King Solomon's Mines (Penguin Classics)
and over one million other books are available for Amazon Kindle .
Learn more
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
 Trade In this Item for up to £0.25
Get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade in King Solomon's Mines (Penguin Classics) for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £0.25, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
Product Description
Product Description
Three men trek to the remote African interior in search of a lost friend - and reach, at the end of a perilous journey, an unknown land cut off from the world, where terrible dangers threaten anyone who ventures near the spectacular diamond mines of King Solomon...
About the Author
Sir Henry Rider Haggard (1856-1925) was a prolific English writer, who published colorful novels set in unknown regions and lost kingdoms of Africa, or some other corner of the world: Iceland, Constantinople, Mexico, Ancient Egypt. Haggard's best-known work is the romantic adventure tale KING SOLOMON'S MINES (1885), which was inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson' s famous Treasure Island.
Giles Foden was born in Warwickshire in 1967. His family moved to Malawi in 1972 where he was brought up. His first novel, the acclaimed The Last King of Scotland (1998), is set during Idi Amin's rule of Uganda in the 1970s and won the Whitbread First Novel Award; his second novel, Ladysmith (1999), is set during the Anglo-Boer War in 1899; Zanzibar (2002), is set in East Africa and explores the events surrounding the bombings of American embassies in 1998. A new book, The Battle for Lake Tanganyika, was published in 2004.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
First Sentence
It is a curious thing that at my agefifty-five last birthdayI should find myself taking up a pen to try and write a history. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
It is a curious thing that at my agefifty-five last birthdayI should find myself taking up a pen to try and write a history. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover
Tags Customers Associate with This Product(What's this?)Click on a tag to find related items, discussions, and people.
|
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
One of the great action adventure stories of any age, Haggard flexes all of his creative musles to weave a spellbinding tale in 'King Solomon's Mines'. Leading us into the wilds of unexplored Africa, even the modern reader is confronted with a world few of us in the West will have expereinced - and probably never will. Haggard mixes all of the ingredients here: romance, battle scenes, a bit of magic and treasure. What more could you want?
Well, in truth as the years have gone by there are those that have levelled the charge of racism at Haggard. Okay, so he tneds to use the term 'negro' and 'native'. But he is a man of the Victorian era. Can we expet anything else? In my opinion I feel that Haggard treats his African characters with respect and dignity and should be hailed for that given the colonial atomposhere he was writing in.
That aside this novel is great fun and I would recommend it for all boys and those men (of which I inlude myself) who have yet to grow up!
Well, in truth as the years have gone by there are those that have levelled the charge of racism at Haggard. Okay, so he tneds to use the term 'negro' and 'native'. But he is a man of the Victorian era. Can we expet anything else? In my opinion I feel that Haggard treats his African characters with respect and dignity and should be hailed for that given the colonial atomposhere he was writing in.
That aside this novel is great fun and I would recommend it for all boys and those men (of which I inlude myself) who have yet to grow up!
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I grew up on the movie so it was quit a shocker to read the book. As stated in the beginning there are no petticoated women in this book. It is a men's adventure written by a man for men. You can not miss the hand of H. Rider Haggard as he has a unique sense of humor that pops up at the strangest times. He may be a little verbose but every word has a use. And as with written stories this one is much more intricate than the movie adaptations. You will find many assumptions of the time such as any complex construction must have been built by white people and natives on their own may turn savage.
The story is told first person by Allan Quartermain. Nevil is off to make his fortune by finding King Solomon's lost diamond mines. Allan sends him a 300 year old map to help. This is the last anyone heard from Nevil. Turns out that Nevil is really the estranged brother of Henry Curtis. Sir Henry Curtis now wants to make amends and he with his friend Captain John Good, bribe Allan Quartermain to take them across an endless desert and trough impassible mountains to an adventure that will hold you to the very end. Along with them is their self imposed helper Umbopa who carries a secret of his own.
If you get a chance also hear the recording, an added plus is narration by John Richmond; He brings the characters to life and adds to the mystique that this story has been passed down.
If you cannot find a copy of the John Richmond, recording you can use the Kindle 2 text-to speak. It is not as smooth but it is functional.
King Solomon's Mines Starring: Deborah Kerr, Stewart Granger
The story is told first person by Allan Quartermain. Nevil is off to make his fortune by finding King Solomon's lost diamond mines. Allan sends him a 300 year old map to help. This is the last anyone heard from Nevil. Turns out that Nevil is really the estranged brother of Henry Curtis. Sir Henry Curtis now wants to make amends and he with his friend Captain John Good, bribe Allan Quartermain to take them across an endless desert and trough impassible mountains to an adventure that will hold you to the very end. Along with them is their self imposed helper Umbopa who carries a secret of his own.
If you get a chance also hear the recording, an added plus is narration by John Richmond; He brings the characters to life and adds to the mystique that this story has been passed down.
If you cannot find a copy of the John Richmond, recording you can use the Kindle 2 text-to speak. It is not as smooth but it is functional.
King Solomon's Mines Starring: Deborah Kerr, Stewart Granger
Format:Paperback
A REVIEW OF `KING SOLOMON'S MINES BY H. RIDER HAGGARD
In many ways, `King Solomon's Mines' is THE classic adventure story. First published in 1885, and written in response to a wager that he could not produce a story half-as-good as `Treasure Island', H. Rider Haggard left a legacy which continues today, not only in literature, but also in such films as `Indiana Jones...' and `National Treasure'. The plot is simplicity itself: Whilst in deepest Africa, gnarled elephant hunter, Allan Quartermain receives an irresistible offer from two fellow Englishmen to join them on a quest to find the lost treasures believed to be hidden in King Solomon's Mine. Added to this, one of the fellow adventurers, Sir Henry Curtis, is looking for his brother who seemingly disappeared on the same quest. Equipped with plenty of guns and ammunition, Quartermain's scrawled map of the region, and some native companions, they are off.
