Works of Jules Verne/Introduction to Volume 6
INTRODUCTION TO VOLUME SIX
HE MYSTERIOUS ISLAND" is a sequel or conclusion to "Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea." "Dropped from the Clouds," the first portion of the celebrated tale, appeared in 1870. But it was not until 1875 that the story was finished by the completion of its other two books "The Abandoned" and "The Secret of the Island."
Thus, long before the books were ended, it is probable that every French reader knew that Captain Nemo was the mysterious protector of the American colonists of the story. For Verne himself made no secret to his friends of the very open "mystery."
It was worth noting that in these books Verne for the first time treats American characters with sympathy and appreciation. In his choice of heroes he was always thoroughly cosmopolitan. He early declared that his own countrymen were too excitable to be used as the central figures of adventure tales. At first he selected Englishmen; because, as he said, "their independence and self-possession in moments of sudden trial make them admirable heroes." To their other national traits he gave little attention, Captain Hatteras for instance being anything but a typical Englishman.
When, in the "Trip to the Moon" Verne for the first time shifted his ground and made Americans the central figures, this was but a natural echo of the European feeling of the moment. Europe was filled with amazement over the marvelous inventions by which during the years 1861 to 1865, American engineers, both North and South, had "transformed the navies of the world." A stupendous invention was to be the heart of Verne's book; naturally the inventors would be American.
Those first Americans of our author's creation were, how- ever, monstrosities, the typical Americans of French imagination in the year 1865, drawn by the author absolutely without personal knowledge to guide him.
But the warm reception of Verne's books in America, stimulated his sympathetic interest in our land. In 1867 he journeyed hither, and as a consequence the Americans of his later books approach more closely to being human. Moreover his youthful admiration of Englishmen was somewhat waning. Scotchmen, resentful and even bitter against their sister kingdom, hold the center of the field in "In Search of the Castaways." Captain Nemo glorifies a yet bitterer foe to England, an East Indian Prince of the great "mutiny."
Hence when in "The Mysterious Island" Verne was again looking for inventiveness and ingenuity, he made all five of his central characters American. Moreover he discriminated them clearly and handled them with appreciation. The sailor Pencraft, to be sure, would scarcely be recognized as an American type; and Cyrus Harding is so completely a walking cyclopaedia rather than a man that one almost wonders if Captain Nemo's secret gift to the colonists of a second cyclopaedia was not meant in sarcasm rather than in kindness. Yet here and in "The Survivors of the Chancellor" we certainly touch high water mark in our author's estimate of the American race.