Carthoris on Thoat at Night, Burroughs Mars Frontispiece c.1913

At the height of Edwardian planetary romance fever, Edgar Rice Burroughs ignited a generation's obsession with alien worlds as exotic, sword-swinging adventure stages. Here, the warrior Carthoris rides a thundering thoat — Barsoom's six-legged mount — through crumbling Martian ruins beneath two luminous moons, Phobos and Deimos, his long-sword slicing through the night air. The dramatic chiaroscuro pen-and-ink rendering channels both Victorian adventure illustration and nascent pulp energy, perfectly evoking the savage grandeur of Burroughs' dying Mars.