20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne
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20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Author: Jules Verne

Narrator: George Guidall

Unabridged: 15 hr 40 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Recorded Books

Published: 01/30/2024


Synopsis

Science fiction novelist Jules Verne unlocks the awe-inspiring secrets of the ocean with this exciting tale of adventure within the murky depths. In 1886, Professor Pierre Aronnax undertakes a United States government expedition in the Atlantic Ocean, plunging him into a watery world of breathtaking excitement and danger.

When Professor Aronnax sets out to find and kill the sea monster that has been wrecking ships, he expects to remain on top of the briny main. But his new acquaintance, Captain Nemo, has other ideas. Soon the professor is witnessing a fantastic undersea life never before dreamt of—and dodging relentless pursuers.

Remarkably ahead of his time, Jules Verne described in this classic the possibilities of extensive submarine travel and scuba diving while they were still in their infancy.

About Jules Verne

French author Jules Verne was born in the port of Nantes in 1828. He later moved to Paris to study law. At age twenty-eight, he married Honorine de Viane, a young widow with two children. Verne published several plays under the tutelage of Victor Hugo and Alexandre Dumas. He made his living as a stockbroker until his first successful series, Voyages Extraordinaire, was published in 1863. Soon Verne's novels became enormously popular around the world. Without a scientific background or experiences as a traveler, Verne spent much of his time doing research for his books. However, when the logic of the story contradicted scientific knowledge, Verne took poetic license with science to serve his fast-paced adventures.

Verne's stories caught the spirit of the nineteenth century and its uncritical enthusiasm about scientific progress and invention. His works were often written in the form of a travel book taking the readers on fantastic voyages. Many of Verne's ideas have been hailed as prophetic, predicting some of the inventions that have changed our world, including the airplane, the submarine, and spacecraft. He published sixty-five novels, some twenty short stories and essays, thirty plays, an opera libretto and two geographical works.

In the first part of his career Verne expressed optimism about progress and Europe's central role in the social and technical development of the world. In Verne's later novels, the author's pessimism is reflected in the doom-laden fin-de-siècle atmosphere. In contrast to the adventurous spirit of his novels, Verne's personal life was relatively uneventful, with the exception of his surviving a murder attempt by his insane nephew. Verne died of natural causes in Amiens on March 24, 1905.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Zachary on February 09, 2025

People say that an intellectual, is someone like Kant, or Nietzsche, or Chesterton. I don’t think that they are intellectuals in its proper sense. Jules Verne is the intellectual. The man knows too much about too many subjects, as is evidenced in all his novels. He goes into detail about a vast vari......more

Goodreads review by Ewan on November 06, 2024

Je veux voyager avec Aronax, Ned Land et Conseil.......more