Although critics continue to debate whether Jules Verne's work is ‘true’ science fiction (SF), rather than scientific romance, Verne is widely credited as one of the founders of the genre, and in the popular imagination, he and SF are seen as largely synonymous. Verne has received renewed attention since the publication in 1994 of his ‘Paris au Vingtieme Siecle’, and this has highlighted his importance as a key commentator on the anguishes of modernity. This book provides a detailed account of the relationship between Verne and the French literary canon, demonstrating the ‘now-ineluctable tren ... More

Although critics continue to debate whether Jules Verne's work is ‘true’ science fiction (SF), rather than scientific romance, Verne is widely credited as one of the founders of the genre, and in the popular imagination, he and SF are seen as largely synonymous. Verne has received renewed attention since the publication in 1994 of his ‘Paris au Vingtieme Siecle’, and this has highlighted his importance as a key commentator on the anguishes of modernity. This book provides a detailed account of the relationship between Verne and the French literary canon, demonstrating the ‘now-ineluctable trend towards rehabilitation and literary canonization’. It examines narrative technique, versimilitude, defamiliarization, naturalization, and dialogism in Verne's work, while developing the enquiry into the nature of the Vernian text in discussing the role of science and textual repetition. The interface between realism, utopianism, and SF in a number of Verne's novels is also investigated.