King Solomon's Mines

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Summary: nice book to read.
Review: i've read this book because it was requirement to read it in my columbia reading class. i didn't feel that it was difficult book to read. but when the professor taught us about post-colonialism and talked about the background with the work of guns, germs, and steel, it was reall hard to understand. anyway..... in MY opinion, it was very interesting to read this book.

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Summary: The ORIGINAL Indiana Jones!
Review: It's really too bad that most children who love the adventures of Indiana Jones have probably never read (or even heard of) Allan Quatermain and KING SOLOMON'S MINES. This is where it all started! Haggard's first novel chronicles the adventures of Quatermain (okay, so maybe he's not as cool as Indiana Jones), Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good as they search South Africa for Sir Henry's brother, who has vanished while searching for King Solomon's treasure.

The novel is the real treasure. The story, while obviously written many years ago (1885), is still fresh and exciting. It was fun to discover this story as a 38-year old kid! Any age will enjoy it. And what a great adventure story to read to your kids instead of taking them to the latest action/adventure junker playing at your local theatre.

Rating:
Summary: Highly enjoyable ...
Review: King Solomon's Mine is one of the proto-adventure novels. It is highly enjoyable reading and a book that you will find hard to put down.

Minor caveats: a few 1890-something sensibilities were quite out-dated. At one point they shot close to a dozen elephants for the sport and the meal....I mean, one elephant could feed a village for a month.

But aside from a few out-dated sensibilities, the book makes Raiders Of The Lost Ark look like a re-run. I am going to read his other book's as this was so enjoyable. I think I'll try "She" next.

Enjoy!

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Summary: King Solomon's Mines
Review: KING SOLOMON'S MINES
This is a very interesting book, because it has danger, suspense, and fun. This is the type of book that everyone wants to read, because almost everyone likes to feel danger. Is a suspenseful book that you can't put down.
The brother of Sir Henry is lost in Africa because he went looking for the treasure of king Solomon's Mines. Sir Henry looks for a lot of people that can fish, hunt, camp, and sail, and they begin their adventures for look for the treasure and his brother. Also with Sir Henry is 2 men named Jhon Good, and the other Allan Quatermain. They begin looking for his brother with a group of Indians. The leader of that group was an old man. He said that if they want to survive, they should always keep near to him. Many people tried to cross that desert and only a few survived. The leader begins to tell on legend of the mines and that only one person had step that land. The legend is that the King Solomon's mine was filled with a lot of brilliants pearls and gold. That night they slept and the next morning they began with the adventures, when they were walking they see a cave and Sir Henry says, "Quiet maybe my brother is inside". But when Sir Henry gets out the cave he was very disappointed, because he sees skeleton, but it wasn't his brother. They keep walking on the way to Solomon's, they get to Kukuanalandia, then they get in Kraal loo they meet 3 witches that make some spells to go bless the way to King Solomon's Mines. The third day they finally arrive to Trio Mountains. Ere they King Solomon's mines lie. Then one witch enters in a cave so they enter too. Sir Henry wants to go to the principal room and she says, " We already hear". Then the witch said that they have to remove the rock in front of them to enter and to have the treasure.
Will they get the entire treasure? Will they find Sir Henry's brother?
If you want to know what happen read the KING SOLOMON'S MINES.
I like the character of Sir Henry because is an adventures man, in part he is very mysterious man, he is sometimes like shy, don't talk too much, only to make an order. He is the type of man that you think that keep secrets inside. I will recommend this book to all the people that like danger, and suspense

Rating:
Summary: Thrilling Adventure
Review: King Solomon's Mines is a very solid and entertaining adventure story. The sotry is set in the late 19th century, and age of colonialism in Africa. It is told by Alan Quartermain, an expert game hunter in South Africa. He is contacted by Sir Henry Curtis, who wished to hire Quartermain as a guide to look for his lost brother. Two years earlier, Curtis' brother left to find the legendary mines of King Solomon. Fortunately, Quartermain had come into possession of a map showing the way to King Solomon's mines. The pair are accompanied by Captain John Good, a naval officer whose habits of cleanliness become comic, and Umbopa, an African porter with a mysterious secret. Needless to say, they encounter quite a few adventures along the way.

Something that might be found objectionable is the racial attitudes in this book. There are several comments that modern readers may find uncomfortable. However, if you keep in mind the time period this was written in, it's racial attitudes were more advanced than the general attitude of the time. The African characters appear as human, but some of the characters make remarks which would not pass today. If you can keep in mind the time period this was written in, I think you can enjoy this adventure, but if you are sensitive about racial remarks, then I recommend you give this a pass.

Rating:
Summary: Thrilling Adventure
Review: King Solomon's Mines is a very solid and entertaining adventure story. The sotry is set in the late 19th century, and age of colonialism in Africa. It is told by Alan Quartermain, an expert game hunter in South Africa. He is contacted by Sir Henry Curtis, who wished to hire Quartermain as a guide to look for his lost brother. Two years earlier, Curtis' brother left to find the legendary mines of King Solomon. Fortunately, Quartermain had come into possession of a map showing the way to King Solomon's mines. The pair are accompanied by Captain John Good, a naval officer whose habits of cleanliness become comic, and Umbopa, an African porter with a mysterious secret. Needless to say, they encounter quite a few adventures along the way.

Something that might be found objectionable is the racial attitudes in this book. There are several comments that modern readers may find uncomfortable. However, if you keep in mind the time period this was written in, it's racial attitudes were more advanced than the general attitude of the time. The African characters appear as human, but some of the characters make remarks which would not pass today. If you can keep in mind the time period this was written in, I think you can enjoy this adventure, but if you are sensitive about racial remarks, then I recommend you give this a pass.

