Sorry Vasanti while your name does start with V, I already had you under U and it wouldn't be fair to the other V authors. Of which I could only find one but still. V is for Jules Verne, also known as the 'Father of Science Fiction'.
It seems I actually don't read a lot of Science Fiction but the Science Fiction I prefer read is one from more than a hundred years ago and so most of it has actually come to pass. They have now renamed it Speculative Fiction about books set in the future, and they can be utopian or dystopian. Dystopias are books about the end of the world. So like the Left Behind Series or 88 reasons why the Rapture will be in 1988. Or 1984, The Handmaid's Tale, The Hunger Games, Tomorrow when the War Began, and the Last Kids on Earth. All fun stuff. The Book of Revelation might come under this category as well. But it's only natural that writers of certain era will be worried about the advent of World War Three. Comic conventions in this post-modern era simply call the whole thing Armageddon.
Utopias on the other hand, aren't so popular. It's now not profitable or compelling enough to write about the wonders of the age and how everything will be wonderful and isn't it a Brave New World - the future is bright and promising. But my author today was a Utopian author even though all the things he wrote about came to pass reading it now takes you back to that bygone age where all these things were potential possibilities on the horizon.
Now you CAN circumnavigate the globe in 24 hours by jumbo jet or concorde but back when Jules Verne wrote Around the World in 80 days in 1872 the wager was that it couldn't be done in 1920 hours. Reading the novel is entertaining and insightful and a fun adventure through time and space. It's also was hugely popular in his day like how chef/writer Anthony Bourdain reached cult status eating his way around the world and presenting it in TV (as well as numerous others..Michael Palin, Monty Don, Michael Portillo, Joanna Lumley, Billy Connelley etc) The best part of 80s days was when Phileas Fogg and Passepourtout met his Indian princess Auoda and took her on a to North America where she marvelled at snow for the first time.
Armchair travellers like me enjoy it because travel from New Zealand is so expensive. Plus nobody has ever challenged me to a journey by betting a million pounds. The other tale by Jules Verne that I delved into was 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. I once chose this book for a book club read and everyone turned up to the discussion night with different versions/editions of the classic book. You can read the real life version about life on the Calypso on a Jacques Cousteau expedition, possibly inspired by the Jules Verne tale itself.
The third of his adventures, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, hasn't actually been accomplished yet. But I live in hope that one day, we could go inside and there is actually an entire metropolis and prehistoric creatures in there that we'd never heard about. As of writing fourth adventure, From the Earth to the Moon, has been accomplished, though I was a bit disappointed in that one, for when Americans landed on the moon they didn't really do much except plant a flag, pick up some moon rocks and gaze back at planet Earth.
Jules Verne is the second most translated author in the world (the first is Agatha Christie, the third is Shakespeare) but he comes top for me. I love the adventure and excitement and risk taking, possibly why Sir Edmund Hilary is on our $5 note. You can become a foolhardy dreamer too and go places in books...by embarking on a the Great Kiwi Bookathon. Save up your $5 notes and help blind and low vision children experience Utopia as well. 😍
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