Journey to the Center of the Earth (or Voyage au centre de la Terre) is a novel written by Jules Verne. Released in 1864, it details a voyage to the Earth's core.
Characters[]
- Axel Lidenbrock
- Otto Liedenbrock
- Hans Bjelke
- Gräuben
rest to be added
Publisher's summary[]
An adventurous geology professor chances upon a manuscript in which a 16th-century explorer claims to have found a route to the earth's core. Professor Lidenbrock can't resist the opportunity to investigate, and with his nephew Axel, he sets off across Iceland in the company of Hans Bjelke, a native guide.
The expedition descends into an extinct volcano toward a sunless sea, where they encounter a subterranean world of luminous rocks, antediluvian forests, and fantastic marine life — a living past that holds the secrets to the origins of human existence.
Full summary[]
The novel begins with Professor Otto Lidenbrock coming home early and in a rush from a trip to a bookshop and calling his nephew Axel into his study, purely delighted by an old book written by an Icelandic chronicler of the twelfth century, Snorri Sturleson. The two stumble on a parchment supposedly written by Arne Saknussem, an Icelandic alchemist of the sixteenth century. It is written in a code, which the Professor becomes obsessed with cracking, trying out a few ways with his less interested nephew. When these fail, Otto flees the house. In the meantime, Axel accidentally cracks the code, which says:
'Go down into the crater of Snaefells Jökull, which Scartaris's shadow caresses just before the calends of July, O daring traveler, and you'll make it to the center of the earth. I've done so. Arne Saknussemm'
but chooses to conceal the truth from his uncle out of fear that he will actually follow the writings instructions. The young man is about to destroy the parchment, when, all of a sudden, Otto bursts back in again, causing him to put the paper down. The Professor works through the night and up to three in the afternoon, trying to find the key to the code. As the house is locked and the pantry empty, everyone in it is forced to starve. Finally Axel tells his uncle that he cracked the code. Otto reads the script aloud and is overjoyed, saying that they shall now eat. Much to his nephew's despair, he orders that both of their suitcases shall be packed.
Martha, the housekeeper, promptly hurries to the market to get food. Lidenbrock still seems to be in a good mood while they dine, joking around a bit. After the meal he orders Axel to come into his room, where the younger of the two expresses his scepticism about the documents credibility. The Professor simply replies that they'll see. When Axel asks him what Yokul, Sneffels and Scartaris mean, he shows his nephew an atlas to explain. He tells Axel that Sneffels Yokul is a volcano in Iceland, who replied that it must be impossible to go to the Center of the Earth in a volcano, as it is full of lava, but is interrupted by his uncle telling him that Sneffels last erupted in 1219. Axel then asks what Scartaris means and what it has to do with the calends of July. According to Otto, the volcano has several craters, which means that the correct one had to be marked.
Saknussem must have noticed towards the end of June and the beginning of July, one of the mountain peak's (Scartaris') shadows reaches to the crater that leads to the Center of the Earth, so that one can't be confused which one to take. Axel says that he still can't believe Saknussem actually went on the journey and came back again, because it must be scientifically impossible due to the heat. They continue arguing and finally come to the conclusion that naught more is proven than an inner heat, which Otto does not believe in, but says that they shall see and will, like Saknussem, then know what is true and what is false.
After his discussion with his uncle, Axel leaves the house and goes on a walk to the bank of the Elbe, telling himself that it must be purely impossible to ask a boy to come on such a trip. On his walk he meets Gräuben, who he is engaged to. Noticing that he is nervous, she asks him what is wrong, to which he quickly informs her of the current situation. After a long silence she finally says that it will be a nice trip, encouraging him to go. When they return home from their stroll, they are surprised to see the Professor packing and the street full of deliverers bringing equipment for the journey. Axel asks him if they are leaving already, which, alongside the date, the day after tomorrow, is confirmed. Hearing this, Axel goes into his room and spends an awful night in there. In the morning he does not want to open the door, but Gräuben tells him that she sees he's better now, and the night calmed him down.
