture the very essence of the colonial empires - an attitude that is stubbornly maintained today by American imperialism - of treating the natives fondly, but with a certain superiority and disdain. The essence of the story is the adventure of an elephant hunter as his safari heads into the interior of South Africa in search of a fabled diamond mine, and to rescue the missing brother of an English gentleman who accompanies him. They are aided by an enigmatic native guide who is more than he seems. As they stumble into Zulu territory, they are drawn into the local politics and discover that their European methods are less effective here, and that they need to learn new tricks. Quickly, they find themselves in deadly peril from a merciless king and a malevolence sorceress who conspires against them. In the end, King Solomon's Mines is more than just the sum of all its parts because Haggard's intelligent and observant characterizations give him the opportunity to put together a revealing social commentary about race and class, while still telling a captivating story. Against the conventional wisdom of the time, Haggard treats his black characters sympathetically, and even dares to suggest that English society might be less than perfect (an audacious heresy in Victoria's reign). So, like Gulliver's Travels, King Solomon's Mines not only tells a great adventure story, it leaves the reader with something more robust to think about.
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