From the Earth to the Moon

From the Earth to the Moon is a humorous science fiction novel written by the French writer Jules Verne and is one of the earliest entries in that genre. It tells the story of three well-to-do members of a post-American Civil War gun club who build an enormous sky-facing canon and ride a spaceship fired from it to the moon.

Jules Verne takes aim at some amusing stereotypes of Americans in this story of a pre-rocketry attempt to shoot a cannonball to the Moon. Those Yankees don’t do anything by halves!

His means is a Columbiad cannon so enormous that it must be bored 900 feet into the ground, so immense that 1200 smelting furnaces would be needed to create the iron for its casting, so stupendous that 100 tons of guncotton would be needed to loft its cannonball heavenwards.

The journey must be watched from the tallest peak of the Rocky Mountains through a new telescope with a reflector measuring 16 feet in diameter and a tube reaching skyward 280 feet.

And then - a simple telegram upsets all the preparations. An unknown Frenchman has taken ship and is on the way. And he has firmly decided that he will ride inside the projectile!

From the Earth to the Moon was first published in 1868. Translated by Louis Mercier. Audiobook read by Mark F. Smith, running time 4 hours, 55 min. Unabridged full version.

Jules Verne (1828 – 1905) was a French writer who pioneered the science fiction genre. Many of his novels involve elements of technology that were fantastic for the day but later became commonplace. Verne is the second most translated author in the world (following Agatha Christie), and his works appear in more translations per year than those of any other writer. Verne is one writer sometimes called "The Father of Science Fiction".