From the Earth to the Moon

Summary

From the Earth to the Moon is Verne's comic and scientific story of the first attempt to send men to the moon, published here with its sequel Round the Moon. After the American Civil War, the Gun Club of Baltimore, a society of artillerymen who have lost limbs but not enthusiasm, is bored by peace. Its president, Impey Barbicane, proposes a grand project: to fire a cannonball to the moon. The Cambridge Observatory supplies the figures; a giant cannon, the Columbiad, is cast in a deep well at Stones Hill in Florida; and money pours in from around the world. Barbicane's rival, Captain Nicholl, who makes armor plate, bets that it cannot be done. Then a telegram changes everything: a daring Frenchman, Michel Ardan, asks to travel inside the projectile. At a great public meeting Ardan charms the crowd, and when Nicholl challenges Barbicane to a duel, Ardan reconciles the two enemies, and all three agree to go together. The first book ends with the shot and a telescope sighting of the projectile in orbit. Round the Moon follows the travellers inside the aluminium capsule. They suffer the shock of launch, discover weightlessness, eat and joke, and calculate their course. A passing meteor deflects them, so they do not land but circle the moon, glimpsing its dark side in the light of a flare and studying its craters. Firing rockets to change course, they fall back toward the earth and splash into the Pacific, where an American naval ship finds them floating, playing dominoes. Verne treats rocketry with real enthusiasm, using careful calculations for speed and distance, though a cannon launch would in fact kill the passengers. Readers since have noticed striking parallels with the Apollo missions a century later, including a Florida launch, a crew of three and a Pacific splashdown. The books also satirize American love of size, guns and publicity, while celebrating courage, friendship and curiosity.

Top Lessons

• Daring and calculation

  The project succeeds because enthusiasm is joined to careful mathematics.

• Reconciling enemies

  Ardan turns two rivals into crewmates by appealing to a shared goal.

• Satire and admiration

  Verne both mocks and admires American boldness, boasting and ingenuity.

Verified Quotes

Medical Lens

The novel discusses the effects of launch shock and weightlessness on the body, though its science is speculative.

• Round the Moon, Ch. 1

  Travellers are knocked unconscious by the launch.