Lost World (genre)
Encyclopedia
The Lost World literary genre
is a fantasy
or science fiction
genre that involves the discovery of a new world out of time, place, or both. It began as a subgenre of the late-Victorian
imperial romance
and remains popular to this day.
The genre arose during an era when the fascinating remnants of lost civilizations around the world were being discovered, such as the tombs of Egypt's Valley of the Kings
, the semi-mythical stronghold of Troy
, the jungle-shrouded pyramids of the Maya
, or the cities and palaces of the empire of Assyria
. Thus, real stories of archaeological finds by imperial adventurers succeeded in capturing the public's imagination. Between 1871 and the First World War, the number of published "Lost World" narratives, set in every continent, drastically increased.
The genre has similar themes to "mythical kingdoms", such as El Dorado
.
(1885) by H. Rider Haggard
is sometimes considered the first of the Lost World genre. Haggard's novel shaped the genre and influenced later "lost world" narratives, including Rudyard Kipling
's The Man Who Would Be King
(1888), Arthur Conan Doyle
's The Lost World
(1912), Edgar Rice Burroughs
's The Land That Time Forgot
(1918), A. Merritt
's The Moon Pool
(1918), William Chester
's Kioga of the Wilderness (1933) and H. P. Lovecraft
's At the Mountains of Madness
(1931).
Earlier works, such as Samuel Butler
's Erewhon
(1872) use a similar plot as a vehicle for Swiftian
social satire
rather than romantic adventure. Other early examples are Simon Tyssot de Patot
's Voyages et Aventures de Jacques Massé (1710), which includes a prehistoric fauna and flora, and Robert Paltock
's The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins (1751), an 18th-century imaginary voyage inspired by both Defoe
and Swift
, where a man named Peter Wilkins discovers a race of winged people on an isolated island surrounded by high high cliffs as in Burrough's Caspak. The 1820 hollow earth
novel Symzonia
has also been cited as the first of the Lost World genre. Edgar Allan Poe
's The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
(1838) has certain lost world elements towards the end of the tale.
James Hilton's Lost Horizon
(1933) enjoyed popular success in using the genre as a takeoff for popular philosophy and social comment. It introduced the name Shangri-La
, a meme
for the idealization of the Lost World as a paradise
.
invokes this tradition in his novel Congo
(1980), which involves a quest for King Solomon's mines, fabled to be in a lost African city called Zinj. During the 1990s, James Gurney
published a series of juvenile novels about a lost island called Dinotopia
, in which humans live alongside living dinosaurs.
The Lost World genre is present in many other media. In video games, it is most notably present in Tomb Raider
and its sequels. In movies, the Indiana Jones franchise makes use of similar concepts.
Literary genre
A literary genre is a category of literary composition. Genres may be determined by literary technique, tone, content, or even length. Genre should not be confused with age category, by which literature may be classified as either adult, young-adult, or children's. They also must not be confused...
is a fantasy
Fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...
or science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
genre that involves the discovery of a new world out of time, place, or both. It began as a subgenre of the late-Victorian
Victorian literature
Victorian literature is the literature produced during the reign of Queen Victoria . It forms a link and transition between the writers of the romantic period and the very different literature of the 20th century....
imperial romance
Romance
Romance or romantic may refer to:* Romance languages, a family of languages originating in south-western Europe.* Romance , a genre of medieval and renaissance narrative fiction* Romance , a type of ballad or lyrical song...
and remains popular to this day.
The genre arose during an era when the fascinating remnants of lost civilizations around the world were being discovered, such as the tombs of Egypt's Valley of the Kings
Valley of the Kings
The Valley of the Kings , less often called the Valley of the Gates of the Kings , is a valley in Egypt where, for a period of nearly 500 years from the 16th to 11th century BC, tombs were constructed for the Pharaohs and powerful nobles of the New Kingdom .The valley stands on the west bank of...
, the semi-mythical stronghold of Troy
Troy
Troy was a city, both factual and legendary, located in northwest Anatolia in what is now Turkey, southeast of the Dardanelles and beside Mount Ida...
, the jungle-shrouded pyramids of the Maya
Maya civilization
The Maya is a Mesoamerican civilization, noted for the only known fully developed written language of the pre-Columbian Americas, as well as for its art, architecture, and mathematical and astronomical systems. Initially established during the Pre-Classic period The Maya is a Mesoamerican...
, or the cities and palaces of the empire of Assyria
Assyria
Assyria was a Semitic Akkadian kingdom, extant as a nation state from the mid–23rd century BC to 608 BC centred on the Upper Tigris river, in northern Mesopotamia , that came to rule regional empires a number of times through history. It was named for its original capital, the ancient city of Assur...
