The Missing Link: Tarzan in the Early-20th Century French Fantasy Landscape

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While Tarzan has basked in global popularity since its creation, the Tarzan narrative was curiously popular in France in the 1930s, the decade in which the serialization (release in frequent and regular installments) of Tarzan novels, films, and comic books converged. Yet serialization cannot fully explain Tarzan's cult French following. Instead, this thesis argues that the themes evoked in Tarzan acknowledged, supported, and resolved French ambitions and anxieties. These core themes subliminally resonated with French audiences: when contextualized in 1930s France, Tarzan may be understood as easing the cognitive dissonance underpinning French colonization of Africa. Key unifying concepts of "benevolent" colonization, the imagined "Africa," la plus grande France, "civilization," eugenics/evolution, and masculinity in the Tarzan narrative weave together to construct Tarzan as an emblem of the French colonial mission in Africa. These narrative themes, central to the Tarzan story, supported and reinforced the values and psychology underlying French colonization in the interwar period by constructing and making real idealized French fantasies.

    Item Description
    Name(s)
    Thesis advisor: Weisberg, Meg Furniss
    Date
    April 15, 2019
    Extent
    111 pages
    Language
    eng
    Genre
    Physical Form
    electronic
    Discipline
    Rights and Use
    In Copyright – Non-Commercial Use Permitted
    Digital Collection