`King Solomon's Mines' wastes no time laboriously setting the scene. Indeed, the first third of the book is a fast-paced tale, full of movement, during which our heroes face all manner of hardships, attempting to reach the road that leads to untold riches. The perils that they face are evocatively and realistically told and the reader is easily drawn into the adventure.
And then, it rather grinds to a halt. The middle third takes the narrative in an entirely different direction. All thoughts of lost treasure and missing siblings vanish, as we are caught up in a bitter and brutal civil war between two rivals for the throne of Kukuanaland. Admittedly, once the fighting begins, the action comes thick and fast. However, for many pages, the momentum of the quest is lost. It's not that these pages are not entertaining. Far from it. They are filled with much humour and mystery, and make the best use of false-teeth and eclipses that I can recall in a novel! Nevertheless, the effect is a bit like expecting the crowd at a football match to be as equally interested in the half-time entertainment as they would be in the match itself.
Thankfully, we rejoin the hunt for the gold and diamonds in the final third of `King Solomon's Mines', and the wait is definitely worthwhile. The telling of the finding of the treasure is brimming with suspense, excitement and some liberal dollops of horror. Like the best moments of `Raiders Of the lost Ark', it all works brilliantly. The effect is enhanced by having Quaertermain as the narrator. At the start of the tale he made it clear that he was no fearless hero, and his responses to the unfolding predicament of the adventurers add a veneer of believability to what could have been presented as excessively far-fetched hokum.
Thus, on turning the final page, `King Solomon's Mines' emerges a terrific (if flawed by its pedestrian second act) adventure classic, worthy of its endless reprints. Haggard clearly knew that he was onto a winner as Quartermain was to return in a whole series of novels, the most famous being the first eponymous sequel. `King Solomon's Mines' may not be pure gold, but it shines brightly enough to keep lovers of boys'-own-fiction hunting for more such treasures.
Barty's Score: 8.5/10
In many ways, `King Solomon's Mines' is THE classic adventure story. First published in 1885, and written in response to a wager that he could not produce a story half-as-good as `Treasure Island', H. Rider Haggard left a legacy which continues today, not only in literature, but also in such films as `Indiana Jones...' and `National Treasure'. The plot is simplicity itself: Whilst in deepest Africa, gnarled elephant hunter, Allan Quartermain receives an irresistible offer from two fellow Englishmen to join them on a quest to find the lost treasures believed to be hidden in King Solomon's Mine. Added to this, one of the fellow adventurers, Sir Henry Curtis, is looking for his brother who seemingly disappeared on the same quest. Equipped with plenty of guns and ammunition, Quartermain's scrawled map of the region, and some native companions, they are off.
`King Solomon's Mines' wastes no time laboriously setting the scene. Indeed, the first third of the book is a fast-paced tale, full of movement, during which our heroes face all manner of hardships, attempting to reach the road that leads to untold riches. The perils that they face are evocatively and realistically told and the reader is easily drawn into the adventure.
And then, it rather grinds to a halt. The middle third takes the narrative in an entirely different direction. All thoughts of lost treasure and missing siblings vanish, as we are caught up in a bitter and brutal civil war between two rivals for the throne of Kukuanaland. Admittedly, once the fighting begins, the action comes thick and fast. However, for many pages, the momentum of the quest is lost. It's not that these pages are not entertaining. Far from it. They are filled with much humour and mystery, and make the best use of false-teeth and eclipses that I can recall in a novel! Nevertheless, the effect is a bit like expecting the crowd at a football match to be as equally interested in the half-time entertainment as they would be in the match itself.
Thankfully, we rejoin the hunt for the gold and diamonds in the final third of `King Solomon's Mines', and the wait is definitely worthwhile. The telling of the finding of the treasure is brimming with suspense, excitement and some liberal dollops of horror. Like the best moments of `Raiders Of the lost Ark', it all works brilliantly. The effect is enhanced by having Quaertermain as the narrator. At the start of the tale he made it clear that he was no fearless hero, and his responses to the unfolding predicament of the adventurers add a veneer of believability to what could have been presented as excessively far-fetched hokum.
Thus, on turning the final page, `King Solomon's Mines' emerges a terrific (if flawed by its pedestrian second act) adventure classic, worthy of its endless reprints. Haggard clearly knew that he was onto a winner as Quartermain was to return in a whole series of novels, the most famous being the first eponymous sequel. `King Solomon's Mines' may not be pure gold, but it shines brightly enough to keep lovers of boys'-own-fiction hunting for more such treasures.
Barty's Score: 8.5/10
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
For people who hate literature
Every so often I get the feeling that a good old timey adventure book would be a good thing to read. This is (hopefully) the last time I think this as the results are always dire. Read more
Published on 14 Mar 2010 by Sam Quixote
An undemanding page turner from the ripping yarns school
This book was written in response to a competition to create a novel as good as Treasure Island. Against that yardstick it is a failure but it is still a pretty good yarn. Read more
Published on 25 May 2009 by Brownbear101
They don't write 'em like this anymore...
We face an interesting dilemma in the twenty-first century when deciding what to do with novels like this. Read more
Published on 2 May 2009 by Alexis Paladin
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
- Books > Fiction > Adventure Stories & Action
- Books > Fiction > Classics
- Books > Fiction > Historical
- Books > Fiction > Literary Fiction
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
