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Re: An early interview

From: Jan Rychlík <jan.rychlik~at~seznam.cz>
Date: Sun, 04 Feb 2007 18:48:19 +0100 (CET)
To: Jules Verne Forum <jvf~at~Gilead.org.il>

Dear Bernhard,
Quincy Daily Whig was published in Quincy, Illinois.
You can find the issue in the library of Quincy at:
http://archive.quincylibrary.org/Archive/skins/QPL/navigator.asp?BP=OK&AW=1170611266656
Christian Sánchez did a good job!
Best regards
Jan
> ------------ Původní zpráva ------------
> Od: BGYKrauth <BGYKrauth~at~t-online.de>
> Předmět: Re: An early interview
> Datum: 04.2.2007 10:33:39
> ----------------------------------------
> Interesting. Can you give more detail about the publication as where did this
> Quincy Daily Whig appeared, what page of the paper and maybe - if you found it
> online - where? Or does anybody else knows about this text? On a fast look I
> couldn't find any text like that in this period.
>
> Brgds
>
> Bernhard
>
>
>
> mail from:
>
> Bernhard Krauth
>
> have a look at:
>
> www.jules-verne.eu
>
> www.jules-verne-club.de
>
> www.bernhard-krauth.de
>
> www.bremerhavenpilot.de
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Christian Sánchez
> To: Jules Verne Forum
> Sent: Sunday, February 04, 2007 6:27 AM
> Subject: An early interview
>
>
> This interview appeared in The Quincy Daily Whig (Date: Aug 13, 1887).
>
> Highlights:
>
> "Ah! the dates! they give more trouble than you can imagine."
>
> "I regret my ignorance of the English language."
>
> "I always give the Americans my best parts."
>
> ...a planisphere upon which M. Verne has traced in lines of different colors
> the voyages of his heroes.
>
> ------
>
> JULES VERNE AT HOME
>
> THE BEGINNING OF HIS CAREER AS A WRITER OF ADVENTURE
>
> He Owes a Great Deal to Poe and to Cooper - How He Writes a Story - A Terror
> to the Proof Reader - His New Novel.
>
> Jules Verne was born at Nantes, in 1828; to be precise, Feb. 8. He wears
> lightly his 59 years of life. His hair and beard are white, but his face is
> young, unfurrowed, and there is an expression of frankness in it, and in his
> clear, calm blue eyes, that always won a heart. Being a Breton, he was born with
> a profound admiration for the sea; at 12 he had read "Robinson Crusoe", and had
> begun to think of writing stories of shipwrecks.
>
> He studied law, was graduated at the law school, went into the stock exchange,
> not as one of the venerable institution created by an ordinance of Philippe le
> Bel, but behind the scenes, in it but not of it, like the gulf stream in the
> ocean.
>
> It had flashed his mind that he might go to California and seek a gold mine
> and find it, and then devote himself to literature; but as he was writing
> constantly, the Gymnase playhouse found something to accept in his mass of
> manuscripts. It was a comedy in verse, in one act, "Les Pailles Rompues", and it
> had been written with Alexandre Dumas fils as a co-laborer. Dumas is his friend.
> Mark this, for Dumas is not a prodigal of his friendship, and is a perfect miser
> at praising the work of others. I have heard him say of Jules Verne that if he
> were a foreigner there would be nothing too good for him in France. Jules Verne
> says that he has been fortunate in the friendship of Dumas and of an editor,
> Hetzel, who coached him, kept him in line, prevented him from making excursions
> in the domain of Balzac, ever since the day of his first novel, "Five Weeks in a
> Balloon", made him able to live by his pen. That was in 1862. Since then he has
> written fifty volumes, two every year.
>
> SOURCES OF INSPIRATION
>
> Had he caught his inspiration from Edgar Poe, whose influence, in the vivid
> translations of Baudelaire, has been great on French men of letters? Were the
> impressions of the brothers de Goncourt in 1856 similar to his own? M. Verne
> said yes, that he owed much to Edgar Poe and much to Fenimore Cooper, of whom he
> is an ardent admirer.
>
> His object was to write books that the young could read with profit. He had no
> pretensions to being a savant, a man of science. He read incessantly. Whenever
> he was in doubt he went to town to one he knew. Joseph Bertrand, of the
> institute, had been his adviser on many occasions. He would make errors,
> perhaps, but not very grave ones. I asked him if his stories were not worked
> backward, like Gobelin tapestry. He said that he never commenced to write a
> story without knowing how it was going to end. He writes the plot, then studies
> the details. The results of his studies are in notes of one word in columns, on
> sheets of paper, letter size. These words refer to books on his library or to
> other notes of ideas or facts. When he has become familiar with his notes, he
> writes the story. His manuscript is remarkably neat, on the left of a letter
> page, leaving a wide margin at the right for the dates. "Ah! the dates! they
> give more trouble than you can imagine." And the names? His proof reading costs
> a good deal of money to the editor, he says. He sends the original manuscript to
> the printer without an erasure, and there are eight successive proofs to be
> corrected by him. He is fastidious in the extreme with regard to style; that has
> to be absolutely faultless.
>
> HIS NEW NOVEL
>
> He goes to bed at 8 o'clock, gets up early and is at work until midday in his
> cozy workshop on the second floor, from which we saw a parade and review by the
> division general of the whole garrison. The men march with a swing of the arm
> that gives them dash and light airiness, something that makes you feel that
> their heart is in it or that they would throw it over an obstacle as a rider
> does to make the horse leap.
>
> "What made you write 'North and South'" I asked.
>
> "Fifty lines out of a few pages of the Comte de Paris' history of the civil
> war in America. The Comte de Paris and I have always entertained pleasant,
> friendly relations, and I was in sympathy with the north at the time of the
> war.
>
> "What material did I use? Everything and anything that I could find. I regret
> my ignorance of the English language. I have to use translations and
> translators. The story is interesting because it rests upon alibis and the key
> is at the end of the story. I have another work under way. I have thought that
> there was room for another Robinson. There is 'Robinson Crusoe', 'Swiss Family
> Robinson', the 'Mysterious Island'. The first Robinson is alone, the second has
> a family, the third is a company of engineers, men of learning. I am writing the
> story of a boarding school for boys. There are eighteen of them; fifteen of them
> are English, two French and one American. I shall place them upon a well fitted
> yacht, that shall be shipwrecked upon an island that is not well known, but
> exists. The eldest boy 14 years of age, the youngest 8. They shall have all the
> necessary tools to take care of themselves."
>
> "I trust you will make the American boy a fine fellow."
>
> "I always give the Americans my best parts. I have a profound veneration for
> the American people. I wanted to see it landed as it deserves to be. The
> American is to be the practical, progressive boy of the party."
>
> In the hall that leads from the stairway to the work room is a large chart of
> the world, a planisphere upon which M. Verne has traced in lines of different
> colors the voyages of his heroes.
>
> His entire work, when completed, is to be the amusing description of the
> earth's geography. - Paris Cor. New York Mail and Express.
>
>
Received on Sun 04 Feb 2007 - 19:56:09 IST

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