Jules Verne · 1870 · sea

Jules Verne's 1870 masterpiece. Professor Aronnax, his servant Conseil, and the harpooner Ned Land set out from Brooklyn to hunt a sea monster wrecking the world's shipping, only to be taken captive aboard the Nautilus, the electric submarine of the brilliant and vengeful Captain Nemo. What follows is a voyage through the entire underwater world, from the drowned forests of Crespo to the ruins of Atlantis, the pearl banks of Ceylon, the open water of the South Pole, and at last the Maelstrom off Norway.

1. 1
   Brooklyn, New York

   The United States frigate Abraham Lincoln steams out of Brooklyn to hunt the sea monster that has been wrecking ships across the oceans. Aboard are Professor Aronnax, his servant Conseil, and the Canadian harpooner Ned Land, who will chase the creature south around Cape Horn and across the Pacific for five long months.

2. 2
   North Pacific near Japan

   Off the coast of Japan the monster is finally found, but when the frigate attacks it the thing strikes back and hurls the three men into the sea. They are dragged aboard the creature itself, which proves to be no animal at all: the Nautilus, an electric submarine commanded by the enigmatic Captain Nemo, who tells them they may never leave.

3. 3
   Island of Crespo

   Fitted with diving suits and air guns, the prisoners follow Nemo onto the seabed to walk through the drowned forests of Crespo, a hunting ground of coral and giant algae lit green by his lamps. They shoot a sea otter, shelter from prowling sharks, and return marvelling at a world no land creature has ever seen.

4. 4
   Vanikoro

   Nemo brings the Nautilus to Vanikoro, the reef where the explorer La Perouse and his two ships vanished a lifetime before. Through the open panels Aronnax sees the wreckage furred with coral, and Nemo, gazing at the grave of the lost expedition, says that a coral tomb makes a tranquil grave and hopes for no other for himself.

5. 5
   Torres Strait

   Threading the treacherous Torres Strait between Australia and New Guinea, the Nautilus runs aground on the reefs. While they wait for the tide the men go ashore for fresh game and are set upon by islanders, who swarm the hull until Nemo turns the electrified rail against them and the rising sea floats the submarine free.

6. 6
   The coral cemetery

   A crewman dies of a crushed skull after a mysterious collision, and Nemo leads a silent procession across the seafloor to a forest of coral. There, in a clearing among branches that are themselves slowly turning to stone, the men dig a grave and lay their comrade in a tomb that no shark and no storm will ever disturb.

7. 7
   Gulf of Mannar

   In the pearl banks off Ceylon, Nemo guides Aronnax among the oyster beds and a single pearl the size of a coconut. When a poor Indian diver is seized by a shark, Nemo throws himself at the beast with only a dagger, and Ned's harpoon finishes it; the captain revives the man and presses a fortune in pearls into his hand.

8. 8
   The Arabian Tunnel

   Nemo reveals his deepest secret: a natural passage he has discovered beneath the Isthmus of Suez, joining the Red Sea to the Mediterranean. With the panels shut and the speed at full, the Nautilus races through the dark gallery of the Arabian Tunnel and surfaces, minutes later, in another sea entirely.

9. 9
   Vigo Bay

   In the bay of Vigo, where a Spanish treasure fleet was sunk in 1702, the source of Nemo's limitless wealth is laid bare. His divers move among the shattered galleons gathering ingots of gold and silver from the seabed, riches he draws on to fund his war on the surface world and his gifts to the oppressed.

10. 10
    Atlantis

    By the red glow of an undersea volcano, Nemo walks Aronnax up a drowned mountain to the ruins of a sunken city: fallen temples, broken columns, the streets of a civilisation lost beneath the Atlantic. Here, for his astonished guest, Nemo writes a single word in the volcanic dust: Atlantis.

11. 11
    The South Pole

    Driving the Nautilus south through the open water beneath the Antarctic ice, Nemo does what no one has done and reaches the South Pole itself. On a bare islet of black rock he plants a black banner bearing a golden N and claims the bottom of the world for himself, a last and fatal act of pride.

12. 12
    The Antarctic ice bank

    Turning north again, the Nautilus is caught when a vast iceberg overturns and pins it beneath the pack, walling the submarine in on every side. For days the men hack at the ice and breathe the last of their stale air, suffocating by degrees, until they boil their way through the thinnest wall and burst, gasping, to the surface.

13. 13
    The Bahamas

    Back in warm Atlantic water near the Bahamas, the Nautilus is set upon by a school of monstrous squid. Nemo leads his crew onto the platform with axes against the writhing arms; one of the creatures drags a sailor overboard to his death, and Ned is nearly taken too before the captain saves him, weeping afterward for his lost man.

14. 14
    The Gulf Stream

    Riding the great river of the Gulf Stream up the American coast, the Nautilus grows strange. Nemo withdraws into silence and shadow, the watches go unkept, and the submarine wanders without purpose while the three captives begin in earnest to plot the escape the darkening captain will never willingly allow.

15. 15
    North Atlantic

    At latitude 47 degrees 24 minutes north, longitude 17 degrees 28 minutes west, a warship of the nation that destroyed Nemo's homeland appears, and the captain becomes an instrument of pure vengeance. He drives the Nautilus like a ram clean through its hull and watches it founder with all hands, then retreats beneath the portrait of a lost wife and children.

16. 16
    Lofoten Islands

    As the Nautilus drifts toward the Norwegian coast the three captives make their break for the skiff, only to find the submarine sliding into the Maelstrom, the monstrous whirlpool off the Lofoten Islands. Their boat is torn loose and flung clear; they wake ashore among fishermen, alive, never to know whether Nemo and his Nautilus survived.