Sir Richard Francis Burton was one tough dude - and he wrote a bunch of books too

On Tuesday, I posted a review of “The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack,” the outstanding steampunk novel by Mark Hodder that took home this year’s Philip K. Dick Award. If you haven’t read this book, I highly recommend that you do so.

I enjoyed Hodder’s book for a number of reasons, and it features one of the most intriguing, interesting lead characters of any book that I’ve read in a long time, Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton. While “The Strange Affair of Spring Heeled Jack” is a work of (outstanding) fiction, the Burton character is based on the real-life man, who may have been one of the most talented Englishmen to have ever lived.

Burton, who was born in 1821 and died in 1890, had an impressive resume. Among other things, he was a noted cartographer, diplomat, explorer, fencer, geographer, linguist, poet, soldier, spy, translator and writer. He traveled the world and reportedly spoke 29 languages. He was James Bond, Batman, Conan the Barbarian, Alan Quartermain and Ernest Hemingway all rolled into one.

I was especially interested in reading more about Burton’s published works. According to Wikipedia, Burton “was a prolific and erudite author and wrote numerous books and scholarly articles about subjects including human behavior, travel, falconry, fencing, sexual practices and ethnography. A unique feature of his books is the copious footnotes and appendices containing remarkable observations and unexpurgated information.”

What follows is a complete list of Burton’s books in alphabetical order by title:

- Abeokuta and the Cameroon Mountains (1863)
- The Book of the Sword (1884)
- The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, 10 Vols. (1885)
- Camoens: His Life and His Lusiads (1883)
- Camoens: The Lyricks, 2 Vols. (1884)
- The Captivity of Hans Stade of Hesse, in A.D. 1547-1555, Among the Wild Tribes of Eastern Brazil (translated by Albert Tootal and annotated by Burton)
- The City of the Saints, Among the Mormons and Across the Rocky Mountains to California (1861)
- A Complete System of Bayonet Exercise (1853)
- Etruscan Bologna (1876)
- Explorations of the Highlands of Brazil (1869)
- Falconry in the Valley of the Indus (1852)
- First Footsteps in East Africa (1856)
- A Glance at the Passion-Play (1881)
- Goa and the Blue Mountains (1851)
- The Gold Mines of Midian (1878)
- The Guide-book: A Pictorial Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina (1865)
- The Jew, the Gypsy and El Islam (1898)
- The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana (1883)
- The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi (1880)
- The Lake Regions of Central Africa (1860)
- The Lake Regions of Central Equatorial Africa (1859)
- The Lands of Cazembe: Lacerda’s Journey to Cazembe in 1798 (1873), edited and translated by Burton.
- The Land of Midian (1879)
- Lettes from the Battlefields of Paraguay (1870)
- A Mission to Gelele, King of Dahome (1864)
- A New System of Sword Exercise for Infantry (1876)
- The Nile Basin (1864)
- Os Lusiadas (The Lusiads), 2 Vols. (1880)
- The Perfumed Garden of the Shaykh Nefzawi (1886)
- Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al Madinah and Meccah, 3 Vols. (1855-56)
- Scinde or the Unhappy Valley (1851)
- The Sentiment of the Sword: A Country-House Dialogue (1911)
- Sindh and the Races Thtat Inhabit the Valley of the Indus (1851)
- Sind Revisited (1877)
- Stone Talk (1865)
- The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night, 6 Vols. (1886-1888)
- To the Gold Coast for Gold, 2 Vols. (1883)
- Two Trips to Gorilla Land and the Cataracts of the Congo (1876)
- Ultima Thule (1872)
- Unexplored Syria (1872)
- Vikram and the Vampire or Tales of Hindu Devilry (1870)
- Wanderings in West Africa (1863)
- Wit and Wisdom From West Africa (1865)
- Zanzibar (1872)

In the end, how many of Burton’s books have you had a chance to read? Which did you like or dislike? Which would you recommend and why? Let us know in the comments section below.