The Begum's Millions

[Dave Monroe]

Verne, Jules.  The Begum's Millions.
   Trans. Stanford L. Luce.  
   Middleton, CT: Wesleyan UP, 2005 [1879].


Verne’s first cautionary tale about the dangers of
science -- first modern and corrected English
translation.

When two European scientists unexpectedly inherit an
Indian rajah’s fortune, each builds an experimental
city of his dreams in the wilds of the American
Northwest. France-Ville is a harmonious urban
community devoted to health and hygiene, the specialty
of its French founder, Dr. François Sarrasin.
Stahlstadt, or City of Steel, is a fortress-like
factory town devoted to the manufacture of high-tech
weapons of war. Its German creator, the fanatically
pro-Aryan Herr Schultze, is Verne’s first truly evil
scientist. In his quest for world domination and
racial supremacy, Schultze decides to showcase his
deadly wares by destroying France-Ville and all its
inhabitants. Both prescient and cautionary, The
Begum’s Millions is a masterpiece of scientific and
political speculation and constitutes one of the
earliest technological utopia/dystopias in Western
literature. This Wesleyan edition features notes,
appendices, and a critical introduction as well as all
the illustrations from the original French edition.

http://www.upne.com/0-8195-6796-5.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Begum's_Millions

Early Classics of Science Fiction

http://www.upne.com/series/SFS.html



 
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