Philip Jose Farmer wrote a brief introduction to Tarzan - Le Monstre, a collection of stories from Dark Horse's 1990's Tarzan series. He called the stories in this collection "insertion stories", or stories which fit neatly into the already existing fictional history of well-known characters. This was a hobby of Farmer's, scouring his immense knowledge of pulp heroes such as Doc Savage and Tarzan of the Apes and finding little gaps which cried out for filling. Also, these heroes often interacted with famous fictional and historical figures. This served to ground the the stories in time and served Farmer's larger purpose to develop his fanciful but intriguing theory of the Wold Newton Family. Whether these tales are intended to be technically Wold Newton yarns or not I can't say, but they well could be. Now I hasten to add that Farmer did not write these stories. All three two-part tales in this collection were written by Lovern Kindierski and drawn by penciler Stan Manoukian and inker Vince Roucher.
The first two-parter title "Le Monstre" features two covers by the late Berni Wrightson. The story itself is set in 1909 when Paul D'Arnot and Tarzan are in Paris before Tarzan goes to America as described in Tarzan of the Apes. They are visiting the Moulin Rouge when the story begins and meet both painter Pablo Picasso and dancer Jane Avril. Later they head to the Paris Opera House where D'Arnot hopes to introduce Tarzan to the love of his life Christine Daae, a renowned singer. When a mysterious masked man learns that D'Arnot is pressuring Christine to leave the Opera he kidnaps her and is pursued by an unrelenting Tarzan who the masked man calls "Le Monstre". It turns out, Tarzan is the title character, despite the reader learning of the reason for the mask is the kidnapper's wrecked face. After much hectic and furious action Christine is saved but by no means intends to give up her life for Paul who has proven in the meantime not to be so very faithful after all.
The action of "A Modern Prometheus" switches to New York City a month later after Tazan has come to America and encountered Jane again in Wisconsin and rejected his heritage for her sake int he final pages of ERB's first novel. In this rather blood-thirsty tale a "Monk" arrives in NYC around the same time as Tarzan. He intends to find a stolen book which hides forbidden knowledge. Tarzan runs across author Arthur Conan Doyle who is fascinated by the Ape Man and the two then run across Nicolai Tesla who is in a lather when he learns some of his precious equipment has been stolen by Thomas Edison's thugs. The trio go to Menlow Park with a policeman named Robert Hinds and they confront Edison who defies the authorities so he can continue with his experiments. The Monk appears and kills two of the thugs and he and Tarzan shut down the experiment which was apparently intended to bring a dead body to life. We learn the Monk is Frankenstein's Creature and the document was his journal. This story showcases two stellar covers by Mike Kaluta.
"Tooth and Nail" is the last of the three two-part tales and pits the Jungle Lord against Robert Louis Stevenson's infamous literary creation Mr. Hyde. Still in NYC before returning to France and the events which will comprise The Return of Tarzan, our hero agrees to help the police with a murder which at first resembles mightily those committed in "The Murders in the Rue Morgue" also by Edgar Allan Poe. There is a savage killer stalking the streets of New York City and Tarzan turns to a zoo keeper Clyde Trenton and a gorilla named "Ko Ved". (The irony of the name is not lost on me.) With Ko Ved's help Tarzan is able to finally track down the killer and solve the mystery of why the killer has two sents. This story sports two dynamic covers by Mark Schultz.
These tales and many more are also collected in the Tarzan Omnibus from Dark Horse. I prefer the full-size Le Monstre collection, but this is a dandy nonetheless if you can find it cheap.
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