Capa da edição original de 1917, a prometer grandes aventuras...
"She was as destitute of clothes as the green Martians who accompanied her; indeed, save for her highly wrought ornaments she was entirely naked, nor could any apparel have enhanced the beauty of her perfect and symmetrical figure."
Sempre pensei que a visão go-go dancer da Dynamite sobre Dejah Thoris, a princesa de A Princess of Mars era sexploitation pura, até deparar com o original. Com descrições destas, capazes de aquecer a mais infértil imaginação, não admira que Edgar Rice Burroughs se tenha tornado num dos autores favoritos dos nossos avós. É fácil imaginar legiões de jovens rapazes de mentes inflamada com este parágrafo nos primórdios do século XX.
Sensual e fiel à descrição original. As capas da Dynamite são explosões de sensualidade.
Diga-se que Burroughs era equalitário. A sensualidade de Dejah Thoris para os avôs, Tarzan esse homem musculado de tanguinha para as avós. Diga-se também que hoje é muito bem legível esta ficção escapista pós fim de século vitoriano publicada num ano em que o mundo ocidental se dedicava às carnificinas nas trincheiras da frente ocidental onde a mecanização industrial da matança colidiu com o espírito guerreiro tradicional.
Para fazer justiça à prosa, eis o primeiro choque do leitor e do herói com a beleza exótica da princesa marciana:
"And the sight which met my eyes was that of a slender, girlish figure, similar in every detail to the earthly women of my past life. She did not see me at first, but just as she was disappearing through the portal of the building which was to be her prison she turned, and her eyes met mine. Her face was oval and beautiful in the extreme, her every feature was finely chiseled and exquisite, her eyes large and lustrous and her head surmounted by a mass of coal black, waving hair, caught loosely into a strange yet becoming coiffure. Her skin was of a light reddish copper color, against which the crimson glow of her cheeks and the ruby of her beautifully molded lips shone with a strangely enhancing effect.
She was as destitute of clothes as the green Martians who accompanied her; indeed, save for her highly wrought ornaments she was entirely naked, nor could any apparel have enhanced the beauty of her perfect and symmetrical figure."
Perfect and symmetrical, indeed...
A Princess of Mars está disponível para leitura no Projecto Gutenberg em vários formatos de livro digital. Quanto ao comic, a série vai continuando mas o melhor são mesmo as capas, porque os argumentos oscilam entre o previsível e o entediante.
