Reviews with content warning for Kidnapping - Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

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Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne

5 reviews

cecinamo's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

A thrilling classic! It was very exciting and interesting. The depiction of sperm whales was far from accurate, but, oh well, it was written in 1870.
Captain Nemo was such a fascinating character! His motivations and background are a complete mystery and you only piece together fragments along with the main character. His love for the sea is truly unparalleled. Mr Aronnax (mc) and him share a really unique bond through this feeling. It is really interesting.
(Also Captain Nemo and Mr. Aronnax definitely had a bit of queer tension ;> )

I also just loved all the parts where Jules Verne described all the different marine creatures!

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meganpbennett's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

Having only read the illustrated classic that was an abridged version of the mangled Mercier translation, I jumped at the chance to read 20,000 Leagues via email, as things happened in the novel. I had vague memories of plot events and was delighted to see what really happened in this delightful story.

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prufrockpreptooth's review against another edition

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adventurous informative slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.25

J'ai lu plusieurs Jules Verne que j'ai adoré - alors je ne me suis pas méfié en me penchant sur celui-ci. Quelle erreur ! C'est long, mais long, mais long, avec des descriptions, même pas des mers ou du Nautilus, non, mais des classifications de centaines d' espèce qui sont d'un ennuie à lire quand on en a rien à faire de la taxonomie... J'imagine que quelqu'un qui aime ce point, adorera peut-être cette ouvrage, bien que l'histoire a aussi terriblement vieillie et nous offre un personnage principale qui se sent particulièrement au-dessus de tout le monde en tout temps, devant pour moi absolument insupportable plus le roman avancé (et c'est le narrateur !)
Bref, il y a tout de même des bons points, les premiers et derniers chapitres sont prenants, et sûrement qu'une version abrégée aurait été plus adaptée au type de lectures que j'apprécie

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melancholymegs's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging informative mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? N/A
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.75

I had picked up this book due to its method of story telling via a travel log/diary, because i had enjoyed Bram Stokers “Dracula”, (5⭐️) which makes use of the same format. Curiosity to read more literature that takes place in the sea/ocean was also a factor when i picked up this book. However, if you are expecting lush descriptions of the sublimity of the sea and its creatures, you will be disappointed.
Trudging through the mass amounts of scientific terminology as well as maths was not worth the pay off. The vaguely hinted at end reward would have been more impactful had more description and build up been provided; instead you get a bunch of anticlimactic explanations dumped into the last 20-30 minutes of the book.
I definitely can see why this book is enjoyed by many people. It does present the interest of sea travel, specifically submarine travel, during the 19th century, as well as giving insight into the scientific idiosyncrasies of various forms of sea life. However this book simply was not enjoyable to me🙃

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nytephoenyx's review against another edition

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adventurous slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea is one of my favorite classics.

There’s a bit of nostalgia to it – I remember the first time I picked up the book at my local library as a child. It was a library-bound illustrated classic. It was probably my first true classic and immediately I fell in love with Jules Verne’s science fiction. A couple decades later, I still enjoy it.

That said, it’s a bit difficult for me to explain why I like it so much. Compared to modern books, it’s dense and lacks compelling descriptions. If you hate info dumping, you’ll really dislike Twenty Thousand Leagues. If you really like fish, you may like Twenty Thousand Leagues. Whether it’s a transition issue (the original is in French) or simply the stylistic product of the nineteenth century, there’s not much I can defend about Verne’s writing style. It’s palatable, but it’s flat.

No, for me, I think it’s the adventure.

Verne predicted so many scientific advances in his science fiction, including our flight to the moon and deep into the earth. While submarines aren’t particularly impressive to us in the twenty-first century, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea was written as a serialized tale between 1869 and 1870. In the 1860s and 1870s, submarines did exist, but they were not commonplace. Captain Nemo’s mighty Nautilus is almost certainly inspired by the vessel of the same name designed by Robert Fulton in 1800 while in France. Submarines existed, but to built one in such a way that it could withstand so much pressure so deep in the water… those didn’t exist. They still don’t exist to the extend Verne describes. But oh! Jules Verne makes it seem perfectly logical that the Nautilus could do all these things. When reading Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, you forget the book was written so long ago and are able to immerse yourself in the story. The research is so well done that it still feels real, more than a century later.

Unfortunately, like any classic, this book isn’t perfect. It’s so close to withstanding the test f time except for one chapter. Somewhere along the lines, the Nautilus stops at an island and M. Arronax, Conseil, and Ned Land enjoy the respite. And, on this island, we meet the indigenous people of that area. They are described with most of the tame but still completely atrocious and inappropriate stereotypes of the time, all of which are racist and inappropriate. Whether those words used are in the same spirit as Verne wrote them or if their crudeness is part of the translation, I don’t know. The unfortunate chapter is, nevertheless, there. The book would be fine without it and this is one of those situations where I feel a perfectly good book could be salvaged by cutting a chapter.

All this time later, I think Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea remains a shining example of really good science fiction. Even read today, it holds true as a piece of science fiction, but Verne’s research was so good as to make the whole thing believable. There’s science and mystery and the ever-compelling enigma that is Captain Nemo. I know it’s not for everyone, but I adore Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea and am happy to have it in my collection.

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