Rating: 
Summary: Conan Doyle Smiles
Review: Professor George E. Challenger, noted scientist, says dinosaurs are still alive, and he knows where to find them. The scientific community says he's a madman or a fraud, or both. Challenger's only evidence is a bunch of blurry photographs. Fellow scientists say the photos are obviously doctored and the newspapers call it a fantasy. Boiling with rage, Challenger goes into seclusion. Anyone foolish enough to bring up the tender subject around him is liable to end up in the gutter outside his house, with a few extra lumps for the gutter press.The only reporter brave, or stupid, enough to face the professor's wrath and get the story is Edward Malone, young, intrepid journalist for the Daily Gazette. At a boisterous scientific meeting, Professor Summerlee, a rival scientist, calls Challenger's bluff. Summerlee will return to South America and prove Challenger wrong. The young journalist volunteers to go along. Lord John Roxton, the famous hunter, can't miss an opportunity to return to the jungle and adds his name to expedition. Professor Challenger is happy they are taking him seriously, even if they don't all believe him. But what will they find in South America? A strange, living time capsule from the Jurassic period filled with pterodactyls and stegosaurs? Or will they only find vast tracks of endless jungles and Challenger's daydreams? Either way there will be danger and adventure for all. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote "The Lost World" in 1912 for the Strand magazine, the same magazine that published his Sherlock Holmes stories. It's a great Edwardian science-fiction adventure, although some may not like the British Imperialism and Darwinian racism. Still, in "The Lost World" Conan Doyle lets his hair down a little. Changing narrators from the earnest Doctor John Watson to the rash reporter Edward Malone makes for a big change. There is a good deal more humor. The students in the scientific meetings are forever yelling out jokes at the expense of nutty Professor Challenger. Affairs of the heart play a big role in Malone's life. He matures from a young swain out to impress his girlfriend to more of a wistful man-of-the-world by the end. It is a very different Conan Doyle than some are used to reading. Different, but just as good, maybe, dare I say it, even better.
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Summary: Another Conan Doyle legacy
Review: Sherlock Holmes was not the first fictional detective but is surely the most famous. "The Lost World" may not have been the first novel of its kind, but as with the incomparable sleuth of 221-B Baker Street, Conan Doyle penned its first memorable novel of the genre; of prehistoric life defying all odds to live on in a virtually inaccessible portion of our planet. How many other writers can claim to have such a profound effect on two different types of literature?
"The Lost World" is a fast-paced and entertaining story of a small expedition to the wilds of the Amazon River Basin and the the dangers the 4 mismatched heroes face from slave traders, the jungle itself, and of course from the prehistoric beasts and ape-men roaming the plateau so dangerous to human habitation. The love interest in this story is negligible but the reader barely notices the absence, as this is an adventure story and not a romance. The main characters are all of a type that would have been familiar to Doyle's Victorian audience, with the egotistical and brilliant Professor Challenger dominating the book. Doyle's humor illustrated within many of Challenger's bombastic pronouncements is a touch that rarely is present in the Sherlock Holmes stories, masterpeices as they are. This is not to say that Lord John Roxton, Professor Summerlee and Edward Malone are pale shadows by comparison - they just don't think they are always right! Warning: Politically correct readers need not bother - Doyle would not get your stamp of approval, but remember he is writing this novel a hundred or so years ago.
Many books, movies and TV shows owe a great deal to Sir Arthur for his authorship of this book, which I certainly recommend for action, storytelling and a glimpse of the Victorian view of the effect of European civilization upon other worlds.
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Summary: ¿There are heroisms all around us¿
Review: This book infests your soul with the want of adventure that every man and woman has deep inside them. Taking the reader through the ordinary streets of London to the exotic jungles of the Amazon, Doyle clearly and vividly describes colorful and long forgotten life forms and life-styles. From the majestic dinosaurs to the fierce ape-men to giant dragon-flies, this book will captivate every mind that reads it with a passion.
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Summary: A Memorable Early "Pulp" Adventure
Review: Whatever else it may be, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's THE LOST WORLD has certainly been influential. The 1925 silent film version was one of the great special effects landmarks of its day, and the novel has been filmed on at least two other occasions, once in 1960 and once more (for television) in 2002. And one scarcely need mention such LOST WORLD-influenced efforts as THE LAND UNKNOWN or the book-to-film JURASSIC PARK and its various sequels. There seems no end in sight. Doyle's original is remarkably straightforward and devoid of the subplots and love-interest introduced in the various film versions. The story is told from the point of view of a London reporter, Edward Malone, whose beloved spurs him into action when she declares that she could never marry a man who has no taste for high adventure or bold risk. Malone accordingly begins to cover a scientific scandal: Professor Challenger has returned from South America with outrageous claims of prehistoric life that survives on a plateau in the Amazon. When Challenger suggests a party be formed to verify his claims, Malone jumps at the chance. It is interesting to read Doyle's LOST WORLD in comparison with Wells' WAR OF THE WORLDS, for the two novels counterpoint each other terms of mindset; where Wells' famous novel is a covert satire of the brutality of English imperialism, Doyle accepts English imperialism with a manly embrace and sends his explorers off into the uncivilized wilds, where they repeatedly encounter undesirables in great need of a blast from an English-made rifle. Indeed, they often seem more interested in eradicating newly discovered life forms than in observing them! But we would do a disservice to both Doyle and his novel by taking it too seriously. It was written to be a blood and thunder adventure, pitting "modern" men against nature's bloody claw--and while Doyle's style here will likely seem a bit stilted to modern readers, the book still works extremely well. According to lore, Doyle preferred Dr. Challenger to his more celebrated Sherlock Holmes, and indeed Doyle wrote several novels that featured the gruff, blustery, and violent-tempered scientist. While it seems unlikely that Challenger will ever depose Holmes in the public favor, fans of the Holmes stories will likely enjoy THE LOST WORLD as an example of Doyle's non-mystery work--and certainly fans of early pulp adventure will have a field day. Recommended for the pure fun of it! GFT, Amazon reviewer
