Publish at June 29 2022 Updated July 06 2022
"Nothing great has been done that was not an exaggerated hope."
Jules Verne
"Family legend even tells that in 1839, at the age of 11, this Nantes native would have sneaked onto a cargo ship ready to set sail for India. Violently lectured by his father, he is said to have promised him to travel only in his dreams..." Time
Anticipation literature is indebted to Edgard Poe (1809-1849), and H. G. Wells (1866-1946), but especially to Jules Verne (1828-1905) for directing our curiosity toward the future. After centuries or our collective unconscious were riveted on the past and the gesture of heroes and glorious Princes and Princesses, where, our imaginations drew on traditions to entertain and marvel, Jules Verne knew how to turn our eyes towards the future. Through his quality of telling the adventures of man at the bottom of the oceans (Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea) or in our solar system (From the Earth to the Moon), he is the precursor of scientific anticipation literature.
In the year 117 after JV, the specific way of seeing the world of the great Jules was declined in novels of anticipation, works of science fiction, works of cyber punk or steam punk, dystopian books, prospective texts. The genre never ceases to explore and diversify under the combined impulses of scientific advances, societal and ecological issues, a pronounced taste of readers to escape and project themselves into other possibilities. Pierre Antoine Marti, in devoting a thesis to science fiction literature, shows in all registers of life how the attraction to the future modifies our human condition. By dint of projecting our destinies forward, authors' prophecies become self-fulfilling, here we are able to learn to go beyond the known. And if science fiction was the ready-made present of our new learning abilities?
The modernity of Jules Verne is still remarkable. In 62 novels and 22,000 pages (4,000 of which are devoted to illustrations), he was able to grasp and make us see the great innovations of his time, such as electricity, the telephone, the telegraph, the railroads, and the steam engine. He irrigated his adventure novels with a perfume of novelty. Each page of his texts is both a human and technical feat. If the repercussion of Jules Verne is planetary, it is probably because his work contributes to feed the general movement of the society towards the contemporary democracy, in counterpoint of a publishing until then dominated by the religious thought. Thus, Jules Verne's novels mixed with science, geography, discoveries of civilizations, offer a support to a secular morality that begins to compete with religious morality.
Jules Verne does not only produce an imaginary immediately recognizable by its exploratory science motifs but above all a method to create his universes and make them archetypes. He finely studies the landscapes and technologies he describes to set the narrative of incredible explorations. He puts a magic in what is difficult to grasp.
Taking characters filled with daring, making them travel in the most extreme conditions, interacting with distant and unknown cultures and with cutting-edge technologies, pushing the moral and technical human challenge to the limit while serving the aesthetics of an era. At a time when mechanization is progressing, he re-enchants the world. This is the genius of Jules Verne, putting magic back at the very moment when we may fear that technology is killing dreams and wonder. He reveals:
"I can't say I'm particularly excited about science. In truth, I never was: I never went to science school, or even did experiments. But, when I was young, I loved to observe the workings of a machine"
Jules Verne
Jules Verne as an observer of society sketches colorful characters, heroes of their time, surprising themselves in the surpassing of themselves through engagement in action.
Today's imaginings are supported by videos; adventure novels are online games, learning to explore is done on the network in the metaverse or multiverse. Editors are put aside by raw and direct expressions on social networks. When it comes to the human, moral and technological adventure, I leave it to everyone to judge if it will leave a mark in history, in a theme park and if it leads us to change paradigm.
Sources
Dekiss, J. - Jules Verne - Contributions to a planetary human- https://www.cairn.info/revue-etudes-2005-7-page-79.htm
Farenheit Magazine Jules Verne father of science fiction https://fahrenheitmagazine.com/fr/art/courrier/Julio-Verne%2C-le-p%C3%A8re-de-la-science-fiction#.YpYb747P23A
Science fiction and scientific fiction in France: from Jules Verne to J.-H. Rosny aîné - https://journals.openedition.org/resf/1406
Radio France. Jules Verne travels to the center of science https://www.radiofrance.fr/franceculture/podcasts/la-methode-scientifique/jules-verne-voyage-au-centre-de-la-science-9094692
Wikipedia Jules Verne https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules_Verne
Universalis. Anticipation and foresight https://www.universalis.fr/encyclopedie/jules-verne/2-anticipation-et-prospective/
Pierre Antoine Marti. Once Upon a Time http://crh.ehess.fr/index.php?5446
Apm prospective. Pierre Antoine Marti. Future and Science Fiction https://www.apm.fr/prospectives/pierre-antoine-marti-futur-et-science-fiction/
Patrick Gyger - His contribution is to have "re-enchanted the world" - Time. https://www.letemps.ch/opinions/apport-cest-davoir-reenchante-monde
A
You might also like:
Online training: boring movies or challenging course?
What do you buy when you order an e-learning course? A lot of media... and some instructional design. Without this essential ingredient, your training is likely to bore participants and fail to achieve its goal.
A serious game on social engagement
Many serious games address the topic of sustainable development. Yet before such solutions were proposed, innovative people had to go against the social grain and fight to improve their environment. A humorous adventure game, hosted by the National Film Board, teaches children the attitudes they need to adopt to make a difference.
Can Catholicism reinvent itself?
The Roman Catholic Church has been in turmoil for years. Much of this has been due to the scandal of pedophile priests and their protection within the clergy, but this is not the only thorn in its side. Even covid-19 has hurt the institution. Now, can it reinvent itself or is it doomed to disappear?
Building a virtual sense of community
The virtual classroom device can create some discomfort. We are talking about various people in front of their computers communicating more or less with others. Not necessarily a warm context. Yet it is possible for the teacher to "forget" the distance and develop a sense of community with the learners.
The choreographic space of constraint [Thesis].
The last twenty years have seen the disciplining of Belgian development NGOs, following the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness and neoliberal governance policies. NGOs manage to dance with these constraints. And this dance is transforming each of the actors to the rhythm of political and administrative reforms.
