In movies and TV (yeah, yeah, I know they’re not realistic to begin with) Tarzan is always depicted as clean-shaven, though his hair is quite wild. You’d think that someone who was raised by apes and away from civilization would look totally ungroomed. 
holy crap thats a good point! I can’t beleive i never thought about that.
Tarzan shaves himself with his father’s hunting knife. He knows that Men are clean-shaven from pictures in the books left in his parent’s cabin.
Burroughs addresses this in the first novel, Tarzan of the Apes. Tarzan was the son of Lord and Lady Greystoke, who died in the jungle, leaving their infant son to be raised by apes. He inherited his parents’ belongings, including many illustrated books. In Chapter 13, Tarzan faces puberty.
So how come the blade never dulled?
"Almost daily he whetted his keen knife "
He kept re-sharpening it.
… the black men were hairless…
? Methinks a certain author did no research.
You betcha Burroughs went light on research. He even put tigers in Africa. But in all fairness, few aboriginal black African men are bearded.
And how about Gary Oldman as Sid Vicious in Sid & Nancy? He’s so junked out that he doesn’t even notice when he sets his hotel room on fire, but he never has even the merest hint of a shadow. (I know, it’s an artistic decision to make Sid seem more of an “innocent abroad,” but once I noticed it I was bugged by it.)
Hey people, Tarzan of the Apes is an adventure story about a super hero who lives with animals and rescues people. I don’t think it’s about what Tarzan did when he got up in the morning.
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Won’t say anything. Too easy.
Maybe I’m slow, Zagadka. What’s the obvious joke?
Yeah, but…I’ve never seen the real Sid Vicious with much in the way of facial hair. Not even here: http//:www.thesmokinggun.com/mugshots/viciousmug1.html (well maybe a bit of fuzz on the upper lip, but he’d probably been in custody for a while)
Apparently the British are very concienscious about grooming, whether swinging though trees or nodding out in alleyways.
as for sid some people just have very little beard growth . it takes me a full month to get what some would call a slight goatee. whereas my friend can have a full beard in a little as three days.
Thank you for sharing that, ma’am…
Say what? Do you mean naturally, or because they shave? In my experience (and I’ve worked in West Africa quite a bit), most naturally have beards, though different ethnic groups may typically be clean shaven. Certainly some groups in the time and place Tarzan was set would have been bearded.
<< Certainly some groups in the time and place Tarzan was set would have been bearded. >>
Ah, but some groups wouldn’t. And Burroughs very carefully disguised the actual region where Tarzan roamed. When he was young (before he came into contact with Europeans), he might only have seen one or two tribes. The Great Apes who raised him did not range far in their travels: see Straight Dope Staff Report: What kind of ape was Tarzan raised by?