. Thus, real stories of archaeological finds by imperial adventurers succeeded in capturing the public's imagination. Between 1871 and the First World War, the number of published "Lost World" narratives, set in every continent, drastically increased.
The genre has similar themes to "mythical kingdoms", such as El Dorado
El Dorado
El Dorado is the name of a Muisca tribal chief who covered himself with gold dust and, as an initiation rite, dived into a highland lake.Later it became the name of a legendary "Lost City of Gold" that has fascinated – and so far eluded – explorers since the days of the Spanish Conquistadors...
.
History
The hugely popular King Solomon's MinesKing Solomon's Mines
King Solomon's Mines is a popular novel by the Victorian adventure writer and fabulist Sir H. Rider Haggard. It tells of a search of an unexplored region of Africa by a group of adventurers led by Allan Quatermain for the missing brother of one of the party...
(1885) by H. Rider Haggard
H. Rider Haggard
Sir Henry Rider Haggard, KBE was an English writer of adventure novels set in exotic locations, predominantly Africa, and a founder of the Lost World literary genre. He was also involved in agricultural reform around the British Empire...
is sometimes considered the first of the Lost World genre. Haggard's novel shaped the genre and influenced later "lost world" narratives, including Rudyard Kipling
Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was an English poet, short-story writer, and novelist chiefly remembered for his celebration of British imperialism, tales and poems of British soldiers in India, and his tales for children. Kipling received the 1907 Nobel Prize for Literature...
's The Man Who Would Be King
The Man Who Would Be King
For the 1975 film based on this story, see The Man Who Would Be King "The Man Who Would Be King" is a short story by Rudyard Kipling. It is about two British adventurers in British India who become kings of Kafiristan, a remote part of Afghanistan...
(1888), Arthur Conan Doyle
Arthur Conan Doyle
Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle DL was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered a milestone in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger...
's The Lost World
The Lost World (Arthur Conan Doyle)
The Lost World is a novel released in 1912 by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle concerning an expedition to a plateau in the Amazon basin of South America where prehistoric animals still survive. It was originally published serially in the popular Strand Magazine during the months of April 1912-November 1912...
(1912), Edgar Rice Burroughs
Edgar Rice Burroughs
Edgar Rice Burroughs was an American author, best known for his creation of the jungle hero Tarzan and the heroic Mars adventurer John Carter, although he produced works in many genres.-Biography:...
's The Land That Time Forgot
The Land That Time Forgot (novel)
The Land That Time Forgot is an Edgar Rice Burroughs science fiction novel, the first of his Caspak trilogy. His working title for the story was "The Lost U-Boat." The sequence was first published in Blue Book Magazine as a three-part serial in the issues for September, October and November 1918...
(1918), A. Merritt
A. Merritt
Abraham Grace Merritt — known by his byline, A. Merritt — was an American editor and author of works of fantastic fiction.-Life:...
's The Moon Pool
The Moon Pool
The Moon Pool is a fantasy novel by Abraham Merritt . It originally appeared as two short stories in All-Story Weekly: "The Moon Pool" and its sequel, "Conquest of the Moon Pool" . These were then reworked into a novel released in 1919. The protagonist, Dr...
(1918), William Chester
William Bennett Chester
The Rt Rev. William Bennett Chester, DD was a Church of Ireland bishop and author. Educated at Trinity College, Dublin, he was ordained in 1848. After a curacy in Kilrush he held incumbencies at Killead, Kilkee, Ballymackey, Nenagh and Birr. He was Chancellor then Archdeacon of Killaloe before his...
's Kioga of the Wilderness (1933) and H. P. Lovecraft
H. P. Lovecraft
Howard Phillips Lovecraft --often credited as H.P. Lovecraft — was an American author of horror, fantasy and science fiction, especially the subgenre known as weird fiction....
's At the Mountains of Madness
At the Mountains of Madness
At the Mountains of Madness is a novella by horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, written in February/March 1931 and rejected that year by Weird Tales editor Farnsworth Wright on the grounds of its length. It was originally serialized in the February, March and April 1936 issues of Astounding Stories...
(1931).
Earlier works, such as Samuel Butler
Samuel Butler
Samuel Butler may refer to:*Samuel Butler , author of Hudibras*Samuel Butler , classical scholar, schoolmaster at Shrewsbury, Bishop of Lichfield...
's Erewhon
Erewhon
Erewhon: or, Over the Range is a novel by Samuel Butler, published anonymously in 1872. The title is also the name of a country, supposedly discovered by the protagonist. In the novel, it is not revealed in which part of the world Erewhon is, but it is clear that it is a fictional country...
(1872) use a similar plot as a vehicle for Swiftian
Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...
social satire
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
rather than romantic adventure. Other early examples are Simon Tyssot de Patot
Simon Tyssot de Patot
Simon Tyssot de Patot was a French writer who penned two very important, seminal works in fantastic literature. Tyssot was born in England of French Huguenot parents...
