Verne, Jean-Jules. Jules Verne. Translated by Roger Greaves. New York: Taplinger, 1976. Written by the author’s grandson.
Scholarship and Criticism
Evans, Arthur B. Jules Verne Rediscovered: Didacticism and the Scientific Novel. New York: Greenwood Press, 1988. Heavy on theory and textual deconstruction, this book is a good academic primer on Verne, and worth the read.
Lynch, Lawrence W. Jules Verne. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1992. Occupies an intelligent and informed ground between academic investigation and biography.
Martin, Andrew. The Mask of the Prophet: The Extraordinary Fictions of Jules Verne. Oxford: Clarendon Press of Oxford University Press, 1990.
For Young Readers
Schoell, William. Remarkable Journeys: The Story of Jules Verne. Greensboro, NC: Morgan Reynolds, 2002.
Teeters, Peggy. Jules Verne: The Man Who Invented Tomorrow. New York: Walker, 1992.
Other Works Used in the Preparation of the Introduction and the Notes
Grann, David. “A Reporter at Large: The Squid Hunter.” New Yorker, May 24, 2004.
Lottman, Herbert R. Jules Verne: An Exploratory Biography. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996.
Verne, Jules. The Complete Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea: A New Translation of Jules Verne’s Science Fiction Classic. Introduction, translation, and annotations by Emanuel J. Mickel. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1991.
—. Jules Verne’s Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea: The Definitive Unabridged Edition Based on the Original French Texts.
Translated and annotated by Walter James Miller and Frederick
Paul Walter. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1993.
a
Marine mammal of the order Cetacea, which includes whales, dolphins, and porpoises.
b
Scientists who study the natural history of fishes.
c
Chain of islands off the southern tip of Alaska, still prime whale-watching sites.
d
Square-rigged warship.
e
Legendary Scandinavian sea monster.
f
Le Constitutionnel was a nineteenth-century liberal daily French newspaper known for its extreme political views.
g
This well-known London-based insurance company began by offering marine insurance.
h
Rifles used by the French army in the nineteenth century.
i
Ironclad warship; the term is derived from the USS Monitor, a warship in America’s Union navy and one of the first ironclad warships.
j
Printed in quarto pages, in which paper is folded in half and in half again to form four sheets.
k
Weapon consisting of a spear and a battle-ax, used especially in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries.
l
Extinct prehistoric relatives of, respectively, the warthog, the horse, the deer, and the raccoon.
m
Or babirusa; a large wild swine of Indonesia.
n
Raised deck at the back, or stern, of a ship.
o
Wharf.
p
Or mizzenmast; the mast located behind the mainmast on a ship, usually the third mast.
q
Biblical sea monster (described in the Bible, Job 41:1-34),
r
That is, a crafty sperm whale.
s
Downwind; facing the direction toward which the wind is blowing.
t
In Greek mythology, fire-breathing monsters.
u
Forecastle: forward part of a ship’s upper deck; taffraiclass="underline" rail surrounding the stern.
v
A fathom, used especially for measuring water depth, is equal to 6 feet.
w
Electric eel.
x
On alert (French).
y
Reference to the biblical story of Jonah, who was swallowed by a whale and thus saved from drowning.
z
Or Scots; people of Scotland.
aa
French scientists Louis-Pierre Gratiolet (1815-1865) and Josef Engel (1816-1874) developed a scientific method for judging character from facial expressions.
ab
Verne was a proponent of Esperanto, a universal language first published in 1887 to help people from different nations communicate.
ac
Mobile within the mobile element (rough Latin).
ad
Potash, or caustic potash, is a potassium compound used in agriculture and industry.
ae
Nemo is a Latin word meaning “no one” or “nobody.”
af
Genus name of the sea cucumber, a worm-like invertebrate.
ag
The translator here omits a long paragraph listing authors and titles meant to establish Nemo’s character as a Renaissance man and to display the scope of Nemo’s reading and interests.
ah
Jean-Baptiste Tavernier (1605-1689) journeyed six times to the East and published a two-volume work, Les six voyages de J. B. Tavernier (The Six Voyages of J. B. Tavernier).
ai
Long, wispy cirrus clouds, from which sailors predict impending winds.
aj
Fictional island northwest of Hawaii.
ak
Firm ground (Latin).
al
Glass bottles coated with metal foil used to accumulate electricity.
am
Large, web-footed bird; a sailors’ superstition held that killing these birds brought bad luck.
an
Or Cretan; Candia is an ancient name for the Greek island of Crete.
ao
Tiny, usually microscopic animals.
ap
Jean Macé (1815-1894) worked with Verne’s publisher at the Magazine of Education and Recreation, in which 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea was first printed.
aq
Celebration (French).
ar
Made by Bazin (French).
as
Strait between New Guinea and Australia.
at
Bitter or troubled dreams (Latin).
au
Sacred river of the Indian subcontinent.
av
Luminous nighttime phenomenon appearing in the upper atmosphere of the Northern Hemisphere; also known as “northern light.”
aw
Greek geographer (c.63 B.C.-C.A.D. 23) whose Geographia was the standard source for geographic and ethnographic knowledge in ancient times.
ax
Summer winds that blow over the Mediterranean for about forty days.
ay
Meaning “red.”
az
Marine mammal of the western Pacific and Indian Oceans with a long body tapered at both ends and a fluked tail like whales and dolphins; also called a sea cow for its habit of “grazing” on vegetation on the ocean floor.
ba
Much bigger than a Dugong’s actual length, which averages about 8 feet.
bb
Collective name for the lands of the Pacific Ocean, especially when referring to the central and southern Pacific.
bc
There, in King Neptune’s abyss by Kárpathos, his spokesman is azure-hued Proteus (Latin); from book 4 of Georgica, by Roman poet Virgil (70-19 B.C.). In classical mythology, Neptune is the god of the sea; Proteus is a minor sea god and Neptune’s servant, who can change his form at will. Kárpathos is a Greek island.
bd
Or Pesce, Italian for “fish.”
be
Group of Greek islands in the southern Aegean Sea.