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Re: From the Earth to the Moon--Does it require a sequel?

From: Jean-Pierre Boutin <boutin~at~versailles.inra.fr>
Date: Tue, 7 Feb 2006 11:00:32 +0100
To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~gilead.org.il>

Dear Brian,
Your message illuminated my day. It shows how much the style Jules
Verne is universal in his great novels. As the music of Mozart (it is
the year Mozart :-)), they can be approached on several levels with an
equal happiness. I think that it is the great adventure of the
conquest of the Moon which justified the reading of FEM in 1969, the
year of the Apollo 11 mission and of the first lunar landing by
Armstrong and Aldrin with the LEM. The contemporaries of JV qualified
this novel, as those which preceded it and followed, of pleasant
scientific or geographical novel (translate unimportant in the French
literature). A beautiful proof of literary myopia that the posterity
largely revealed, but also an immense literary unexplored area which
allows reader like you and me, almost 150 years after the writing of
work, to feel an authentic emotion when the mirror of appearances is
crossed. Cheer and thanks for sharing that with us.
Jean-Pierre Boutin

Cher Brian,
Votre message a illuminé ma journée. Il démontre combien le style Jules
Verne est universel dans ses grands romans. Comme la musique de Mozart
(c’est l’année Mozart ;-)), ils peuvent être abordés à plusieurs
niveaux avec un égal bonheur. Je pense que c’est la grande aventure de
la conquête de la Lune qui a motivé la lecture de "De la terre à la
lune" en 1969, l’année d'Appolo XI et du premier alunissage par
Armstrong et Aldrin avec le LEM. Les contemporains de JV ont qualifié
ce roman, comme ceux qui l’ont précédé et suivi, d’aimable roman
scientifique ou géographique (traduisez insignifiant dans la
littérature française). Une belle preuve de myopie littéraire que la
postérité a largement révélée, mais aussi une immense friche littéraire
qui permet à un lecteur comme vous et moi, presque 150 ans après
l’écriture de l’œuvre, de ressentir un authentique émoi quand on
traverse le miroir des apparences. Bravo et merci de nous avoir fait
partager cela.
Jean-Pierre Boutin

Le mardi, 7 fév 2006, à 01:33 Europe/Paris, Brian Taves a écrit :

>
> The cartoon image of the lightbulb appearing above a character's head
> is
> familiar to all of us, and is in fact to my mind a rather amusing but
> also
> accurate portrayal of how a fresh idea may suddenly illuminate our
> thinking.
>
> Such occurred to me, a few days ago, and I'd like to share it with the
> Forum
> for the reactions of others.
>
> I first read a (no doubt watered-down) Scholastic Press version of
> From the
> Earth to the Moon as my first Verne book, in the fifth grade, age ten,
> in the
> spring of 1969. I found it singularly unsatisfying; nowhere in the
> little
> paperback was there any mention of a sequel. Nonetheless, some months
> later, I
> had entered my own lifelong thrall to Verne and discovered Around the
> Moon,
> discovering that the story of FEM had a more satisfactory conclusion.
>
> Yet, in subsequently realizing the five year span between the
> composition
> of the two stories, something has always remained unsatisfactory about
> the
> relationship between the two works. And it may be linked to that need
> for
> closure, for "a happy ending" that AM offers. Judged purely as a
> literary
> achievement, FEM outweighs AM, when the two are measured as separate
> novels.
>
> Much has been written on this Forum about Verne's choice of a cannon,
> and
> whether he was indeed likely aware that his solution to the problem of
> lunar
> travel was ultimately no more practical than that of Poe's Hans Pfaal.
>
> That, however, seems to me a matter of secondary interest. More to the
> point, as highlighted in Walter James Miller's Annotated JV
> translation of
> FEM (the fabulous version I have just been rereading), is the fact that
> the whole background of artillery serves as a perfect launch pad for
> Verne's own ironic commentaries on militarism, nationalism, capitalism,
> and sectionalism. FEM may be best understood as satire, rather than,
> more
> conventionally, a scientific novel.
>
> And it is with that in mind that it seems to me it is quite possible to
> read FEM, not as the first part of the story of a lunar journey that it
> became, but a stand-alone volume. One which is open-ended, yet seems
> to
> indicate that nature has intervened and the ambition of man has been
> thwarted. Just as Herr Schultz sought the destruction of Franceville
> and
> instead launched a satellite, so too did the Gun Club fail in their
> aim,
> instead creating yet another satellite. The Club has failed, just as
> they
> will again in the ultimate volume of the trilogy, which returns to the
> tone of FEM. A later team of American astronomers hunting for a
> meteor--whether or not having the help of an interfering French
> scientist--similarly find nature overwhelming their dreams. Thanks to
> modern literary reappraisals of Verne, we can recognize in him a
> writer of
> much greater depth, and the seemingly sudden, "surprise ending" of FEM
> is
> indeed inevitable, and the implied death of all the protagonists
> (despite
> the hopes of Maston, who has been foolish throughout the novel), an
> experiment with a different type of ending. So too were such other
> early
> Verne novels as Hatteras and Paris au XX Siecle intended to end in the
> death of the protagonist.
>
> Vernian sequels don't always merge together easily Indeed, the
> addition of
> Around the Moon rather distorts FEM, losing the materialist view of
> American culture that formed the first volume. The futher adventures
> of
> the Gun Club to change the Earth's axis lacks the lightness of FEM, or
> Around the Moon. Reading FEM and AM together results in emphasizing
> the
> science, just as making the background of Captain Nemo concrete in
> L'Ile
> mysterieuse robs 20K of its ambiguity and universality of experience.
> Maitre du monde does not answer the questions raised by Robur le
> conquerant; instead it multiplies them, and if it ends the life of
> Robur,
> it leaves his true motivations and background never to be known.
>
> Perhaps, then, it is not so unfortunate that at least in English, FEM
> has
> often appeared separately, far more times than its sequel has, and
> indeed
> the two are surprisingly rarely published together.
>
> Given the above, I see that my own one-time belief that FEM demanded a
> sequel may have been a result of an incorrect reading, or only one way
> of
> reading of FEM. Perhaps a sequel was possible, but certainly not
> essential, from a literary standpoint, any more than L'Ile mys. had to
> resolve the open ends of 20K and Les Enfants du Capitaine Grant. My
> assumption has always been that Verne always planned FEM to have a
> sequel,
> but I open the question to our expert biographers on that more
> practical
> point. And, I would suggest the notion that FEM is indeed a singular
> volume, able to stand alone.
>
>
> Brian Taves
> Motion Picture/Broadcasting/Recorded Sound Division
> Library of Congress
> 101 Independence Avenue, S.E. Washington, D.C. 20540-4692
> Telephone: 202-707-9930; 202-707-2371 (fax)
> Email: btav~at~loc.gov
>
>
> Disclaimer--All opinions expressed are my own.
>
>
>
>
__________________________________________
Jean-Pierre Boutin
Laboratoire de Biologie des Semences (Seed Biology Lab.)
UMR 204 INRA-INA PG
INRA, Centre de Versailles-Grignon, RD 10
78026 Versailles cedex
Tel. 33(0)1 30 83 33 39 Fax. 33(0)1 30 83 30 96
___________________________________________
Received on Tue 07 Feb 2006 - 12:00:58 IST

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