Fiction Friday: Around the World in Eighty Days

Fiction Friday: Around the World in Eighty Days

Photo: WikiImages

PBS has been showing an eight-part “adaptation” of Jules Verne’s acclaimed novel Around the World in Eighty Days. I put the word adaptation in quotations because two significant changes were made to the original. The characters of Fix and Passepartout are completely different and seemed to be a nod to political correctness rather than adhering to Verne’s intentions, with Fix being a female journalist and Passepartout being black. 

For those of you unfamiliar with this 1872 French novel, Phileas Fogg, a rich Englishman who lives a solitary life in London. He periodically frequents a gentleman’s club called the Reform Club where he seems to be ridiculed for his habitual modest lifestyle and fastidious manner, so fastidious he fires his valet for bringing him shaving water at a lower temperature than desired. He hires Frenchman Jean Passepartout as replacement. 

One day, Fogg and several of his friends see an article in The Daily Telegraph that states a new railroad

section has opened in India, making it now possible to travel around the world in eighty days. An argument ensues as to the veracity of the claim, and Fogg accepts a bet for 20,000 pounds that he can complete the journey. Experiences in Bombay, Calcutta, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, San Francisco, New York, France, Ireland, and finally Liverpool, and the intervening travel keep readers turning pages. At first, Fogg believes he has lost the wager but a series of events reveal that because he has traveled eastward, his days were shortened by four minutes for each of the 360 degrees of longitude they cross, thus they had seen eighty sunrises and sunsets to London’s seventy-nine, therefore winning the bet. Ironically, he has spent nearly 19,000 pounds of his travel money during the trip. 

Photo: WikiImages

Written during the Franco-Prussian war in which Verne was drafted, he struggled with financial difficulties and grief over the recent death of his father. Fascinated by technology, Vern was intrigued by the possibility of such speedy travel. Interestingly, the closing date of the novel, December 21, 1872, was the same date as the serial publication, leading some readers to believe the journal was actually taking place. Bets were placed, and some railroad companies campaigned for Verne to include them and the book. 

After the book’s publication as a novel, several people attempted to follow Fogg’s circumnavigation. Here are a few of them: 

• 1889: Nellie Bly did the journey in 72 days and met Verne in Amiens at its completion; 
• 1903: James Willis Sayre’s journey lasted 54 days 
• 1908: Harry Bensley attempted the journey on foot, but it took so long, he had to abandon the trip in 1914 at the commencement of WWI. 
• 1928: A Danish Boy Scout traveled by train and ship, but did not go via India, and his journey lasted 44 days. 

Since 1979, Verne is the second-most translated author, ranking between William Shakespeare and Agatha Christie. Have you read this classic?

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Rayne's Redemption:

Will she have to lose her identity to find true love?

Twin sisters Rayne and Jessica Dalton have been swapping places their whole lives, so when Jessica dies on the eve of heading west to become a mail-order bride, Rayne decides to fill her sister's shoes. The challenge will be faking Jessica's faith in God. Can Rayne fool her prospective groom without losing her heart...or her soul?

Flynn Ward fled England to escape his parent's attempts at marrying him off, but now that he's ready to wed, locating a woman in the Wyoming mountains is harder than finding a hackney in a rainstorm. Then the Westward Home & Hearts Agency offers him the perfect match. But when his prospective bride 

arrives, she's nothing like she seemed in her letters. Is he destined to go through life alone?

Can two desperate people overcome their differences to find common ground...and love?

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Fiction Friday: Vintage Reads - The Professor by Charlotte Bronte

Fiction Friday: Charlotte Bronte’s The Professor 

 

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Authors are told to write what they know, and British writer Charlotte Brontë did just that. The Professor, which was published by her husband two years after her death was actually Charlotte’s first novel, written well before Jane Eyre. Rejected by the few publishers of the time, the book manuscript was put on the back burner as the author set about crafting her next novel. Parts of the manuscript were later reworked from the prospective of a female teacher and published as Villette. 

 

Based on her experiences ten years’ prior as teacher and language student in Belgium, The Professor tells the story of William Crimsworth, a teacher in Brussels. Told in first-person narrative form, the novel describes his maturation, career, and relationships. The story begins with a letter sent from William to a friend and discusses his rejection of an uncle’s proposal that he become a clergyman as well as his first meeting with his rich brother. William obtains a job with Edward who treats him poorly. Leaving the position, William accepts a job at a school in Brussels. 

 

Author photo

His excellent reputation as a “professor” becomes known to a headmistress at a girls school nearby. Sheoffers him a job that he accepts, and slowly falls in love with her. He overhears a conversation with her fiancé about their deceitful treatment of him, and reacts by being cold and distant with her. In a plot line that would make the author of Peyton Place proud, William begins to teach one of the younger instructors and falls in love with her. Jealous of the attention he is paying to the young woman, the headmistress fires her. He searches high and low for her, finally finding her in a graveyard (of all places). Not wanting to cause further dissension at the Williams quits and finds a new position at a college. He and the young teacher marry, open and school together, and have a child – a neatly tied up happily-ever-after. 

 

Interestingly, Brontë uses the book as an opportunity to put forward her dislike of Catholics and the Flemish, and there are several negative incidents involving both. 

 

Photo: Pixabay/
Joaquin Aranoa

Because she based the novel on her own experiences, The Professor gives readers a peek into the Charlotte’s life. During her short stint at the school, she fell in love with the headmaster, a married man with children. According to a later biography, she didn’t handle the situation well, and made herself an embarrassment. Additionally, because Charlotte passed away at an early age she didn’t write as many books as she might have if she’d lived longer. Of the book, she said, “The middle and latter portion is as good as I can write...it contains more pith, more substance, more reality, in my judgment, than much of Jane Eyre.” 

 

Some find the book slow and plodding, lacking the passion and intrigue of Jane Eyre, but I enjoyed reading the story as it immersed me in the “working man’s life” of the mid-1800s. Consider reading this classic.

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About Dinah's Dilemma

Will she have to run from the past for the rest of her life? 

Dinah Simpkins has no chance of making a good marriage. Her outlaw brothers and her father’s gambling addiction have ruined the family’s reputation. Then the Westward Home and Hearts Matrimonial Agency provides an opportunity for a fresh start. After Dinah arrives in Nebraska, she discovers her brothers played a part in the death of her prospective groom’s first wife. 

As a former Pinkerton detective Nathan Childs knows when someone is lying. The bride sent by the matrimonial agency may be beautiful, but she’s definitely hiding something, and he has no intention of marrying her until he uncovers the truth. But an easier solution may be to send her packing. Then his young daughter goes missing. He and Dinah must put aside their mutual hurt and mistrust to find her.

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