Summary
Summary of Tanar of Pellucidar
Tanar of Pellucidar at a glance
Summary: 8 min to read
- Reading time
- About 4 h 50 min3 h 50 min fast, 5 h 45 min slow
- Length
- 68,500 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
- First published
- 1929by Edgar Rice Burroughs
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
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Key ideas
Key idea 1
A radio opens the inner world
Jason Gridley is testing a new radio signal in his lab in Tarzana when strange voices give way to code and the word Pellucidar. The sender is Abner Perry, communicating from deep inside the earth. A question about a fire in Perry's gunpowder factory helps confirm the connection.
Burroughs places himself beside Jason as a listener. Before Tanar's adventures begin, this opening makes the hidden world feel reachable: an extraordinary tale arrives through an invention, with a doubtful listener there to hear it.
Key idea 2
Tanar buys time among the pirates
Taken hostage while serving as an envoy, Tanar faces the Korsar leader, The Cid, and the hostile Bohar the Bloody.
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Key idea 3
The storm reveals a different Stellara
When a storm strikes the pirate ship, the crew's boasts of courage give way to panic.
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Key idea 4
A birthmark challenges a cruel rule
Escaping through the forest, Tanar carries Stellara through the trees to hide their tracks.
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Key idea 5
Unspoken love turns into jealousy
In Fedol's village of Paraht, Stellara is welcomed and Tanar earns a place among the hunters.
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Key idea 6
The rescue leads beneath the ground
Bohar has survived the storm, and his return shatters the safety of Paraht.
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Key idea 7
Loyalty faces distance and misunderstanding
After escaping the underground world, Tanar reaches Stellara and finally declares his love.
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Key idea 8
Communities reveal what their values build
Tanar's travels place different ways of living beside one another.
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Key idea 9
The rescue keeps opening new dangers
What begins with a radio call grows into a rescue reaching across seas, islands and the world below ground.
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The rest of the summary, written and spoken, and the whole book: free to start.
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Who it’s for
For readers who love lost worlds, sea chases, cave escapes and hunters with spears, and for anyone who enjoys a love story among strange peoples.
What this book is
What would you do if a voice from the center of the earth asked for your help? In Tanar of Pellucidar, a young radio builder named Jason Gridley sits in his lab in Tarzana, California, with a friend who writes adventure stories. Out of the static comes code, and then a message from an old inventor named Abner Perry, sending from inside the hollow world of Pellucidar.
Edgar Rice Burroughs writes himself into the opening as the listener. Perry tells of Tanar, a young hunter taken prisoner by pirate ships. A rescue grows into shipwreck, island kingdoms, underground horrors and a love story. You meet the proud Korsars, the people of Amiocap and the quarrelsome cliff dwellers of Hime.
In this summary
- 1A radio opens the inner worldFree
- 2Tanar buys time among the pirates
- 3The storm reveals a different Stellara
- 4A birthmark challenges a cruel rule
- 5Unspoken love turns into jealousy
- 6The rescue leads beneath the ground
- 7Loyalty faces distance and misunderstanding
- 8Communities reveal what their values build
- 9The rescue keeps opening new dangers
A radio in Tarzana picks up Pellucidar
The book opens in the author's own voice. Jason Gridley, a young orphan with an income, has built a lab behind his home in Tarzana. He is testing a new radio signal that he and the author call the Gridley wave.
One evening Jason hears voices in a language nobody knows. Then the headphones carry code, followed by one word, Pellucidar. The sender is Abner Perry, writing from deep inside the earth. To prove Burroughs is listening, Jason asks about a fire in Perry's first gunpowder factory, a thing only Burroughs could know.
Perry then tells the tale. David Innes, Emperor of Pellucidar, is a captive in the north, and white invaders called Korsars sail huge painted ships. The frame makes Pellucidar feel reachable, with a doubting friend standing in for the listener.
A good adventure begins by making you want to believe it.
That’s 1 of 9 key points.
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Check yourself
Why does Tanar agree to help the Korsars make better gunpowder?
Right. “He knows nothing about it, but he agrees, because the lie buys time.”Not quite. “He knows nothing about it, but he agrees, because the lie buys time.”
What convinces Fedol that Stellara is his daughter?
Right. “Stellara turns her left shoulder toward him, and the birthmark matches his.”Not quite. “Stellara turns her left shoulder toward him, and the birthmark matches his.”
What lies behind Tanar and Stellara's anger toward each other?
Right. “Tanar's anger and Stellara's anger come from wounded pride, not from a lack of love.”Not quite. “Tanar's anger and Stellara's anger come from wounded pride, not from a lack of love.”
Go deeper: the whole of Tanar of Pellucidar
About 5 h to read.Start freePaperback, hardcover and large print, printed for you at cost, are on their way.Email me when it is printed
About this edition
Every format is free to start, and print and large print are at cost.
- LengthAbout 68,500 words
- Reading timeAbout 4 h 50 min
Questions about Tanar of Pellucidar
What is Tanar of Pellucidar about?
It tells how a young hunter named Tanar is captured by pirates called Korsars, how Emperor David Innes follows him, and how Tanar crosses islands and underground tunnels while trying to protect Stellara and return to his homeland.
Do I need to read the earlier Pellucidar books first?
No. The opening pages explain the inner world and its main figures, David Innes and Abner Perry. The story then follows Tanar, so a new reader can step in easily and enjoy it as an adventure.
What is Pellucidar?
Pellucidar is a hollow world inside the earth, where the sun hangs forever at noon, nobody keeps time, and the land curves upward in every direction. Stone Age people live there beside saber-toothed tigers, mammoths and sea monsters.
Who are the Korsars and the Coripies?
The Korsars are bearded pirates with painted ships, harquebuses and cutlasses, ruled by The Cid. They are called the Buried People.
Is it a true story?
No. It is a lost-world adventure novel by Edgar Rice Burroughs. The opening scene, where he hears the story by radio from Jason Gridley's lab in Tarzana, is part of the fiction and sets the tone for the tale.
Cite this edition
Burroughs, Edgar Rice. Tanar of Pellucidar. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/tanar-of-pellucidar.
Burroughs, E. R. (2026). Tanar of Pellucidar. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/tanar-of-pellucidar (Original work published 1929)
Burroughs, Edgar Rice. Tanar of Pellucidar. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/tanar-of-pellucidar.
@book{burroughs2026tanar,
author = {Burroughs, Edgar Rice},
title = {Tanar of Pellucidar},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/tanar-of-pellucidar},
note = {First published 1929}
}
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