She continues to encourage Axel, telling him that he will be a free man when he returns. They then go to the Professor's room and Axel asks him if it is necessary to leave so soon, to which Lidenbrock replies that there is only one boat to Iceland each month, on the 22. If they would wait to the the 22. of June, they would come after the 1 of July and wouldn't know which crater to take, so they need to go to Kopenhagen and find a way to Iceland themselves. Otto ends the explanation by telling Axel to finally pack his suitcase. Axel and Gräuben go back into Axels' room, where his fiancé packs his bag for him and keeps him calm. Deliveries for physical instruments, weapons and electrics devices keep coming. Lidenbrock tells his nephew that they shall be leaving at 6 o' clock sharp in the morning. After a night full of nightmares, Axel wakes up at 5 A.M. At 5:30 A.M. a carriage comes to transport the travellers and their luggage to the train station. Axel says farewell to his fiancé, then leaves for the train which departs at 7 o' clock, arriving at the german city of Kiel three hours later.
They are to continue their journey to Kopenhagen in a boat, the Ellenora, which wouldn't leave before the evening. Otto, who would love to depart at the very moment, is greatly annoyed. His nephew and him go on a walk around the city to pass the time, finally leaving Kiel at a quarter past ten, arriving at a town in Zealand named Körsör at 7 o' clock in the morning. Three hours later they arrive in Kopenhagen, having come by train. They then step into a wagon and let it transport their luggage and themselves to a hotel. Lidenbrock asks the Portier where a certain museum is located, which they then depart to, meeting the friendly director of it, Mr Thomson, there. Together they go to the quays to look for a boat to Iceland and find a small danish Corvette which will be leaving for Reykjavik on the second of June and is ready to take them. Afterwards, breakfast is eaten and they take a stroll through the city. Lidenbrock notices a church with a high tower, which he forces the dizzy Axel to climb. They stay up there for an hour to get Axel used to looking at the world from above.
This is repeated over the course of several days, until finally the 2. of June comes around and the two travellers leave Kopenhagen in the morning with good wind. According to the captain, Mr Bjarne, the trip to Reykjavik will take roughly ten days. After a few days at sea, the two arrive in Reykjavik, where they meet Baron Trampe, a governor, the mayor, Finsen and and a Professor, Mr Fridrickson. While Otto looks for a certain manuscript in the library, Axel goes on a walk in Reykjavik. When he returns, he finds his uncle in the company of Mr Fridrickson, whose house they will temporarily be staying at. Together they eat lunch, the two professors talking about scientific questions in Icelandic. When Fridrickson asks Lidenbrock if his search in the library was successful, the latter replies by saying that the library is nearly empty, to which the former responds that there are 8000 books in the library, but they are scattered across the country, going from hand to hand. Then he asks what books Lidenbrock was looking for in the library, so that he might help him.
Otto asks him if they have the works of Arne Saknussem, which Fridrickson denies, saying that all of his works were burnt. Lidenbrock nearly reveals the secret of the document by saying that it all makes sense now, that Saknussem had to hide his discovery in a secret document. When Fridrickson asks about the document, Lidenbrock has to backpedal. The Icelandic man then wishes to know if he will do any mineralogical research, especially on mountains, glaciers and volcanoes like the Sneffels. The German pretends not to know about the volcano and says he would love to explore the Sneffels. Fridrickson asks him how he will travel there, but tells Lidenbrock after his reply that he can't travel per ship, due to there not being a boat in Reykjavik. The Icelander then tells him that there will be a guide who they can meet tomorrow, who might show them the way over land.
The next day Axel wakes up to his uncle speaking danish to a strong, calm, man who must be the guide Mr Fridrickson was talking about. According to the Icelandic professor, he is a an eiderhunter called Hans Bjelke. Hans becomes their guide to a village named Stapi, near the foot of the volcano, roughly 160 km (100 miles) away from Reykjavik, which would take them seven or eight days to reach, according to Lidenbrock’s calculations. They will be needing four horses, two for luggage, and two for Axel and his uncle, as Hans will be traveling by foot. The equipment can be sorted into four groups: instruments, weapons, tools and food. To add to that, Otto also intends to bring a first-aid kit, tabac, gunpowder, money, tinder and good shoes. On the 15th, the day before the three want to leave, Mr Fridrickson gifts Otto a map of Iceland. On the 16th, Axel gets woken up at five in the morning by the neighing of the horses. The three depart, thanking Mr Fridrickson for his friendliness.
