Monday 20 July 2009

Outlaw of Gor by John Norman

The plot
Man finds himself back on parallel Earth where men are men and women are women. But his city -- and his woman -- have vanished and he finds himself set against a city where the world order has been turned on its head.

What I liked
  • The delicious naughtiness of reading a Gor book -- my mother firmly removed one of the books from my hands when I was 12.
  • The plot is actually very impelling: where else are you going to get a gladiator escapes because he is randomly set to fight against his own giant hawk? And what other hero would, in making his escape on the back of his GIANT HAWK, kidnap the queen from her seat in the arena? And then be BETRAYED and sent to the slave mines? And then escape by making the slaves wait in turn to eat like MEN? And then buy the queen as his SLAVE, because she LOVES him, even though she's a queen who hates men and he kidnapped her?
  • It has introduced into our domestic vocabulary the phases 'Scarlet Dancing Silks of Gor' and 'The Pleasure Rack of Gor'.
What I learnt
  • That forbidden fruit is the sweetest.
  • That logic and realism are not vital ingredients of a good story.

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