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Summary: Something nasty in the jungle
Review: I thought that "The Lost World" was an entertaining novel, taking the reader back to the glory days of the Empire, when heroes sporting bushy moustaches and eccentric professors with beards dressed in Harris tweeds and armed with little more than a trusty service revolver and hunting rifle, could venture into the most inhospitable wildernessesa and survive. Professors Challenger and Summerlee, along with Lord John Roxton and the Irish journalist Edward Malone, go on an expedition to the deepest Amazon in an attempt to prove Challenger's claim the prehistoric life had survived there. The rest of the story has been copied and adapted so many times, tha it's not worth going over. Nonetheless, "The Lost World" is still a good read: Conan Doyle could spin a decent yarn. True, it's very much of its age: the modern reader might feel assaulted by the Social Darwinianism and racial stereotypes which run through it: the only black character is the faithful yet simple "Zambo" (ouch); and the Latin American characters are all treacherous (of course). Even Malone, being Irish, is not exempt from this kind of stuff. I was struck also by the violence permeating the novel. Challenger brawls with or threatens everyone who disagrees with him, the explorers decimate every living thing around them (hunting trophies being sought assidously), fights break out at scientific meetings, and the expedition members participate eagerly in a battle which is justified by the "survival of the fittest" mantra. No doubt we live in violent times at the moment, but if this is any representation of times past (albeit it is only a work of fiction) our ancesters seemed to be squabbling and brawling their way towards World War One! G Rodgers
Rating:
Summary: Showing Its Age, But Still A Classic
Review: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's "The Lost World" is a classic adventure story first published in 1912. It is the story of a scientific expedition that is sent to determine if the reported findings of prehistoric life still existing in a remote area of South America are true. Professor Challenger is the one defending his findings, Professor Summerlee is the skeptic, and there are two unbiased observers: the guide, Lord John Roxton, and a reporter Ned Malone, who also servers as the Narrator of the story. This book is certainly showing some of its age. The opening of the book, in which we learn of Ned Malone's motivation, certainly comes across as dated and sexist. In it the woman of his dreams tells him "There are heroisms all round us waiting to be done. It's for men to do them, and for women to reserve their love as a reward for such men... That's what I should like - to be envied for my man." Much later in the book, we have the scientific expedition deciding to try to wipe out a race of previously unknown ape-men, hardly something a scientist would contemplate in this day and age, and I doubt it would have been even when this book was first published. Yet despite these and other flaws, I did enjoy reading this book. The characters were eccentric and entertaining, and I was compelled to keep reading to find out what would happen to them. This book was tied for 9th on August Derleth's Arkham Survey of 'Basic SF Titles', but it really is more of an Adventure novel than a Science Fiction novel.
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Summary: Jurasscic Park, 19th Century Style
Review: Arthur Conan Doyle has done it again, and this time, without Sherlock Holmes. In "Lost World", the egotistical, eccentric professor, the desperate lover, the cynical skeptic, fantastic life forms, danger, and conflict all play their roles in the weaving of this tale. George Edward Challenger, the eccentric professor, shocks and challenges London's scientific community with incredible tales of prehistoric animals living in South America. Challenged to prove his position, he leads an expedition in search of this 19th century Jurassic Park, an expedition which will prove him a giant or a charlatan. I won't ruin it for you, but trust me, join the expedition. This truly is a book which you will not want to put down.
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Summary: In the Rider Haggard tradition
Review: After many years of searching for this book, I finally found it and read it in a single afternoon. It was an excellent yarn, written by an imaginative medico, sitting in his study in England who could only have had scientific journals as references. Other reviewers are chagrined that he didn't write like Jules Verne, so maybe they should just stick to Verne. The action is slower than the filmed renditions of this book, but it is an adventurous journey in the H. Rider Haggard tradition. Now to read Greg Bear's sequel...
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Summary: Imitation of Jules Verne
Review: Arthur Conan Doyle, at the age of fourteen, learned French so that he could read Jules Verne in the author's original language. So it's unsurprising that Doyle's "The Lost World" (1912) shows some influences from Jules Verne's "The Raft; Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon" (1881). In fact the writing style of "The Lost World" seems, to me, more like Verne's style than the familiar crisp style of the Sherlock Holmes stories. The idea of finding dinosaurs deep in the Amazon is a bold one, and guaranteed to appeal to the popular imagination, but in general I would say that Jules Verne is better at this genre. "The Lost World" is without a doubt more thrilling; Verne's "The Raft," which is also full of adventure, is more realistic and gave me the feeling I had really been to the Amazon.
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Summary: Lost Classic
Review: It's great to see THE LOST WORLD in print in a nice paperback edition. While maybe not in the same pantheon of classics as H.G. Wells' THE WAR OF THE WORLDS or THE TIME MACHINE, or Jules Verne's JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH or 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA, this novel certainly is a classic in its own right. Most are probably familiar with the basic plot - an intrepid, self deprecating reporter along with vain academics and a pompous sportsman set off to find a land where pre-historic beasts still roam the earth. The story takes a little while to get exciting as we are introduced to the cast of characters and to Professor Challenger's unbelievable claim that the he had discovered a land where beasts long since thought extinct still existed. But these precursors to the actual expedition are important as we learn the motives and personalities of the characters. And the action moves along quite swiftly as the four explorers find themselves in a series of (mis)adventures in the lost world.
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