Subject: Review: PARIS IN THE 20TH CENTURY by Jules Verne

From: Kevin Lauderdale <[email-masked]>
Date: 09 Dec 1996 20:31:19 GMT

Paris in the Twentieth Century by Jules Verne
		Review Copyright 1996 Kevin Lauderdale

Reading Jules Verne's PARIS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY is like nothing so much
as reading one of Isaac Asimov's Foundation novels.  That's not to say that
PARIS is as good as the Foundation books; it's not.  Verne's publisher
rejected it in 1863, Verne locked the manuscript in a box, and, justifiably,
forgot about it.  It's nowhere near as good as any of Verne's masterpieces
like AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS, or even FIVE WEEKS IN A BALLOON.  But it
is a sort of "future history."  It is a story written in the 1860s, which
takes a look back at the events of the 1960s, which we are reading in the
1990s.  Verne was not only remarkably prescient in his predictions of what
twentieth century life would be like, but he got his dates right too.  With
only a few extreme exceptions, this book could be a novel of contemporary
angst.  Jules Verne, meet Jay McInerney.

The hero of this short novel is a young man named Michel Dufrenoy.  He is a
poet in a dystopia where all forms of literature and art have vanished in
favor of practical matters.  Reading is now taught solely that mechanical
manuals may be read.  PARIS concerns his trials and tribulations in this
overly mechanized Paris where commerce is all.  He yearns to create, he
yearns to love, and all around him others are concerned only with profit and
trade.

Like much of Verne, this novel is a travelogue with a plot stretched over
it.  In this case, the plot is very thin.  We see Michel at work in an
office, complete with a form of computer; he and his friends stroll along
the newly built Paris canal, and he takes the metro everywhere.  But PARIS
is a much less developed book than Verne's other works, and his characters
have little depth to them.  Michel Dufrenoy is no Captain Nemo, nor a
Phileas Fogg.  There *are* good bits in this novel.  On several occasions,
Verne levels the ultimate Gallic condemnation on Twentieth Century France:
it has become like England.  When Michel goes to a huge bookstore to find
some Nineteenth century authors, he learns that Victor Hugo and Balzac are
out of print, but the store does have some contemporary poetry --
MEDITATIONS ON OXYGEN, POETIC PARALLELOGRAM, and the DECARBONATED ODES are
all available.  Although Verne does not envision television, the theater
still exists in his Paris.  There, classics are plundered and their plots
reused over and over.  This could be the voice of a network television
producer: "We are not concerned with novelty here; all personality must be
dispensed with; you will have to blend into a vast ensemble, which produces
collective works, of an average appeal."

This once-lost minor novel did not need to be published.  It adds nothing to
Verne's reputation, which has long been secure.  If it did need to be
published, the 1990s were not the time for it; it's just too late for this
book.  We can marvel at how accurate Verne was when he filled his Paris with
horseless carriages, fax machines, and a society obsessed with business.
But, unlike Orwell's 1984 or Huxley's BRAVE NEW WORLD, we cannot take it as
a warning, because we already live there.  His future is our past.  This is
a period piece that is more dated than most because reality has already
outpaced most of Verne's fiction.  His trucks only go up to thirty
horsepower.

PARIS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY doesn't grip you; it doesn't inspire.  It
doesn't make you want to go there.  Maybe it's the fact that the real Paris
in the 1960's was much more exciting than the one Verne envisioned.  Or
maybe it's that his publisher was right 130 years ago.  This is far from
Verne's best work.  Go read 20,000 LEAGUES UNDER THE SEA again instead.

%D 1996
%G 0-679-44434-3

Kevin Lauderdale
This and other reviews may be found at the Kevindex Web Page
http://smi.Stanford.EDU/people/kxl/Webazine.html
Available by e-mail:  [email-masked] (Subject:  Subscribe Kevindex)
Available free by post:  Kevin Lauderdale, MSOB x-215, Stanford, CA
94305-5479, USA
Coming soon:  I'll call you up and read it over the phone to you.