“Quest of the Dawn Man” by J. H. Rosny. Ace F-269 (1964). Cover art by Harry J. Shaare.
Translated from the French by the Honorable Lady Whitehead. (Original title: “The Giant Cat”]
“Aoun, son of Urus, was tall and strong and delighted in the hunt. His courage was legion and his strength formidable, but he had a strange weakness that the other Oulhamr tribesmen did not understand – he could feel pity. His companion was Zouhr, last of the Men-without-shoulders, whose subtle, dreamy intelligence was also unique among men.
“They set out, these two, to discover new and fertile hunting grounds for the horde, in the unknown land beyond the mountains. Here they would encounter the fierce sabertooth, the giant lion, the crocodile, the huge python, and wild mammoth. But most dangerous of all, these two would have to face alone the strange primitive hordes of the forest – the half-men who ate the flesh of other men.” [Introduction to the Ace edition]
“This novel on its appearance at once hit the public fancy in France and ran through forty editions.
“In the fabulous time of the Mammoth and the Great Lion of the Caves, some twenty thousand, or perhaps some hundred thousand years ago, races of men, today extinct, lived upon the earth.
“Monsieur Rosny, basing his vivid narrative upon all the findings of science, has found a way to reconstruct imaginatively, in the form of a novel of the passions and combats of this primitive age, the life of these prehistoric times.
“As with much of Kipling’s work this book will cast its spell alike upon young and old.” [Introduction to the 1924 first American edition]
“J. H. Rosny was the pen-name of Joseph Henri Honoré Boëx who, throughout his long life (1856-1940), was one of France’s most prolific writers. Since he originally collaborated with his younger brother, under the joint signature of J. H. Rosny, he was generally referred to as J. H. Rosny ainé (the elder) after he began writing on his own in 1909.
“Having his roots in the Nineteenth Century’s revolutionary scientific theories – Darwinism, etc. – his works of fiction and non-fiction show his fascination with science, including astronomy, anthropology, zoology, and sociology. He wrote distinguished science fiction as well, and was renowned in France for his novels of the Cro-Magnon era, of which ‘The Giant Cat’ (Le Félin Géant) is one of the best.” [From the author’s bio in the Ace edition]
The “New York Times” said it was. . . “One of the most exciting books of fiction that has appeared in some time. It is easy to see why this story has gone through forty editions in France. It is a thriller in the best sense of the word.”
“Quest of the Dawn Man” by J. H. Rosny. Ace F-269 (1964). Cover art by Harry J. Shaare.
Translated from the French by the Honorable Lady Whitehead. (Original title: “The Giant Cat”]
“Aoun, son of Urus, was tall and strong and delighted in the hunt. His courage was legion and his strength formidable, but he had a strange weakness that the other Oulhamr tribesmen did not understand – he could feel pity. His companion was Zouhr, last of the Men-without-shoulders, whose subtle, dreamy intelligence was also unique among men.
“They set out, these two, to discover new and fertile hunting grounds for the horde, in the unknown land beyond the mountains. Here they would encounter the fierce sabertooth, the giant lion, the crocodile, the huge python, and wild mammoth. But most dangerous of all, these two would have to face alone the strange primitive hordes of the forest – the half-men who ate the flesh of other men.” [Introduction to the Ace edition]
“This novel on its appearance at once hit the public fancy in France and ran through forty editions.
“In the fabulous time of the Mammoth and the Great Lion of the Caves, some twenty thousand, or perhaps some hundred thousand years ago, races of men, today extinct, lived upon the earth.
“Monsieur Rosny, basing his vivid narrative upon all the findings of science, has found a way to reconstruct imaginatively, in the form of a novel of the passions and combats of this primitive age, the life of these prehistoric times.
“As with much of Kipling’s work this book will cast its spell alike upon young and old.” [Introduction to the 1924 first American edition]
“J. H. Rosny was the pen-name of Joseph Henri Honoré Boëx who, throughout his long life (1856-1940), was one of France’s most prolific writers. Since he originally collaborated with his younger brother, under the joint signature of J. H. Rosny, he was generally referred to as J. H. Rosny ainé (the elder) after he began writing on his own in 1909.
“Having his roots in the Nineteenth Century’s revolutionary scientific theories – Darwinism, etc. – his works of fiction and non-fiction show his fascination with science, including astronomy, anthropology, zoology, and sociology. He wrote distinguished science fiction as well, and was renowned in France for his novels of the Cro-Magnon era, of which ‘The Giant Cat’ (Le Félin Géant) is one of the best.” [From the author’s bio in the Ace edition]
The “New York Times” said it was. . . “One of the most exciting books of fiction that has appeared in some time. It is easy to see why this story has gone through forty editions in France. It is a thriller in the best sense of the word.”