In the resplendent galaxy of literature, the name of Jules Verne shines with unique brilliance. Although he may be difficult to rank among the pinnacle of the greatest writers in history, in the field of science fiction, he is deservedly hailed as the "father of science fiction". Moreover, it is undeniable that countless people, including many imaginative souls, have been deeply influenced by his works during their growth.
The Germination of Adventure in Childhood: The Intertwining of Environment and Dreams
On February 8, 1828, on the Ile Feydeau in Nantes, an important port city in France, Pierre Verne, a lawyer, welcomed the birth of his son Jules Verne. Nantes, a city that flourished due to navigation, has left a profound mark in the long river of history (for those familiar with the "Age of Sail" series of games, Nantes must be no stranger). Verne's mother, Allotte, came from a family of sailors. Many of her relatives were either captains or navigators. Such a family background injected an adventurous gene into Verne's childhood.
In his early years, Verne studied at a school run by Madame Sambin. Madame Sambin's husband was a captain who disappeared without a trace after a voyage. But she always firmly believed that her husband was adrift at sea and would return one day. This belief was deeply engraved in Verne's heart and was reflected in his later works (such as "The Mysterious Island").
Under the influence of such an oceanic environment, like many boys, Verne was filled with a strong desire for adventure, long voyages, and exploring the unknown. The unique advantages of Nantes Port allowed him to do something that children in inland areas dared not attempt. At the age of 11, little Verne secretly boarded a large ship bound for India without telling his family. His original intention was to find a coral necklace from the Indian Islands for his cousin and start his round-the-world journey at the same time. However, this bold plan was quickly "crushed" by his witty lawyer father. Verne's father caught up with the ship at the next port of call and took Verne back home. This plot is recorded in Verne's first biography. Although it may be exaggerated, if this is true, Verne fans should perhaps be glad because if it weren't for his father's action, there might be one more excellent sailor or captain in the world, but a large number of popular science fiction masterpieces might be lost.
Verne, who was caught and brought home, was severely reprimanded. He could only promise with tears that he would only travel in his imagination from then on. After that, he liked to "explore" on the Loire River with his younger brother Paul in their often leaky boat. In addition, Verne was also keen to go to the machine factory near his father's vacation villa and observe the operation of the machines for a long time. That wonderful mechanical movement seemed to have a kind of magic that attracted his attention. These experiences all seemed to pave the way for him to become an excellent science fiction writer.
Years in Paris: The Pursuit of Literary and Dramatic Dreams
In 1847, after graduating from high school at the age of 19, Verne came to Paris, a metropolis filled with romance and literary atmosphere. He did not come to devote himself to literary creation. Instead, with his father's ardent expectations, he was preparing to study for a law degree and continue the family's legal career. However, the strong literary atmosphere in Paris was like an invisible force that deeply touched Verne, who was full of imagination and poetic charm. On the surface, he was dealing with the studies required by his father, but deep in his heart, he had made up his mind to change careers. However, his initial goal was not to be a science fiction writer but a playwright.
In Paris, Verne had a wonderful encounter. Once, he left a party in Paris early. When going downstairs, he suddenly had an idea and slid down the handrail of the stairs. Unfortunately, he bumped into a fat man. Verne hurriedly apologized and casually asked out of embarrassment, "Have you had a meal?" The man replied, "I just had Nantais scrambled eggs." This answer dissatisfied Verne: "There is no authentic Nantais scrambled eggs in Paris at all! Because I am from Nantes, and this is my specialty!" This man was Alexandre Dumas. Although the authenticity of this anecdote is difficult to verify, Verne had a close friendship with Alexandre Dumas fils. The latter provided a lot of valuable advice and help on Verne's literary and dramatic creation path.
In 1850, Verne's drama "The Broken Straw" (some say it was co-authored with Alexandre Dumas) was premiered for the first time, which marked his official departure from his father's expectations and his plunge into the embrace of literary and dramatic creation. However, at this time, his living expenses in Paris still depended on his father. In order to ask his father for living expenses, he expressed his needs by writing poems, and his father responded with a poem, roughly meaning: "Your poems are admirable. If it didn't cost me sixty francs, your poems would be even more beautiful!"
