Jules Verne, 120 years since the writer’s death

Romancier, poet and playwright, Jules Verne is one of the authors whose novels, such as ‘five weeks in the ball’ (1863), ‘Journey to the center of the earth’ (1864), ‘from the ground to the moon’ (1865), ‘twenty thousand leagues under the seas’ (1870), ‘the bypass of the earth in 80 days’ (1873)

His work has been translated into over 150 foreign languages, according to https://www.goodreads.com/.

Born in Nantes, on February 8, 1828, Jules Verne was the youngest of the five children of the family. His father, Pierre, originally from Province, was a lawyer.

He was a child on the island of Feydeau, a piece of land located in the middle of the Loire river, crossing the city of Nantes. Then, from the age of 14, he lived in the village of Chantenay, the Nantes district, which offered pictures of the boats that were heading to the port, images that later became favorite themes in many of his novels.

During the school he began to write stories and poems. Two notebooks to which he continued to add lyrics throughout his life remained unpublished until 1989.

Later, Jules Verne asked his friend, the composer Aristide Hignard, to put his poems on music. In 1857, a compilation of the results ‘Rimes et Mélodies’ was published.

The father, who wanted his son to become a lawyer, sent him to Paris to study law. Verne took his diploma in law, but remained in Paris where he continued his work as a writer and published the first texts in the magazine ‘Musée des Familles’, edited by his compatriot in Nantes, Pitre-Chevalier.

He then met Alexandre Dumas, who obtained his permission to play his first play at the Lyric Theater in Paris (whose secretary later became): ‘Les Pailles Rompues’ (1850).

The play will also be presented at Nantes, at the Graslin Theater. Between the plays he wrote and which were staged, we mention: ‘Le Colin-Mellard’ (1853), ‘Les Compagnons from Marjolaine’ (1855), ‘L’Auberge des Ardennes’ (1860), ‘Eleven days of the Siege’ (1861), notes https://en-julesverne.nantesmetropole.fr/

At the same time, he knew the geographer and traveler Jacques Arago, famous for making the world around in 1817, aboard the Uranian vessel. It was a decisive meeting for the young enthusiast of maritime adventures and travelers who was then Jules Verne.

In 1861, through the novelist Alfred de Bréhat, Jules Verne met the publisher Pierre-Jules Hetzel, who agreed to publish her first novel.

Thus, on January 31, 1863, Jules Verne’s first novel – ‘Five weeks in the balloon appeared in libraries. Printed in 2,000 copies, another 76,000 children were sold during his life. They followed: ‘Journey to the center of the earth’ (1864), ‘from the earth to the moon’ (1865; ‘around the month’, 1870), ‘The adventures of Captain Hatteras’ (1866), ‘Children of Captain Grant’ (1867), ‘Twenty thousand leagues under the seas’ (1870).

During the publishing house, Jules Verne was an associate editor of the periodic « Education and Recreation », created by Hetzel and Jean Macé, meant to offer families a serious and attractive learning tool, pleasant for parents and beneficial for children. When Hetzel died in 1886, his son took the publishing house and continued to publish ‘extraordinary travelers’, reaching a number of 62 novels and 18 novels.

After Nantes where he spent the first 20 years of his life, then another 23 years lived in Paris, Jules Verne moved to Amiens in 1871, his wife’s hometown of Viane, a young widow with two children, who married in 1857. They had only one child-Michel Jean Pierne Verne (1861-1925). As soon as they allowed his income, he bought his first boat, Saint-Michel. Two others followed, along with whom he was committed to travel to the seas of Europe. With Saint Michel III, he made several cruises in the Mediterranean Sea between 1878 and 1885, which were all sources of inspiration.

He continued to write: ‘The floating city’ (1871), ‘The Land of the Fur’ (1873), ‘The District of the Earth in 80 days’ (1873), ‘Mysterious Island’ (1874), ‘Michael Strogoff’ (1876), ‘Captain at fifteen years’ (1878), ‘House of Affine’ (1880), ‘School’), ‘School’) (1881), ‘800 leagues on Amazon’ (1881), ‘Green Raza’ (1882), ‘Archipelago in flames’ (1884), ‘South Star’ (1884), ‘A lottery ticket’ (1886), ‘Two years of holiday’ (1888), ‘Castle in the Carpathians’ (1892), ‘Island with Elice’ (1895) The conqueror. The master of the world ‘(1904), according to https://en-julesverne.nantesmetropole.fr/.

In 1888, he was chosen counselor of the city of Amiens being in charge of all theatrical activities. For the next 15 years, Verne participated in the council meetings and dedicated considerable time to the Local Theater and his civic duties, held speeches at the local schools and officially opened the municipal circus in 1889. Knight of the Legion of Honor of 1870, Jules Verne was elevated to the rank of officer, being decorated by the prefect.

Concerning several health problems, the writer died on March 24, 1905 in Amiens, in the house on Longueville Boulevard, which today bears the name of the writer.

Many of his novels have been screened, since 1902 and 1904 with the short films ‘from the Moon’ and ‘an impossible journey’, both directed by Georges Mélies, continuing with ’20. ‘Journey to the center of the Earth’ (1959, directed by Henry Levin; 1997, 1999, 2008); ‘Mysterious Island’ (1961, Michael Craig; 2005, 2012), ‘Ocol of the Earth in 80 days’ (1956, directed by Michael Anderson, with Shirley Maclaine, Marlene Dietrich, Fernandel; 1989, with Pierce Brosnan, Peter Ustinov; 2004, with Jackie Chan), according to www.cinemagia.ro.