Work record

Around the World in Eighty Days

Jules Verne

1873 · 19th Century · Novel · French

Public domainlow medical relevanceRead full text Download EPUB Five-minute digest

Abstract

Written: serialized in Le Temps 1872; published in book form 1873
Setting: 2 October to 21 December 1872; London, Suez, Bombay, the Indian interior, Calcutta, Hong Kong, Yokohama, San Francisco, the American West, New York and Liverpool
Author: Jules Verne; trans. George Makepeace Towle
Country: French Third Republic (France)
Language: French
Genre: Adventure novel (voyage extraordinaire)
Form: Prose novel in thirty-seven chapters
Recommended: Grades 6–8

Background. Verne drew on the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, the completion of the American transcontinental railroad the same year and a new Indian rail line, which together made a timed circuit of the globe newly plausible. The story ran as a newspaper serial before Hetzel issued it in book form.

Plot. Fogg stakes twenty thousand pounds that he can return to his club within eighty days. Steamers and trains carry him east, while Fix, awaiting an arrest warrant, delays him at every port. In India the travellers ride an elephant and save Aouda from sacrifice; in America they survive a Sioux attack on their train. Arrested at Liverpool, Fogg reaches London apparently five minutes late, until Passepartout learns that travelling eastward has gained them a day.

Structure. Chapters move leg by leg through a dated itinerary, each crisis measured in hours lost or regained. Verne alternates Fogg's unruffled calculations with Passepartout's mishaps, such as his stolen shoes in a Bombay temple and his stint as an acrobat in Yokohama.

Themes. Punctuality against chance, loyalty and generosity spending what the wager seems to forbid, and a world shrunk by steam and telegraph.

Significance. One of Verne's most popular books, it inspired real circumnavigation races, beginning with Nellie Bly's in 1889, and many stage and film versions.

Main characters

Phileas Fogg: Impassive, exact English gentleman of the Reform Club who makes the wager
Passepartout: Fogg's newly hired French manservant, impulsive, loyal and resourceful
Detective Fix: Scotland Yard officer who trails Fogg as a suspected bank robber
Aouda: Young Parsi widow rescued from a funeral pyre, who later marries Fogg
Sir Francis Cromarty: Brigadier-general who travels with Fogg across India
Andrew Speedy: Captain of the Henrietta, whose ship Fogg buys and burns for fuel
Colonel Stamp Proctor: Quarrelsome American who challenges Fogg to a duel

Early edition of Around the World in Eighty Days (1873). Source · Public domain

Summary

Jules Verne’s Around the World in Eighty Days, in George Makepeace Towle’s public-domain English translation, follows Phileas Fogg’s Reform Club wager to circle the globe in eighty days with his servant Passepartout, while detective Fix shadows him as a bank-robbery suspect. Steamships, railways, elephants, and storms turn geography into a race; calm precision meets loyal improvisation. Label three transport crises on a wall map and ask which was Fix’s fault more than the sea’s. Passepartout’s errors and courage together prove loyalty can spend hours the wager seems to forbid. Towle’s named translation is the English text against which every stored quote was checked. The journey begins on 2 October 1872, when Fogg leaves the Reform Club after a whist-table argument about how quickly the world can now be crossed. He goes by steamer through the Suez Canal to Bombay, then finds that the railway across India is unfinished and buys an elephant to cover the gap. On that jungle detour Passepartout helps rescue a young Parsee widow, Aouda, from a funeral pyre, and she joins the party. Fix, convinced that Fogg is the gentleman who robbed the Bank of England, keeps trying to hold him in British territory until a warrant arrives; in Hong Kong he drugs Passepartout with opium and separates him from his master, and the servant later earns his passage in Yokohama with a troupe of Japanese acrobats. Crossing the Pacific to San Francisco, the travellers take the train east, live through an attack on the line and Passepartout's capture, and finish the American leg on a sail-driven sledge across the frozen prairie. When the Atlantic steamer runs short of coal, Fogg buys the ship and burns her woodwork to keep going. Arrested on landing, released when the real thief is found, and believing himself late and ruined, he receives Aouda's offer of marriage, only to learn that travelling eastward has given him an extra day.

