Amerique francaise: Les fables canadiennes de Jules Verne (PDF)

Over the course of three decades-from the early1870s to the turn of the 20th century-Jules Vernewrote three novels covering more than half a centuryof Canadian history.While this triptych is undoubtedly located within theVernian corpus, it nevertheless constitutes a body ofwork in its own right, a powerful testimony to the placethat Canada and Quebec occupied in France. This placewas relative, however, dependent on interactions withEngland and the United States.Several of Verne's works beginning with the publicationof The Adventures of Captain Hatteras in the mid-1860scompare English and American characters. Ultimately,the rivalry that emerges between the two countries isfurther developed in the Canadian novels The FurCountry (1872-1873) and Family Without a Name(1889). The Anglo-American conflict explains theaffinities between French Canadians and Americanspresent in both novels.Toward the end of his life, however, Verne revisits thisalliance. In The Golden Volcano, written in 1899-1900,those relations change diametrically: French andEnglish Canadians, all honest people in search ofKlondike gold, unite against the Texans, notoriousand feared delinquents.How is this reversal to be understood? What clues doesit offer for understanding of the depictions of Canadaand Quebec that prevail henceforth in France on abroader scale?