Allan Quatermain

From Freepedia

Allan Quatermain is a fictional character, the protagonist of H. Rider Haggard's King Solomon's Mines and its various sequels and prequels. Allan Quatermain was also the title of an 1887 book in this sequence.

Quatermain is an English big game hunter in Africa. While not precisely anti-colonial in his outlook, he appears to strongly favour native Africans having a say in how their affairs are run, a rather progressive outlook for a Victorian. Quatermain is a quintessential outdoorsman, who finds English cities and climate unbearable, and thus prefers to spend most of his time on the African continent. Quatermain frequently travels with his English companions Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good of the Royal Navy, and his African friend Umslopogas. He studied at Eton College in his youth.

About Quatermain's family, little is known. One of his film versions makes reference to having been widowed twice. It is probable that he was married at least once; the printing of some of the memoirs in the series is entrusted to Quatermain's son, Harry, whose own death is heavily mourned in the opening of the novel Allan Quatermain. Harry Quatermain had been a medical student who died of smallpox while working in a hospital. The possibility of other children has been speculated -- for instance, the family trees of the "Wold Newton family" (see below) indicate that Quatermain had a daughter who married a relation of Sherlock Holmes -- but canonically, Harry appears to have been an only child; after his death, his father laments that he is an old man "without a chick or child to comfort me."

In addition to Haggard's works, the character was placed by science fiction writer Philip José Farmer as a member of the "Wold Newton family". The character was also used by the graphic novelists Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill in their series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, which was adapted to film in 2003. The use of the character by other authors was due to that fact that after 100 years, the character had became public domain (free to use), much like Sherlock Holmes.

The character of Allan Quatermain has been portrayed in film and television by Richard Chamberlain, John Colicos, Sean Connery, Cedric Hardwicke, and Patrick Swayze.