Virtues in this work

Fortitude: Fogg meets delays without panic or abandoned duty.
Friendship: Passepartout’s loyalty becomes essential to the race.
Industry: Planning and steady movement win against wasted time.

Plot or Argument

The wager
Fogg bets he can span the world in eighty days from the Reform Club.
Routes and obstacles
Transport mishaps and Fix’s interference test the schedule repeatedly.
Heart and clock
Loyalty and a final time discovery resolve the wager.

Characters

Phileas Fogg, protagonist
Punctual gentleman of the wager.
Passepartout, companion
French servant-companion.
Fix, antagonist
Detective shadowing Fogg in error.

Lessons

Precision as character
Fogg’s punctuality is moral coolness under pressure, not mere fussiness.
- How does Fogg keep time?
- When does calm help?
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Context

French steam-age adventure novel of timed circumnavigation and detective error. It remains a formative English-language classic for school and home in the public domain.

Composition

1873; Towle’s English translation circulated widely in the US.

Reception

Perennial classic of the race against time.

Travel Journey Friendship Technology Modernity Virtue Ethics Heroism

Comparisons

robinson-crusoe
Solo ordeal versus timed global race.
treasure-island
Adventure motion and loyal companions.

Quotes

“Phileas Fogg lived, in 1872, at No. 7, Saville Row, Burlington Gardens, the house in which Sheridan died in 1814.”

— Jules Verne, Around the World in Eighty Days, Chapter I, trans. George Makepeace Towle.Quote card

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For Students

A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.

Reading Guide

Watch for

The Reform Club wager scene.
Hiring Passepartout in London.
Fix’s suspicion and pursuit.
Major transport legs and delays.
The closing time discovery.

Key terms and names

Wager: Bet to circle the globe in eighty days.
Passepartout: Fogg’s servant-companion.
Steam age: Trains and steamships enabling the race.
Itinerary: Planned routes raced against the clock.

Seminar Questions

Comprehension What does Fogg bet according to the text?
Comprehension Who is Passepartout?
Comprehension Why does Fix follow?
Interpretation Is Fogg cold or disciplined?
Interpretation How does loyalty beat mere speed?
Interpretation What world picture does the novel give?
Big Question What is worth racing for, and what must not be sacrificed to the clock?

Faith Connections

Ecclesiastes 3:1 (Scripture)
A time for every purpose—the wager’s clock under providence.
Proverbs 27:10 (Scripture)
Thine own friend—Passepartout’s loyalty in crisis.
Steam-age travel narrative (Great Conversation)
Technology serving steadfast character.

Logic and Rhetoric

Central argument: Discipline and loyalty can master distance when technology opens the world.

Rhetorical device: race against time. The clock structures episodes.

Debate: Resolved: that Fogg’s calm is a virtue.

Memory Work

Phileas Fogg lived, in 1872, at No. 7, Saville Row, Burlington Gardens, the house in which Sheridan died in 1814.
Chapter I, trans. George Makepeace Towle. Places Fogg at Saville Row in 1872.

Writing Prompts

Essay: Map the journey and mark three crises.

Comparison with Robinson Crusoe: Compare Fogg’s calm with Crusoe’s inventiveness under ordeal.

Medical Lens

Travel strain is light narrative pressure.

Grief

Listen to the book

Running time 8 hr 48 min (08:48:01) · 37 tracks · Solo reading

Public-domain audiobook from LibriVox, read by TBOL3, translated by George Makepeace Towle. Recording: Around the World in Eighty Days on LibriVox (Internet Archive).

LibriVox recordings are volunteer readings released into the public domain. The reading may follow a different edition or translation from the text in this library.

Creative Prompts

Classroom
Plot an eighty-day route on a world map.
Essay
How does Fix’s error create suspense?
Fiction
A missing transport leg and how loyalty answers it.