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Title: Jules Verne's Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea: The Definitive Unabridged Edition Based on the Original French Texts by Jules Verne, Walter James Miller, Frederick Paul Walter ISBN: 1-55750-877-1 Publisher: United States Naval Inst. Pub. Date: September, 1993 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $42.50

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Average Customer Rating: 5 (4 reviews)

Rating: 5
Summary: fantastic!
Comment: My (10 year old) daughter got interested in '20,000 leagues' after reading the "Wishbone" version (go ahead and laugh). I went searching for the real thing to read with her, and came across this edition. With all of the missing content recovered, plus the annotations to fill in all sorts of additional information, the result is fascinating for adult readers. If you read the usual (butchered) version as a kid, you really owe yourself this one. All of the critiques of Verne over the years that tried to belittle his knowledge of science turn out to have been based on translations that whacked out what Verne really said -- they thought it was too dry and boring. Reading what he really said, plus the extensive footnotes that describe the state of knowledge at the time, make Verne's brilliance tripling astonishing. Just consider that he wrote about the Nautilus at a time when the Hunley was the state of the art!

Rating: 5
Summary: The True Verne
Comment: One of the great problems with Jules Verne is that in the English speaking world he is relagated to the category of "Boys' Own Adventures". On the Continent, however, he is considered a brilliant social commentator, and biting satirist, AND a man who predicted the future. This is a volume that helps set matters to the right.

If you know of "20,000 Leagues" already, you will find little different at first. The plot is still the plot. Nemo is still Nemo, Prof. Aronnax is still pompous and fascinated by the Nautilus and Ned Land....

Ned Land is a flaming socialist.

This is one of the major shifts between the original French and the "cleaned up" English editions. Most of the science of the day was pulled out as a "dull read" and all the Socialism, anti-English remarks, and other commentaries of a "questionable nature" were excised. We Americans have unfortunately been until only very recently only able to find these poor early translations, or translations based on these poor translations. There is much more to Verne than submarines and diving suits. He is a man with a vision of his times, both scientific and political, and his books underline this strongly.

English readers, demand your Verne well-translated! Do not allow yourself to be fobbed off with bowlderized versions! To be able to read as he wrote himself (well, in English, for those of us who don't read French...) is a greater pleasure than merely an amusing old science-fiction story from the 19th century. Reading this book, as Verne /meant/ it to be read, if a pleasure, but also a struggle to understand ourselves and our relationship to the oceans themselves.

Rating: 5
Summary: OUTSTANDING ! A perfect book for you or for your child.
Comment: The best translation in English. Satisfies the intellect and imagination. Translated to show the truly beautiful qualities of Verne's writing that no other version can equal. The adventure comes alive by not omitting the breadth and depth of Verne's aesthetic ability originally entrenched within this masterpiece.