The Classics Club: Le tour du monde en 80 jours (Around the world in 80 days)

What good memories I have from the original film of "Around the world in 80 days" by Jules Verne... All the colours, the sites, the excitement, the adventure! Both as a teenager and as an adult, I've thoroughly enjoyed the whirlwind travel of Fogg and Passepartout...

For my Classics Club, I wanted to read the book as well, to see how Verne had interpreted all these elements in writing.  Also, because I've read other books of his that tend to be futuristic, I was curious to see how he would tackle a non-futuristic subject...

We enter in the life of Phileas Fogg, an Englishman whose daily routine must not be varied:

In the year 2889

Read for What's in a name

In the year 2889, Verne's story on an ultra-modern future in the USA really fascinated me.  It echoes so much today's elements, that I still cannot believe that people in 1889 (when it was published) could be such visionaries.  I can only but list the predictions for 2889, which have already materialised:

pneumatic tubes -- bullet train in Japan?
accumulators -- renewable energy
telephotic journalism -- internet
telephote -- skype
commutators - WAP services
classification -- web engine results
the Moon is uninhabited -- this was confirmed in 1969...
asphyxiating shells -- atomic bomb or nuclear reactor?
(the Chinese government bothering others... no comment)
A private joke?  UK colony to the USA, India to Russia, Australia independent.  Nothing is left for the UK, except for Gibraltar -- the future order of things???
touch knob to listen to music -- radio (invented in 1901)
electro reckoner -- calculator
live coverage of major events -- the birth of papparazzi???


The language used is suitable for a young adult audience, as with most of Verne's books.  Where I stood speechless was the vision and imagination of this person, and consequently the lack of vision and imagination of our present society.  We have accumulated such wealth of comforts around us and have assumed that this is the reality, that we've stopped having visions.  It hit a nerve to think that in 1889, when people had nothing compared to present-day, when they did not know who lived in the village next to theirs, let alone in a neighbouring country, when travel was extremely difficult and time-consuming, that they would nevertheless think of a "better" world with the comforts of our lives today.  What are WE doing?? Why have we lost that vision?  Can we do something before it's too late? Can we ever leave our comfort zone...