The Path of Creation: The Bumpy Journey from Setbacks to Success
In 1857, at the age of 29, Verne got married. The bride was a woman he met at someone else's wedding. She was the sister of the bride, a widow with two children named Honorine de Viane. After marriage, in order to improve his economic situation, Verne became a stockbroker. However, he did not give up scriptwriting and also began to try writing novels.
After publishing several little-known novels, starting from 1860, 32-year-old Verne gradually reduced his salon activities and affairs at the stock exchange and locked himself at home to concentrate on writing novels. He revealed to his wife that this novel was related to balloons. Here is a widely circulated story: Verne submitted this novel to 16 publishers one after another and was rejected by all. In a fit of anger, he threw the manuscript into the stove. Fortunately, his wife Honorine was quick-eyed and quick-handed and rescued the manuscript and encouraged him to try the 17th publisher. Eventually, he succeeded.
However, there is also a well-documented story. Verne showed the manuscript to Alexandre Dumas. Alexandre Dumas thought it was very interesting and introduced him to a Paris publisher named Jules Hetzel who had the same name as him. Hetzel had published works by literary giants such as Victor Hugo and had unique vision and rich experience. Verne gave his novel manuscript named "Travels in the Air" to Hetzel. This novel, which tells the story of Dr. Ferguson of England traveling on the African continent by balloon, was initially nothing special. However, the content that combined a large amount of scientific knowledge with adventure plots caught Hetzel's attention. Hetzel put forward many revision suggestions, and Verne accepted them humbly. In early 1863, this novel was publicly released, and Hetzel changed the title to "Five Weeks in a Balloon".
"Five Weeks in a Balloon" was a great success as soon as it was launched. Verne's vivid depiction of the African continent and his professional analysis of the scientific principles of hydrogen balloons made readers' eyes shine. After the success of the first cooperation, Hetzel signed a contract with Verne, paying him a fixed salary every month and requiring him to complete and publish two novels every year. Hetzel classified Verne's novels as the "Extraordinary Travels" series.
In 1864, Verne's second novel in this series, "Journey to the Center of the Earth" was published (during this period, another work "Paris in the Twentieth Century" was rejected by Hetzel). This novel led readers deep into the earth's interior from the earth's surface and told the story of Professor Lidenbrock leading his nephew and a guide to enter the center of the earth for an adventure from the crater of Snæfellsjökull in Iceland. Verne's astonishing imagination and rigorous scientific research attitude are admirable. This novel has been adapted into movies many times later. Verne showed his difference from other writers in this work. In previous novels about traveling to the center of the earth, the protagonists were often directly sent to the center of the earth to start an adventure. However, in Verne's works, the protagonists start from the ground and elaborate in detail the process of how to enter the center of the earth, the site selection, the arrival process, the scientific principles and the twists and turns encountered. This writing style is like the difference between the works of Gu Long and Jin Yong. The male protagonists in Gu Long's works often have unrivaled martial arts skills as soon as they appear. The source of their martial arts is mysterious. The focus is on the adventures they unfold with their peerless martial arts. When the male protagonists in Jin Yong's works appear, either they have low martial arts skills or they don't know martial arts at all. Then they show readers step by step the arduous journey of how they practice unrivaled martial arts. The process of learning martial arts itself is a thrilling and tortuous story.
This style continued in his work "From the Earth to the Moon" in 1865. After leading readers to appreciate the scenery of the center of the earth, Verne turned his gaze to space. This novel tells the story of Barbicane, the chairman of the Baltimore Gun Club after the American Civil War, leading members to travel to the moon on a spaceship launched by a cannon. This novel fully demonstrates Verne's rigorous scientific research spirit. Although from a modern perspective, the way of being launched to the moon by riding a cannonball is very absurd (scientists later calculated that if such a launch speed is to be achieved, the cannon barrel would have to be 20 kilometers long), but surprisingly, when comparing the 1969 American "Apollo 11" moon landing with this novel written 104 years ago, there are still many details that are astonishing: The launch site described by Verne is the same as that of "Apollo 11", which is Cape Canaveral, Florida, USA; the number of people on the moon in the novel is three, and the number of people carried by "Apollo 11" is also three; the speed of the spaceship described by Verne is 36,000 feet/second, and the speed of "Apollo 11" is 35,533 feet/second; the time it takes to reach the moon described by Verne is about 97 hours, and the actual time taken by "Apollo 11" is about 103 hours, only a difference of six hours; the splashdown point of the return capsule of "Apollo 11" returning to Earth is only a dozen kilometers different from the return location described in Verne's book.
Rising to Fame: Science Fiction Masterpieces and the Harvest of Wealth
The publication of these novels made Jules Verne famous. More importantly, he proved to the world an unbelievable fact at that time: Writing science fiction can also earn wealth.
After having an economic foundation, Verne's life was improved. He purchased a fishing boat named "Saint-Michel I" after his son's name and served as the captain himself. He drove the fishing boat to look for his younger brother Paul who had once ridden in a small boat with him. In 1867, the Verne brothers started their ocean voyage to the United States with two tickets to the world's largest cruise ship "Great Eastern" obtained by Paul. This voyage left a deep impression on Verne. After returning home, he began to create a story that had been brewing in his heart for a long time.
In 1869, Verne published the famous "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" (the original title was "Voyage sous les mers", which was revised by Hetzel). The "Nautilus" submarine and the colorful underwater world depicted in this novel caused a huge sensation at that time. At that time, the most advanced "submarine" could only dive to about 10 meters underwater and last for 3 hours. However, the "Nautilus" in Verne's works is a huge thing that can use sodium extracted from seawater as power and sail under the sea forever. In 1886, the United Kingdom developed the first submarine powered by storage batteries. In 1955, the first nuclear-powered submarine of mankind appeared. They were both named "Nautilus", which shows the profound influence of this work.
From 1873 to 1874, on the basis of "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea", Verne launched "The Mysterious Island" (this is also a work loved by many readers). This work tells the story of five northerners trapped in the southern army camp during the American Civil War who escaped by hot air balloon and fell on a deserted island in the Pacific Ocean (later named "Lincoln Island"). Starting from making fire with a concave-convex mirror, they became self-sufficient and finally made glass, pottery, crops, mills, and even telegraphs. In this work, Verne brought his writing characteristics to the extreme. The "upgrading" process of the protagonists from having nothing to being self-sufficient involves many aspects of scientific knowledge such as metallurgy, blasting, engineering, hydraulics, zoology and botany, astronomy, and physics. Readers will not feel bored during the reading process but will find the development of the protagonists reasonable. "The Mysterious Island", "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" and "The Children of Captain Grant" created by Verne earlier are called Verne's "trilogy". Coupled with the later "Around the World in Eighty Days", these four works have become Verne's masterpieces.
Setbacks and Persistence: The Intertwining of Literary Pursuit and Regret
On March 17, 1886, Verne suffered a heavy blow. His good friend and partner, publisher Hetzel, passed away. At the same time, he was shot by his insane nephew, and the bullet hit his ankle. Due to Verne's diabetes, the doctor advised him to recover slowly. This injury left him disabled and he could no longer continue sailing. After that, he began a new hobby - stamp collecting to satisfy his desire to travel around the world through stamps.
In fact, Verne's greatest dream in his life was to become a traveler. In his novels, whether it is a balloon, a submarine or a ship, they are all his imaginations of traveling around the world. Although he has been hailed as the "father of science fiction", this is not all he pursues. In 1893, when interviewed by American journalist Robert Sherard, Verne expressed his regret: "My greatest regret in life is that I have not won a place in French literature." Although Alexandre Dumas fils nominated him to enter the Académie française, he never succeeded. What made him even more sad was that many people thought he was a writer who created science fiction stories for children.
However, Verne always considered himself a writer for adults. He didn't even think he was a science fiction writer but an artist. He said in the interview, "I don't long for money or medals. What I long for is for people to see what I have done and what I am trying to do, instead of belittling an artist as a storyteller. I am an artist."
