(The Nationalist, 20 June 2003)
The French writer, Jules Verne, (1828-1905) is known for his books, Round the World in Eighty Days, Twenty-Thousand Leagues under the Sea, Five Weeks in a Balloon, and Journey to the Centre of the Earth. These works of adventure or fantasy anticipated many later scientific and technical discoveries. They were immensely popular in his life-time. He became a best-selling author, and very wealthy.
In recent years, researchers discovered an unpublished manuscript of his, and accompanying correspondence with his publisher. In this text, Verne created an image of how he saw the Paris of the future. It would have street-lighting everywhere, trains would run underground, and written messages could be sent by telegraph. Verne’s publisher was horrified at this. He wrote to him, pointing out the folly of presenting such ideas to the public. How could there be street-lighting everywhere; it would be impossibly expensive as well as creating the danger of gas poisoning and fire. And underground trains? Where would the smoke and the steam go? People would suffocate. Written messages by telegraph? Mere fantasy.
The publisher strongly advised Verne against publication, saying that his excellent reputation would only be spoiled by offering such foolishly unrealistic ideas to the public. Credibility would be stretched too far, even for a work of fantasy. ‘Forget about it; you’ll only make a fool of yourself’, was his recommendation. Verne accepted the advice and the book was never published.
Today, of course, we know that street-lighting is everywhere, Metro systems are common, and fax machines are widespread – except where they have been replaced by something more remarkable – e-mail.
Sometimes visionaries are more practical than pragmatists. Verne, the visionary, was more practical than his pragmatic publisher. There is nothing new in that. Most people with a vision beyond the commonplace were dismissed as being fanciful, building castles in the air, not having their feet on the ground, and so on. If we listened only to the pragmatists, we would have little in the way of vision, ingenuity, discovery or imagination.
There is nothing as practical as a good theory.