20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

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Authors: Jules Verne

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BOOK: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
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Try, as hard as you can, to imagine a world where gasoline-powered automobiles abound, where airplanes and helicopters are commonplace, where people work to bring water to the Sahara Desert, where computers and calculators grind away, where audiovisual reproductions—pictures that actually move and talk—are part of daily life, where a trans-Siberian railway exists, where criminals are no longer beheaded but are instead electrocuted, where people travel by submarine to the depths of the oceans, and where a “photographic telegraph” allows anyone to send a facsimile of any message or design to the far reaches of the globe.
Sound familiar? Jules Verne, who predicted all of these things in the second half of the nineteenth century (one hundred years before the first fax machine), viewed the future with unusual clarity. In addition to these new technologies, he also predicted an explosive capable of destroying our planet, the widespread use of electricity, lasers, artificial rain, and a giant cannon that could be used to adjust the Earth’s axis. Strangest of all, perhaps, was his conception in 1865 of a moon rocket with practically the same dimensions as the actual Apollo 8. Furthermore, Verne’s imaginary vessel was launched from Florida, reached a top speed identical to the Apollo spacecraft, and splashed down only four kilometers away from the spot in the Pacific Ocean where Apollo 8 actually landed.
If, with the benefit of hindsight, all this seems easy, try to do it yourself. What will happen to the world during the next century? Imagine the cascading changes in all realms of technology. Imagine the condition of social, political, and religious institutions. Imagine, most challenging of all, the evolution (or lack thereof) of human consciousness, of the self-awareness and spiritual fulfillment of the species that chooses to call itself
Homo sapiens
.
What would such a world be like? And would you want to be part of it?
Jules Verne lived and breathed such questions. Although not all of his books are set in the future, by the time he died in 1905 he was one of the most famous storytellers ever and was known as someone who combined a talent for creating adventurous plots with a shrewdness for divining the path of technological change. Verne did not fully appreciate the accelerating rate of technological development, but his “instinct for the direction of science,” in the words of Leon Blum, informed by his extensive reading, remains unparalleled.
Verne did not take for granted the confidence of his readers, and therein lies a key to his success. He believed that such confidence must be earned, through the use of convincing detail. In addition, he believed, as I do, that no story has greater need of being grounded in honest, believable experience than a story attempting to carry its readers beyond the bounds of everyday experience. This approach requires both extensive research and a commitment to making all of the readers’ senses come fully alive.
Yet, as the reader of
20,000 Leagues Under The Sea
will discover, Jules Verne was more than a brilliant futurist. He understood the importance of character development and tried to explore the often-baffling subtleties of interpersonal relationships. Captain Nemo, the enigmatic hero of the novel, is a complicated man, and his bond with his guest-and-prisoner, Professor Aronnax, is equally complicated. The novel is much richer for their intriguing relationship.
Nemo himself declares with great conviction: “The
Nautilus
is the ship of ships.” For the reader as well as the passenger, that is certainly true. Come aboard, then, for a journey to a world both very distant and very near.
—T.A. Barron
 
