A World to Conquer

Michael Whelan is another wonder of the modern fantasy art world. One of the 7 wonders? We'll have to see, down the road aways.

A number of modern illustrators have delivered wondrous visions of the Edgar Rice Burroughs realms. But Whelan set the bar pretty high when he painted his set of Barsoomian covers for the Del Ray version of the John Carter series.

This wrap-around cover of A Princess of Mars is among my favorites of all time, if nothing more than for the sheer heroic posturing—but of course Deja Thoris might have something to do with it.

Above, the painting beautifully unencumbered with type elements.

Above, the painting beautifully encumbered with type elements.

Above, the gorgeous preliminary drawing.

Above, some preliminary designs.

Above, some character workups.

Checklist

Frank Frazetta and Roy Krenkel are forever linked through their decades of work and friendship, inspiring each other on to create their best.

Frank Frazetta — 1950s sketches

Roy Krenkel — Sorcery

As well, they are forever linked to the Edgar Rice Burroughs' oeuvre of work, exciting the imagination more with their paint and ink, than perhaps ERB's words do (though don't get me wrong—they are ripping yarns).

A question came in from one of our good friends, regarding the ERB Ace John Carter books. He was having trouble figuring out just where they originally appeared and how many total there were. He's got four of them, but he can't find an image of a paperback with the universally famous artwork of the A Princess of Mars, and he's wondering what exactly to look for.

Well, first off, there ARE only four John Carter Ace paperbacks from the 60s, and A Princess of Mars is, inexplicably, not one of them. And when the new Ace series, with new Frazetta art, rolled out, none of the John Carter novels were among them. Instead, the hardback editions, published by Nelson Doubleday, presented Frazetta's mature paintings on dust covers and interior pen and inks. And that is where we find maybe the finest interpretations ever of the Barsoom series.

For any help it might provide, I'm posting below a checklist of ERB Ace paperbacks by Frazetta and Krenkel, gathered by Bruce Brenner in the lovely Fanzine Qua Brot, published some years ago. Disclosure: I did some editing to present only the information pertinent to this post.

An Incident on Barsoom

Ah. Roy Krenkel and Barsoom.

Need I say more?

THE St. John?

In the early 20th century era of amazing magazine illustrations, this Vogue cover stands out. It's typical art nouveau subject matter of the time, but the treatment is sensitive and gorgeous. It's signed by St. John, and I can't help but figure that this is J. Allen St. John, by any means not typical of him, and likewise his signature.

This was the point in time when J(ames) Allen St. John was turning out mainstream assignments for magazines and advertisers, though four years prior to this cover he had illustrated the book The Face in the Pool, and it would be two years after this cover that Edgar Rice Burroughs would write his first story Dejah Thoris, Princess of Mars. I could settle this in my mind if I had access to the St. John bibliography, but I don't. Probably one of you St. John enthusiasts do (Mr. DoorTree?).

Later note: We've heard from Mr. DoorTree, and yes indeed, this cover was created by our esteemed ERBdom chronicler, J. Allen St. John. So sweet, so sweet.

St. John — Vogue — March 18, 1909

Jungle Drama

Joe Kubert wasn't just about war drama. He was about jungle drama too. His Tarzan renderings are probably the best in the whole comic history of Edgar Rice Burroughs' character, including Hal Foster's. Unfortunately I thought many of the stories were rather lackluster, as most jungle stories tend to be, in my opinion. I just wish he had done more of ERB's Mars or Venus art.

These are a few of my favorite Tarzans by Joe.

R.E.H.

RGK was enamored with REH as he was with ERB . . .

Conan

Plunder

Kull Triumphant

The Golden Lion

Of course, the most classic rendition of Tarzan and the Golden Lion comes from J. Allen St. John, the patron saint of Edgar Rice Burroughs imagery. Yes, Frazetta and Krenkel are shining stars, but you can see just where those two received their inspiration from.

In my book, the epitome of Tarzan, complemented by St. John's fabulous title design:

Flexing Artistic Muscle

This beautiful ink rendition by Roy Krenkel is of course based on the original painting by PJ Monahan for Tarzan and the Golden Lion, for the December 9, 1922 cover of Argosy Magazine.

It is not a swipe, but pays honor to the classic illustrative history of ERB , as well to flex Krenkel's artistic muscle and 'improve' Tarzan's visual identity.

Above, Roy Krenkel. Below, PJ Monahan—1922

You can certainly see some of the inspiration for Frazetta, as well.

Pretty Good Run

Russ Manning had a pretty good run with the Tarzan epic, his renderings of women always interesting. But I particularly liked his specialty drawings. These are from an ERB portfolio.

Below—this piece was also used, slightly altered and in color, on the cover of ERBdom #83.

The two pieces below are from the same base art, but can you spot the subtle difference?

The piece above was also used on a record album cover.