This is the book on which the iconic 1968 movie starring Charleton Heston was based. Three astronauts from Earth have traveled at light speed to the distant planet Soror, where they discover that the apes are the "intelligent" rulers and humans are the "primitive" animals. The humans are unable to speak, and appear to lack the intelligence to think or reason; they had "a sort of void, an absence of expression." The apes are civilized; they "had the manner of aristocrats. They chatted happily in an articulate language, and each moment their faces expressing human sentiments, not a trace of which I had found in {humans}."
This was a distracting read in these dark times, and I enjoyed reading it. I did find it rather simplistic, and I don't think it has aged well. I will note, however, that some critics at the time of its publication found it to be an incisive satire and commentary on human society, and compared it to works such as Gulliver's Travels.
2943 ( )

Book 273 - Pierre Boulle - Planet of the Apes

Written in 1963 and followed up with a brilliant movie in 1968 starring Charlton Heston and then some sillier sequels…this led to a reboot by Tim Burton in 2001 which is just bonkers…then a further series of movies that are very clever indeed.

Interestingly the novel is so different but fits in to the post war paranoia about world end events and pushing them the future and asks…what if ?

Unusually for a tale like this it is told from a first person perspective as the main character’s story has been found, of all places, in a bottle, floating through space. It is the far future and a couple are enjoying a break away from it all when come across the bottle. We aren’t privy to their species but the man can understand English even if he isn’t from Earth.

The story relates how a science expedition is nearing the star of Betelgeuse when they discover an earth-like planet. As they come in to land they spy cities…cars…farmlands and then come across one of the indigenous species…humans…who cannot speak and don’t or are unable to laugh or smile.

The book then follows much of what is seen in the first movie as ….. they are captured by the apes…apes who were hunting humans and killing them for sport…and is experimented on like lab rats in a maze.

Interestingly the ending of the novel explains a lot about how the ending of Tim Burton’s movie came about. Devastating. ( )

Perfect book to kick off my holiday weekend! Old school sci-fi with a familiar plot (if you've seen the movie) but with enough deviations to keep it fresh & interesting.

Fast paced and easy to read. Makes you think hard about how our world operates and how we treat our fellow primates.

On a side note, I'm a big fan of orangutans so I was sad they are the big jerks in the story!

Also - I'm going to have to rent Rise of the Planet of the Apes now... ( )

This felt like a mixture of Jules Verne and "Gulliver's Travels". There is nothing wrong with either, yet why would any author feel obliged to write something like that in the 1960's? The writing style left me cold, the characters had no personality whatsoever, the sci-fi elements were ridiculous. This novel hasn't aged gracefully. I do realize that I am looking at a satire/social commentary/animal rights statement masquerading as a sci-fi novel, but I would have appreciated a bit more effort from the author. I was bored out of my wits and had to take a break once in a while, reading other books. Frankly, I am surprised by the high ratings here on Goodreads. Is that because many have seen the movies (I haven't), loved them and were then prepared to love the book no matter what? It is also possible that this book simply wasn't for me.

The best thing about finishing "Planet of the Apes": I can finally focus on other books, yay :-) ( )

I started off disliking this book quite a lot. In fact, I was very tempted to take it back to the library only a few chapters in. However, by the end, I loved it. I mean, it's not amazingly written, the first person narrative doesn't quite work, the concept's completely ridiculous and Boulle uses the word “latter" far too many times BUT it really does turn out to be a great story. It's quite different from the film in a lot of ways but it's still easy to go through the book thinking that you know exactly what's coming. Well, likelyhood is you probably don't. If you've seen the film then it's much better just to forget everything you remember and tackle the book afresh. Think of the film and the book as separate entities. Both have good twists and both are worth feasting your eyes. The film's worth watching just for Charlton Heston, “damn dirty ape!" and the “you blew it up!" speech. The book is worth reading simply because it has a fuller story than the film and a different/better twist. ( )