's Voyages et Aventures de Jacques Massé (1710), which includes a prehistoric fauna and flora, and Robert Paltock
Robert Paltock
Robert Paltock was an English novelist and attorney. His most famous work is The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins, a Cornish Man .Paltock was admired by Walter Scott, Coleridge, and Charles Lamb....
's The Life and Adventures of Peter Wilkins (1751), an 18th-century imaginary voyage inspired by both Defoe
Daniel Defoe
Daniel Defoe , born Daniel Foe, was an English trader, writer, journalist, and pamphleteer, who gained fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe. Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest proponents of the novel, as he helped to popularise the form in Britain and along with others such as Richardson,...
and Swift
Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swift was an Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer , poet and cleric who became Dean of St...
, where a man named Peter Wilkins discovers a race of winged people on an isolated island surrounded by high high cliffs as in Burrough's Caspak. The 1820 hollow earth
Hollow Earth
The Hollow Earth hypothesis proposes that the planet Earth is either entirely hollow or otherwise contains a substantial interior space. The hypothesis has been shown to be wrong by observational evidence, as well as by the modern understanding of planet formation; the scientific community has...
novel Symzonia
John Cleves Symmes, Jr.
John Cleves Symmes, Jr. was an American army officer whose 1818 Hollow Earth theory, expounded on the lecture circuit, gained him considerable notoriety.-Biography:...
has also been cited as the first of the Lost World genre. Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
's The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket is the only complete novel written by American writer Edgar Allan Poe. The work relates the tale of the young Arthur Gordon Pym, who stows away aboard a whaling ship called the Grampus...
(1838) has certain lost world elements towards the end of the tale.
James Hilton's Lost Horizon
Lost Horizon (novel)
Lost Horizon is a 1933 novel by English writer James Hilton. It is best remembered as the origin of Shangri-La, a fictional utopian lamasery high in the mountains of Tibet.-Overview:...
(1933) enjoyed popular success in using the genre as a takeoff for popular philosophy and social comment. It introduced the name Shangri-La
Shangri-La
Shangri-La is a fictional place described in the 1933 novel Lost Horizon by British author James Hilton. Hilton describes Shangri-La as a mystical, harmonious valley, gently guided from a lamasery, enclosed in the western end of the Kunlun Mountains...
, a meme
Meme
A meme is "an idea, behaviour or style that spreads from person to person within a culture."A meme acts as a unit for carrying cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena...
for the idealization of the Lost World as a paradise
Paradise
Paradise is a place in which existence is positive, harmonious and timeless. It is conceptually a counter-image of the miseries of human civilization, and in paradise there is only peace, prosperity, and happiness. Paradise is a place of contentment, but it is not necessarily a land of luxury and...
.
Contemporary examples
Contemporary American novelist Michael CrichtonMichael Crichton
John Michael Crichton , best known as Michael Crichton, was an American best-selling author, producer, director, and screenwriter, best known for his work in the science fiction, medical fiction, and thriller genres. His books have sold over 200 million copies worldwide, and many have been adapted...
invokes this tradition in his novel Congo
Congo (novel)
Congo is a 1980 science fiction novel by Michael Crichton. The novel centers on an expedition searching for diamonds and inspecting the mysterious deaths of the previous expedition in the dense rain forest of Congo...
(1980), which involves a quest for King Solomon's mines, fabled to be in a lost African city called Zinj. During the 1990s, James Gurney
James Gurney
James Gurney is an artist and author best known for his illustrated book series Dinotopia, which is presented in the form of a 19th century explorer’s journal from an island utopia cohabited by humans and dinosaurs...
published a series of juvenile novels about a lost island called Dinotopia
Dinotopia
Dinotopia is a fictional utopia created by author and illustrator James Gurney. It is the setting for the book series with which it shares its name. Dinotopia is an isolated island inhabited by shipwrecked humans and sentient dinosaurs who have learned to coexist peacefully as a single symbiotic...
, in which humans live alongside living dinosaurs.
The Lost World genre is present in many other media. In video games, it is most notably present in Tomb Raider
Tomb Raider
Tomb Raider is an action-adventure video game developed by Core Design and published by Eidos Interactive. It was originally released in 1996 for the Sega Saturn, with MS-DOS and PlayStation versions following shortly thereafter...
and its sequels. In movies, the Indiana Jones franchise makes use of similar concepts.
See also
- Hollow earthHollow EarthThe Hollow Earth hypothesis proposes that the planet Earth is either entirely hollow or otherwise contains a substantial interior space. The hypothesis has been shown to be wrong by observational evidence, as well as by the modern understanding of planet formation; the scientific community has...
- List of non-fictional lost worlds