Two hours after their departure from Reykjavik, Lidenbrock and his nephew, having ridden on horses, unlike Hans, who walked, the three stop for a rest of half an hour in a village named Aoalkirkja and eat breakfast. Hans says he plans to stay overnight in the town Gardar, some distance away from Reykjavik. After finding a ferry which shall depart at 6 o' clock and embarking on it, they reach Gardar in half an hour. They then dine and stay the night at an incredibly welcoming farmhouse, which the travellers leave at 5 o' clock in the morning. The following night is spent in an abandoned farmhouse in the desolate countryside, in which the three freeze.
Finally, on Saturday, the 21st of June, they reach Stapi, a hamlet of roughly thirty houses. There, Axel, his uncle and Hans stay overnight in a priests home, departing for the volcano with three Icelandic men to carry their luggage on the 23rd of June. The company arrives on the top of the Sneffels at roughly eleven o'clock in the evening.
After more than a week on the road, they ascend the southern peak of Snäfell, called Scartaris by the locals, and descend into its crater. There they find three chimneys and, after waiting for several days because of overcast skies, they are finally able to observe that the peak’s shadow marks the middle chimney as the entrance described by Saknussemm.
The three men use a rope to climb down the chimney. At the bottom, a tunnel opens, leading southeast. After several days, the group reaches a fork in the road. Otto decides to turn left, and the three men continue their journey. However, the tunnel seems to be horizontal, and they eventually reach a dead end. It becomes clear they need to return to the fork, but they are running out of water and suffer greatly on the way back. After barely making it back to the crossroad, Axel wants to go back to the surface.
Otto, however, is determined to explore the other tunnel and is convinced that they will soon find water. Axel does not want to abandon his uncle, so the three men continue forward. After an hour, Axel is exhausted and delirious from thirst, and they are forced to stop. Hans eventually continues alone in search of water and soon discovers a place in the tunnel where it is possible to hear the sounds of a river. Hans uses a pickaxe to pierce the wall where the sound is the strongest, and soon there is a stream of boiling liquid flowing into the tunnel. The three men must wait for some time for the water to cool down but are finally able to quench their thirst. The little stream continues flowing down the tunnel and serves as a water source for the group.
Otto, Axel, and Hans continue their slow descent. At one point, Axel somehow takes a wrong turn unnoticed and finds himself completely alone. He also stumbles, injuring himself and damaging his lantern, which turns off, leaving him in complete darkness and silence. After some time wondering in the dark, Axel hears his uncle’s voice, carried a long way through the tunnel. They determine they are in parallel shafts and that Axel should go down so that he will eventually reach a chamber where multiple tunnels open up. He does that but causes a rockslide and falls down, hitting his head. He loses consciousness but is rescued by his uncle, who is waiting at the bottom.
After regaining consciousness, Axel discovers that they have reached a vast open space that contains a subterranean sea. Otto decides that they must cross the open water to reach the other shore, where he anticipates they will continue their descent into the center of the Earth. Hans constructs a raft from semi-fossilized wood, and they set sail. While traversing the sea, they encounter huge prehistoric monsters who battle each other, as well as a volcanic island with a geyser next to it. Eventually, they sail into a storm and are tossed around for several days.
The raft reaches land, but to Otto’s despair, it seems they have arrived on the same shore from which they embarked. While waiting for Hans to repair the raft to try traversing the water a second time, the professor and Axel go on a walk. They come across human remains, theorizing that these must be people who lived in pre-historic times. Further along the shore, they come across a forest where they observe a herd of mastodons. Axel is convinced he sees a 12-foot-tall human among the trees, but after he and his uncle run away in fear, he begins doubting his own eyes.
On the way back, they discover Saknussemm’s initials and discover an opening in the rock face. However, the passage is blocked by a wall. The group decides to use gunpowder to blast away the obstacle. They board the raft and set fire to powder. Even though they do not hear an explosion, they observe a shift in the rock face and realize that they have created a chasm and that the sea is flowing through the new opening. Their raft is swept along, and they keep falling for a long time, until eventually they stop and Otto realizes that they are being swept upward on top of a waterspout.
They realize they are at the forefront of a volcanic eruption, carried upward by a side shaft by water, which soon becomes a white boiling mass. In this way, they are swept up and out of the ground. The three men find themselves on the Italian island of Stromboli. From there, they make their way in several stages to Hamburg. Hans continues on to Iceland as he feels homesick. Back home, Otto becomes famous, while Axel is finally able to marry his sweetheart, Gräuben
See also[]
- The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle
- Down by Lawrence Miles
- Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson