| Paris in the Twentieth Century | |
|---|---|
French edition |
|
| Author(s) | Jules Verne |
| Original title | Paris au XXe siècle |
| Translator | Richard Howard |
| Country | France |
| Language | French |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction novel |
| Publication date | 1994 |
| Published in English |
1996 |
| Media type | |
Paris in the Twentieth Century (French: Paris au XXe siècle) is a science fiction novel by Jules Verne. The book presents Paris in 1960, about 100 years in Verne's future, where society has value only for business and technology.
Contents |
Written in 1863 but first published only in 1994, about a young man who lives in a technologically advanced, but culturally backwards future. Often referred to as Verne's lost novel, the work, set in August 1960, paints a grim, dystopian view of the future. Many of Verne's predictions are remarkably on target. His publisher, Pierre-Jules Hetzel, did not release the book because he thought it was too unbelievable and inferior to his previous work, Five Weeks in a Balloon.
Paris in the Twentieth Century's main character is 16-year-old Michel Dufrénoy, who graduates with a major in literature and the classics, but finds they have been forgotten in a futuristic world where only business and technology are valued. Michel, whose father was a musician, is a poet born too late.
Michel had been living with his respectable uncle, Monsieur Stanislas Boutardin, and his family. The day after graduation, Boutardin tells Michel tomorrow he'll start working at a banking company. He doubts he can do anything in the business world.
The rest of that day, Michel searches for literature, e.g. Hugo, Balzac, etc. Nothing but technology is available in bookstores. Michel's last resort is the Imperial Library. The librarian turns out to be his hidden uncle, Monsieur Huguenin. Huguenin, still working in the arts, is considered a 'disgrace' to the rest of the family and so was barred from attending Michel's birthdays, graduations, etc., though he has followed Michel's life—from a distance. This is the first time they've met. Michel fails at each task with Casmodage and Co. Bank until he is assigned to The Ledger. Michel is a reader for bookkeeper Monsieur Quinsonnas. Quinsonnas, a kindred spirit in his 30s, writes the bookkeeping information on The Ledger. Quinsonnas tells Michel this is a job he can do in order to eat, have an apartment, etc., while he continues working on music. Michel's fear of not fitting in is resolved; he can be a reader and still work on his writing.
The pair visit Uncle Huguenin and are joined by other visitors, Monsieur Richelot and his niece, Mademoiselle Lucy. Richelot had been Michel's teacher. Quinsonnas and Michel both dream of being soldiers, but this is impossible, because warfare has become so scientific that there is really no need for soldiers anymore---only chemists and mechanics to work the killing machines, and even this profession is denied to them, because 'the engines of war' have become so efficient that war is inconceivable and all countries are at a perpetual stalemate.
Before long, Michel and Lucy are in love. Michel discusses women with Quinsonnas, who sadly explains that there are no such things as women anymore; from mindless, repetitive factory work and careful attention to finance and science, most women have become cynical, ugly, neurotic career women. In fury, Quinsonnas spills ink on the Ledger and he and Michel are fired on the spot. Quinsonnas leaves for Germany. Without war or musical and artistic progress, there is no news, so Michel can't even become a journalist. He ends up living in a squalid apartment writing superb poetry, but lives in such poverty that he has to eat synthetic foods derived from coal. He eventually writes a book entitled Hopes.
For reasons that are never explained, all of Europe enters a winter of unprecedented ferocity. All agriculture is compromised and food supplies are destroyed, resulting in mass famine. The temperature drops to thirty degrees below, and every river in Europe freezes solid. All industry grinds to a halt. The scientists of Paris devise new apparatus for reviving the dead, using electricity, and attempt to recall people who have drowned in the frozen rivers. The winter is possibly symbolic of the sterile pragmatism of Paris.
In despair, Michel spends his last bit of money on violets for Lucy, but finds that she has disappeared from her apartment, evicted when her grandfather lost his job as the university’s last teacher of rhetoric. He is unable to locate her amongst the thousands of starving people in Paris. He spends the entire evening bumbling around Paris in a delirious state, but no matter where he goes, he is unable to escape electricity.
In the climax, the heartbroken Michel, bereft of friends and loved ones, wanders through the frozen, mechanized, electrical wonders of Paris. The subjectivity becomes steadily more surreal as the dying artist, in a final paroxysm of despair, unconsciously circles an old cemetery before collapsing comatose in the snow.
Pierre-Jules Hetzel, his publisher, thought the book's pessimism would damage Verne's then-booming career, and suggested he wait 20 years to publish it. In a scathing rebuke to Verne, Hetzel writes about a draft of the novel he has just seen:
Hetzel was also critical of Verne for not covering new ground with the novel:
With that, Verne put the manuscript in a safe, where it was forgotten, only to be discovered by his great-grandson in 1989. It was finally published in French in 1994, and in English, by Random House, in 1997.
In the book, Verne predicted many things he thought would occur in the 1960s. Some came true, but some were so prescient that by the 1960s, people had not yet reached the standard. Among them are:
Verne predicted a geometric, modern centerpiece built for the Louvre in Paris. A modern, geometric, glass-and-steel pyramid structure was erected in 1989 in the courtyard plaza of the Louvre. He also predicted the Eiffel Tower. The tower itself was built in 1887; the book was written in 1863.
The appearance of Verne's lost novel caused a stir among modern critics, who mostly received the book warmly, greeting it as "prescient and plausible".[1] On the other hand, some saw the book every bit as unnecessarily pessimistic about the future as did Verne's editor.[2]
The book was a best seller in France, where it was heavily hyped before publication. Some critics were put off by the publisher's hype of the book, although most readily admitted it was "a work of inestimable historical importance."[3]
Critic Evelyn C. Leeper suggested that Verne might be a good candidate for a Hugo Award for Best Novel in 1996, noting that she had not read very many novels that were much better than Verne's work that year.[4] The award is given annually to honor the best science fiction of the preceding year.
The work is also of importance to scholars of Verne's literature, some of whom had long asserted that none of his works ever came close to prophesying the future of a society as a whole.[5]
Within two years of the novel's appearance, it had been adapted as a stage play in the Netherlands.[3]