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Written almost a century before the daring flights of the astronauts, Jules Verne’s prophetic novel of man’s race to the stars is a classic adventure tale enlivened by broad satire and scientific acumen. When the members of the elite Baltimore Gun Club find themselves lacking any urgent assignments at the close of the Civil War, their president, Impey Barbicane, proposes that they build a gun big enough to launch a rocket to the moon. But when Barbicane’s adversary places a huge wager that the project will fail and a daring volunteer elevates the mission to a “manned” flight, one man’s dream turns into an international space race. A story of rip-roaring action, humor, and wild imagination, From the Earth to the Moon is as uncanny in its accuracy and as filled with authentic detail and startling immediacy as Verne’s timeless masterpieces 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Around the World in Eighty Days.… (more)
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Holy Verne, it's been so long since my last fix of his work. Two years perhaps. From the Earth to the Moon is light but still well written. This book was published in 1865, more than a
I'm not able to prove all the scientific calculation and details described so eloquently here, but they're sure as hell convincing enough. Again, Verne never ceases to amaze me with his knack of making technical details to be interesting.
He actually made some correct predictions, such as:
1. the country who successfully sent a manned mission to the moon is the US. Well, he did manage to include a French guy to join the mission - nationalistic interest perhaps?
2. the two states contesting to be the launch site were Florida and Texas. Yep, and Florida won too in real life.
3. the shape of the capsule and there were three people on board. Remember Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins?
Verne did see far into the future. And he complemented all of those with wisecracking humor in between. Je vous adore beaucoup, monsieur!
Distance is an empty word, distance does not exist!
Believe in the power of imagination and let it flow, because you'll never know what the future holds.
And yet the book is laced with good sound science that one would expect
A group called the Gun Club form with the intention of making bigger and better arms, but when peace is declared its members feel somehow deprived of an enemy to fight and so must look elsewhere. Then up pops the idea of a huge gun, bigger than anything they have seen before, and it will be used to fire a cannon at the moon to gain relations with the selenites up there (i.e. colonise!) and plant the American flag declaring the world theirs! But thats how people thought back in the day, and bear in mind this was written over 100 years before the 1969 moon landing!
All in all quite incredible and great fun!
The fourth of the
Verne populates the novel with a colorful cast of characters. The members of the Gun Club are mostly veterans, and many had been severely injured on the battlefield: “Pitcairn calculated that in the Gun club there was not quite one arm for every four men, and only one leg for every three.” But these men are hardly disabled; they have the courage of their convictions and nothing will deter them from achieving their goals. There’s a great deal of humor in the interactions between the characters, as they argue among themselves what properties the cannon and projectile will have and where and when the launch will take place.
It was an enjoyable adventure tale, though I admit to skimming over much of the scientific calculations. It’s easy to see why these Extraordinary Voyages have remained popular for over a century.