T.A. Barron is the author of
Heartlight, The Ancient One
, and
The Merlin Effect
, all published in paperback by Tor Books.
T
HE YEAR 1866 was signalised by a remarkable incident, a mysterious and puzzling phenomenon, which doubtless no one has yet forgotten. Not to mention rumours which agitated the maritime population and excited the public mind, even in the interior of continents, seafaring men were particularly excited. Merchants, common sailors, captains of vessels, skippers, both of Europe and America, naval officers of all countries, and the Governments of several States on the two continents, were deeply interested in the matter.
For some time past vessels had been met by “an enormous thing,” a long object, spindle-shaped, occasionally phosphorescent, and infinitely larger and more rapid in its movements than a whale.
The facts relating to this apparition (entered in various log-books) agreed in most respects as to the shape of the object or creature in question, the untiring rapidity of its movements, its surprising power of locomotion, and the peculiar life with which it seemed endowed. If it was a whale, it surpassed in size all those hitherto classified in science. Taking into consideration the mean of observations made at divers times—rejecting the timid estimate of those who assigned to this object a length of two hundred feet, equally with the exaggerated opinions which set it down as a mile in width and three in length—we might fairly conclude that this mysterious being surpassed greatly all dimensions admitted by the learned ones of the day, if it existed at all. And that it
did
exist was an undeniable fact; and, with that tendency which disposes the human mind in favour of the marvellous, we can understand the excitement produced in the entire world by this supernatural apparition. As to
classing it in the list of fables, the idea was out of the question.
On the 20th of July, 1866, the steamer
Governor Higginson,
of the Calcutta and Burnach Steam Navigation Company, had met this moving mass five miles off the east coast of Australia. Captain Baker thought at first that he was in the presence of an unknown sandbank; he even prepared to determine its exact position when two columns of water, projected by the mysterious object, shot with a hissing noise a hundred and fifty feet up into the air. Now, unless the sandbank had been submitted to the intermittent eruption of a geyser, the
Governor Higginson
had to do neither more nor less than with an aquatic mammal, unknown till then, which threw up from its blow-holes columns of water mixed with air and vapour.
Similar facts were observed on the 23rd of July in the same year, in the Pacific Ocean, by the
Columbus,
of the West India and Pacific Steam Navigation Company. But this extraordinary creature could transport itself from one place to another with surprising velocity; as, in an interval of three days, the
Governor Higginson
and the
Columbus
had observed it at two different points of the chart, separated by a distance of more than seven hundred nautical leagues.
Fifteen days later, two thousand miles farther off, the
Helvetia,
of the Compagnie-Nationale, and the
Shannon,
of the Royal Mail Steamship Company, sailing to windward in that portion of the Atlantic lying between the United States and Europe, respectively signalled the monster to each other in 42° 15’ N. lat. and 60° 35’ W. long. In these simultaneous observations they thought themselves justified in estimating the minimum length of the mammal at more than three hundred and fifty feet, as the
Shannon
and
Helvetia
were of smaller dimensions than it, though they measured three hundred feet over all.
Now the largest whales, those which frequent those parts of the sea round the Aleutian, Kulammak, and
Umgullich islands, have never exceeded the length of sixty yards, if they attain that.
In every place of great resort the monster was the fashion. They sang of it in the cafés, ridiculed it in the papers, and represented it on the stage. All kinds of stories were circulated regarding it. There appeared in the papers caricatures of every gigantic and imaginary creature, from the white whale, the terrible “Moby Dick” of sub-arctic regions, to the immense kraken, whose tentacles could entangle a ship of five hundred tons and hurry it into the abyss of the ocean. The legends of ancient times were even revived.
Then burst forth the unending argument between the believers and the unbelievers in the societies of the wise and the scientific journals. “The question of the monster” inflamed all minds. Editors of scientific journals, quarrelling with believers in the supernatural, spilled seas of ink during this memorable campaign, some even drawing blood; for from the sea-serpent they came to direct personalities.
During the first months of the year 1867 the question seemed buried, never to revive, when new facts were brought before the public. It was then no longer a scientific problem to be solved, but a real danger seriously to be avoided. The question took quite another shape. The monster became a small island, a rock, a reef, but a reef of indefinite and shifting proportions.
On the 5th of March, 1867, the
Moravian,
of the Montreal Ocean Company, finding herself during the night in 27° 30’ lat. and 72° 15’ long., struck on her starboard quarter a rock, marked in no chart for that part of the sea. Under the combined efforts of the wind and its four hundred horsepower, it was going at the rate of thirteen knots. Had it not been for the superior strength of the hull of the
Moravian,
she would have been broken by the shock and gone down with the 237 passengers she was bringing home from Canada.
The accident happened about five o’clock in the morning, as the day was breaking. The officers of the quarterdeck
hurried to the after-part of the vessel. They examined the sea with the most careful attention. They saw nothing but a strong eddy about three cables’ length distant, as if the surface had been violently agitated. The bearings of the place were taken exactly, and the
Moravian
continued its route without apparent damage. Had it struck on a submerged rock, or on an enormous wreck? They could not tell; but, on examination of the ship’s bottom when undergoing repairs, it was found that part of her keel was broken.
This fact, so grave in itself, might perhaps have been forgotten like many others if, three weeks after, it had not been re-enacted under similar circumstances. But, thanks to the nationality of the victim of the shock, thanks to the reputation of the company to which the vessel belonged, the circumstance became extensively circulated.
The 13th of April, 1867, the sea being beautiful, the breeze favourable, the
Scotia,
of the Cunard Company’s line, found herself in 15° 12’ long. and 45° 37’ lat. She was going at the speed of thirteen knots and a half.
At seventeen minutes past four in the afternoon, whilst the passengers were assembled at lunch in the great saloon, a slight shock was felt on the hull of the
Scotia,
on her quarter, a little aft of the port-paddle.
The
Scotia
had not struck, but she had been struck, and seemingly by something rather sharp and penetrating than blunt. The shock had been so slight that no one had been alarmed, had it not been for the shouts of the carpenter’s watch, who rushed on to the bridge, exclaiming, “We are sinking! we are sinking!” At first the passengers were much frightened, but Captain Anderson hastened to reassure them. The danger could not be imminent. The
Scotia,
divided into several compartments by strong partitions, could brave with impunity any leak. Captain Anderson went down immediately into the hold. He found that the sea was pouring into the fifth compartment; and the rapidity of the influx proved that the force of the water was considerable. Fortunately this compartment did not hold the boilers, or the fires would have been immediately extinguished.
Captain Anderson ordered the engines to be stopped at once, and one of the men went down to ascertain the extent of the in jury. Some minutes afterwards they discovered the existence of a large hole, two yards in diameter, in the ship’s bottom. Such a leak could not be stopped; and the
Scotia,
her paddles half submerged, was obliged to continue her course. She was then three hundred miles from Cape Clear, and, after three days’ delay, which caused great uneasiness in Liverpool, she entered the basin of the company.
The engineers visited the
Scotia,
which was put in dry dock. They could scarcely believe it possible; at two yards and a half below water-mark was a regular rent, in the form of an isosceles triangle. The broken place in the iron plates was so perfectly defined that it could not have been more neatly done by a punch. It was clear, then, that the instrument producing the perforation was not of a common stamp and, after having been driven with prodigious strength, and piercing an iron plate 1
3/8
inches thick, had withdrawn itself by a backward motion.
Such was the last fact, which resulted in exciting once more the torrent of public opinion. From this moment all unlucky casualties which could not be otherwise accounted for were put down to the monster.
Upon this imaginary creature rested the responsibility of all these shipwrecks, which unfortunately were consider able; for of three thousand ships whose loss was annually recorded at Lloyd’s, the number of sailing and steam-ships supposed to be totally lost, from the absence of all news, amounted to not less than two hundred!
Now, it was the “monster” who, justly or unjustly, was accused of their disappearance, and, thanks to it, communication between the different continents became more and more dangerous. The public demanded sharply that the seas should at any price be relieved from this formidable cetacean.
1

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