Jules Verne

Jules Gabriel Verne was born on February 8th, 1828 on Île Feydeau, a small artificial island on the Loire River in Nantes. His father wanted his son to take over the family law practice. Jules started along this course and despite graduating with a licence en droit in January 1851 was soon diverted by the lure of literature and by his own ambitious talents in this direction. He wrote for the theatre and for magazines and soon with the publication

A Journey to the Center of the Earth, also translated as A Journey to the Interior of the Earth, follows a man, his nephew and their guide down an Icelandic volcano into the center of the earth. There they encounter an ancient landscape filled with prehistoric animals and natural dangers. There is some discussion as to whether Verne really believed that such things might be found in the center, or whether he shared the alternate view,

Although science fiction is often regarded as a twentieth-century phenomenon, early masters such as Jules Verne were mining the outer reaches of space for their stories for nearly a century before the 1950s SF boom took hold. In Off on a Comet, Verne follows the imaginary exploits of a ragtag group of Earthlings who are forced to take a two-year journey through space on a gigantic comet.