Rating:
Summary: King Solomon's Mines
Review: King Solomon's Mines was a great book! It was really exciting and i enjoyed it a lot. This story was about these three men who went out into the desert on a journey to find the mines of king solomon that were filled with treasure and the lost brother of one of the people in the group. The party was made up of a man named Sir Henry Curtis (the one looking for his brother), Good and sailor, Umbopa a Zulu servant, and Quatermain the main character and narrator of the story. These men set out on a long journey through the desert, over the mountains and to the long lost treasure caves. Along the way they lost several memebers of the party they began with and all almost died from lack of food and water but in the end they did find the treasure. though it took much more than they had every imagined. They also found the man's brother and the true king of the native tribe they ran accross on the journey. This was a very good book if you like the "treasure hunt" type of stories and i highly reccomend it.

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Summary: Great Enjoyment in this Classic Adventure Story
Review: 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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Summary: One of the 1st "lost civilization" tales & a grand one.
Review: 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 & adventure among unknown & exotic peoples. This is the story of an over the hill "white hunter" impressed into the service of two English gentlemen seeking the brother of one 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 (@ least by Europeans) tracts of Africa & into a lost nation related, apparently, to the Zulus of southern Africa whom the English of that day so feared & respected. Drawn at once into the internal politics of these people & overawing them w/their European tricks, they are soon in deadly peril from the 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 quick & exciting & no more than what it seems: a fast paced adventure in strange parts, for those w/a taste to see how the great ones, like Haggard, did it. -- Stuart W. Mirsky ([e-mail]

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Summary: The original swashbuckling `saved by the eclipse' adventure.
Review: The concept of a swashbucking adventure where the heroes escape death at the hands of threatening natives by appealing to an eclipse as evidence of their divine power over the sun and moon is hardly a new one. But to my knowledge, in "King Solomon's Mines" Henry Rider Haggard (1856-1925) offers no clone of this legend. He offers the original idea that spawned the copies. Haggard's story is such a good one, it's not hard to see why it's been often imitated and reworked with varying degrees of success. Here's a case where you should read the original and find out where all the cliches came from.

The story-line is full of adventure, revolving around the journey of three Englishman accompanied with a native into the heart of Africa. They are in search of king Solomon's legendary treasure of diamonds, a lost brother, and adventure. The prospect of buried treasure is an age-old theme that arouses excitement today as it did in Haggard's day, and is combined with Haggard's contemporary fascination with the mysteries of Africa. Haggard employs Allan Quatermain as his narrator. Quatermain is far from the bravest of characters, and his sense of fear adds to the tension in times of conflict. His companions, however, are bolder: the native Umbopa and the Englishmen Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good.

The first part of the story is somewhat slow, relating the preparations for their adventure, as they venture into the desert wilderness and face the elements. But persevere through the desert, because if you can make it through the perils of the dry desert with Quartermain and company, even greater adventures lie on the other side. The area where Solomon's legendary treasure is hidden is inhabited by a lost civilization of primitive and barbarian natives, ruled by an evil leader who proves to be a usurper. King Twala and his sorceress are not too quickly persuaded by the marvels of European technology. In the style of typical colonistic arrogance, Haggard ensures that his characters survive by pretending to be gods from the stars, their credentials including the use of guns, Good's false teeth, half shaved face, and white legs (the result of which being that Good has to continue walking around without trousers to preserve his image, offering delightful comic relief!). In the process important questions about colonization are raised, for many of Haggard's contemporaries viewed Africa as a paradise inhabited by barbarians, whose wealth could freely taken over by the "superior" European colonists.

The identity of the rightful king turns out to be rather surprising, and the adventurers pledge to help him overthrow the usurper Twala. It is at this point that they call on a lunar eclipse to escape death by the skin of their teeth. Several battle scenes ensure, with truth and justice prevailing. Even though there seems to be some misplaced colonistic arrogance typical of the time, Haggard shows sympathy for the blacks by having his adventurers establish an indigenous government. More importantly, he shows the follow of paganism and defends important virtues such as justice and truth. The cause that the adventurers fight for is to overcome evil and maintain a proper king who defends justice, a king with Messianic overtones, and with virtues worth pursuing in our own lives. Their zeal for the right cause is unforgettable: "Never before had I seen such an absolute devotion to the idea of duty, and such a complete indifference to its bitter fruits." (p198)

Only then does the diamond hunt continue, but when the elusive treasure trove is finally discovered, the adventurers find themselves trapped, giving new meaning to the expression "Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die." (p258). The irony of being buried with immense wealth is carefully portrayed: "There around us lay treasures enough to pay off a moderate national debt, or to build a fleet of ironclads, and yet we would gladly have bartered them all for the faintest chance of escape ... Truly wealth, which men spend all their lives in acquiring, is a valueless thing at the last." (p262). At the resolution, the adventurers have a renewed perspective on wealth "Oh! hang the diamonds! I hope that I may never see another." (p267).

It is ironic that at the outset the adventures left in search of wealth, but they return in the end with the wisdom that wealth is valueless. They have learned the lesson of Solomon, who was offered wealth by God, but instead correctly chose wisdom (1 Kings 3). By journeying to Solomon's Mines in search of treasure, both adventurers and readers return with the treasure of wisdom, and learn something about the fleeting value of earthly wealth. So although this is a great adventure novel, it isn't only about adventure. Even if you return from King Solomon's Mines without Solomon's diamonds, you may return with some of Solomon's wisdom. And read a great adventure story in the process.