“ONE OF THE DEFINITIVE FOUNDATION STONES OF THE SCIENCE FICTION GENRE”: JULES VERNE’S FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON, 1874

VERNE, Jules. From the Earth to the Moon. New York: Scribner, Armstrong, 1874 [i.e. 1873]. Octavo, original burgundy gilt-stamped pictorial cloth.

First combined American edition and first hardcover American edition of Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon, And a Trip Around It—“the first interplanetary novel” to unite preparations for a trip to the moon and the return of its intrepid voyagers to earth—with 80 full-page illustrations, in original bright gilt cloth with the splendid image of a spaceship racing to the moon on its cover.

Jules Verne is widely held as “one of the two founding fathers of science fiction—the other being H.G. Wells” (Clute & Nicholls, 1275). “Verne was not just a technological prophet. He juxtaposed scientific achievement on the tapestry of human experience” (Firsts, 1996:31). This first fully illustrated American edition brings together the two separately issued French publications: De la terre à la lune, 1865 (From the Earth to the Moon) and Autour de la lune, 1869 (A Trip Around the Moon). A landmark work, Verne’s From the Earth to the Moon is “the first interplanetary novel to focus on the technical and organizational preparations for the voyage, using the actual blast-off as a climax, introducing thereby a new narrative realism… And a Trip Around It continues the story by describing the experiences of the intrepid voyagers as they observe the Moon en passant before a slingshot effect hurls them earthward again. The couplet is one of the definitive foundation stones of the science fiction genre” (Barron:II:1180). From the Earth to the Moon is also linked to the very beginning of modern cinema, for “as early as 1902 Georges Méliès adapted From the Earth to the Moon to make Le voyage dans la lune (Clute & Nicholls, 1277). This is first combined American edition and the first American edition in cloth. It is preceded only by the 1869 paperbound 88-page Newark edition of From the Earth to the Moon alone, of which only one copy is known. As issued with an title-page imprint of 1874, yet published by Scribner, Armstrong on “November 22, 1873,” this is “their ‘authorized’ one-volume edition of From the Earth to the Moon and A Trip Around It, which is the original translation furnished by Mercier and King for Samson Low, Marston and Company in England. This edition has a very elaborate pirctorial binding with stamped images of the moon and the rocket train on the front cover, and the projectile on the spine. The book contains 80 full-page illustrations from the original French edition,” containing images by Bayard, de Montaut and de Neuville (Taves & Michaluk V007). With advertisement to title page verso for Verne’s A Journey to the Centre of the Earth; four pages of advertisements at rear. As issued without dust jacket. Taves & Michaluk V003 & V007. Edwards 3 & 7. Myers 26. Contemporary owner inscription dated “Christmas 1873.”

Text and plates generally fine, slight edge-wear to original cloth, gilt exceptionally bright. A wonderful extremely good copy.