Research Blog Antarctica #101: An Antarctic Mystery

Novel: Jules Verne: An Antarctic Mystery (Mondial 2006, orig. 1897)

An Antarctic Mystery is Jules Verne’s sequel to the most enduring classic of Antarctic fiction, Edgar Allan Poe’s novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. Poe’s novel has spawned a number of sequels by various authors. It follows in the typical pattern of a protagonist who realizes that Poe’s story is not a work of fiction, but truth.

The hero enlists on an expedition to save the men of Pym’s journey, stranded on Antarctic islands. The novel is largely a seafaring story, written before most of what we know about Antarctica was discovered. By Verne’s standards, it’s a disposable little book with a single, silly sci-fi idea in the end.

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