From a literary perspective, later generations also have different views. Verne's works indeed did not create classic literary characters that can be remembered by later generations (perhaps "Captain Nemo" can barely be counted as one). Most of the characters in his works are rather stereotyped. But on the other hand, Verne's romanticism and profound poetic skills have made him occupy a very high position in the field of science fiction. Moreover, with his rigorous research attitude and assiduous spirit (Verne had no scientific background and relied entirely on consulting materials and taking notes in the library), he became a representative figure of "hard science fiction" (among the "Three Giants of Science Fiction", Wells represents "soft science fiction", and Asimov is good at establishing systems and discussing moral guidelines).
In 1905, Verne, who was plagued by diabetes, fell into a coma after publishing his last novel "The Invasion of the Sea" and passed away at the age of 77. Verne created a total of 104 novels in his life. According to statistics by UNESCO, his works have a cumulative total of 4,751 translations. He is a famous writer whose number of translated works is second only to Agatha Christie in the world and above Shakespeare.
Many outstanding people have been inspired by Verne. Simon Lake, who invented the famous "Argonaut" submarine, wrote in the first sentence of his autobiography: "Jules Verne is the general director of my life's career." "The father of aerospace" Tsiolkovsky once said: "Verne gave me great inspiration and let me fantasize in his direction." Rear Admiral Byrd of the United States Navy who successfully flew over the North Pole in 1926 also said: "Verne is my guide."
The Eternal Value of Works: The Charm and Inspiration Beyond Time
As time goes by, when we examine Jules Verne's works, we can't help but think: In today's era, are his works outdated?
In modern society, most of the "science fiction" things depicted by Verne more than 100 years ago have become reality. Reading them again now may feel less "freshness" and "surprise" than when we first encountered them. However, the answer is no.
The charm of Verne's science fiction works lies in that the "future era" he depicted is based on the strict scientific principles since the Industrial Revolution and is a foreseeable future. This is also the reason why many of his "prophecies" can come true. In the process of reading, readers can not only be attracted by wonderful stories but also obtain rich knowledge.
But more importantly, although Verne has certain deficiencies in portraying character personalities, the protagonists in his works, whether it is Engineer Smith in "The Mysterious Island", Chairman Barbicane of the Gun Club in "From the Earth to the Moon", or Fogg in "Around the World in Eighty Days", or Captain Servadac in "Hector Servadac", all show curiosity and longing for the unknown world, a positive attitude towards life, and the courage and drive to conquer nature. Reading Verne's novels seems to feel a vigorous vitality and vitality coming towards us.
Just as Gao Xiaosong said: "Life is not only about the hardships in front of us, but also about poetry and the fields in the distance." Verne spent his whole life pursuing devoting himself to poetry, dramatic creation and traveling far. But these two wishes were not fully realized. However, this did not prevent him from pouring all his enthusiasm and fantasy into his writing and passing on that enthusiasm and vitality to countless readers through his words.
In today's busy world of concrete and steel, do we still remember the fantasies we had when looking up at the brilliant starry sky in our childhood? Do we still retain our curiosity about the depths of the vast ocean? Do we still cherish the dream of traveling around the world? Perhaps the burdens of life have become too heavy for us to bear, but at least we should keep that little thought in our hearts. This may be the precious significance that Jules Verne's works leave to generations of readers. Just as it is engraved on his tombstone: "Vers l' immortalité et l' éternelle jeunesse! (Towards immortality and eternal youth!)"
Reflection
Sometimes I even think that the protagonists of popular time-travel novels nowadays don't need to bring anything else. As long as they bring Jules Verne's books, it is a living guide to a technology tree from scratch. When I was a child, I didn't have the concepts of "soft science fiction" and "hard science fiction". I just felt that what this person wrote was very down-to-earth, all visible and tangible science fiction. Scientists sometimes find it difficult to make accurate predictions about the future. On the contrary, the descriptions of science fiction writers are astonishingly consistent with the facts many years later. That's because science fiction writers have magnificent and bold imaginations.