Honestly, if you ask someone to name a book by Jules Verne, they’ll probably rattle off the same three or four titles. Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Around the World in Eighty Days. Maybe Journey to the Center of the Earth if they watched that movie with the Rock. But here’s the thing: that’s barely the tip of the iceberg.
Verne didn't just write a handful of adventure stories; he was basically a content machine. He produced a massive series called the Voyages Extraordinaires, which contains 54 novels published during his lifetime. If you include the stuff released after he died, we’re talking over 60 books.
Most readers today have no clue that Verne’s work was part of a meticulously planned "knowledge project." His publisher, Pierre-Jules Hetzel, wanted a series that would literally "outline all the geographical, geological, physical, and astronomical knowledge amassed by modern science."
It was a wild ambition.
The Jules Verne Books List Everyone Knows
Before we get into the weird, obscure stuff, let’s acknowledge the heavy hitters. These are the books that turned Verne into the second most-translated author of all time (trailing only Agatha Christie).
- Five Weeks in a Balloon (1863): This was his big break. It’s basically a travelogue in a balloon over Africa.
- Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864): German professor Otto Lidenbrock finds an Icelandic manuscript and decides to hike into a volcano. Classic.
- From the Earth to the Moon (1865): It’s surprisingly technical. He actually got the physics of the launch site (Florida) and the splashdown (Pacific Ocean) fairly close to reality.
- Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (1870): Captain Nemo and the Nautilus. This is where everyone starts.
- Around the World in Eighty Days (1872): Phileas Fogg and a very expensive bet.
These books define "Vernian" adventure. But sticking to just these is like only listening to the greatest hits of a band that has 50 albums. You’re missing the experimental phase, the dark period, and the weirdly prophetic stuff.
🔗 Read more: A Simple Favor Blake Lively: Why Emily Nelson Is Still the Ultimate Screen Mystery
The Prophecies and the Rejections
You’ve probably heard that Verne "predicted" the future. He sorta did, but it wasn't magic. He was just a massive nerd who read scientific journals and wondered, "What if we pushed this tech to the limit?"
Take Paris in the Twentieth Century. He wrote it in 1863, but his publisher thought it was way too depressing and "unbelievable." Hetzel told him it would ruin his career. Verne threw the manuscript in a safe. It wasn’t found until 1989 by his great-grandson.
When it was finally published in 1994, people were freaked out. It described:
- A world-wide communications network (basically the internet).
- Glass skyscrapers.
- High-speed trains.
- Gas-powered cars.
- A society obsessed with business and tech while the arts were dying.
Sound familiar? It’s a bit eerie how right he was about the 20th century.
The Obscure Voyages: Beyond the Classics
If you want to dive deeper into the jules verne books list, you have to look at the titles that didn't get the Hollywood treatment. Some are actually better than the famous ones.
💡 You might also like: The A Wrinkle in Time Cast: Why This Massive Star Power Didn't Save the Movie
The Mysterious Island (1875)
Many scholars, including the folks at the North American Jules Verne Society, consider this his masterpiece. It’s a "Robinsonade" (a survival story). Five guys and a dog escape a Civil War prison in a balloon and crash on a remote island. They have to rebuild civilization from scratch using chemistry and engineering. It also functions as a secret sequel to Twenty Thousand Leagues and In Search of the Castaways.
Michael Strogoff (1876)
This isn't sci-fi at all. It’s a high-stakes political thriller set in Russia. Strogoff is a courier for the Tsar who has to travel across Siberia to warn the Tsar’s brother about a traitor. It was a massive hit in its day, even though we barely talk about it now.
The Begum's Millions (1879)
This is Verne’s dark, dystopian side showing. It’s about two men who inherit a massive fortune. One builds a utopian city in the US focused on health and peace. The other builds "Stahlstadt" (Steel City), a giant weapon manufacturing plant designed to wipe out the first city. It’s basically a proto-spy novel and a warning about industrial warfare.
The Problem With Modern Translations
Here’s a fact that might ruin your childhood: if you read an old English version of a Verne book, you probably read a butchered text.
Victorian translators were... let's say "creative." They thought Verne’s scientific descriptions were boring, so they cut them out. They changed character names. They even added their own jokes. Some translations were so bad they made Verne look like a clumsy writer for kids.
📖 Related: Cuba Gooding Jr OJ: Why the Performance Everyone Hated Was Actually Genius
If you’re serious about checking out a jules verne books list, look for translations by William Butcher, Frederick Paul Walter, or the Wesleyan University Press editions. They actually keep the science and the nuance intact.
A Chronological Sampling of the "Extraordinary Journeys"
Don't try to read them all at once. You'll get "Verne fatigue." Instead, pick one from each "era."
- The Early Hits: The Adventures of Captain Hatteras (1864). It’s a brutal Arctic survival story.
- The Golden Age: The Fur Country (1873). It involves an island that turns out to be made of ice.
- The Social Satire Period: The Tribulations of a Chinaman in China (1879). A wealthy man tries to get himself killed so he can feel something.
- The Late Dark Phase: The Castle of the Carpathians (1892). It’s got a Gothic, Bram Stoker vibe but with "scientific" ghosts.
What to Read Next
If you’ve already done the big three, don't just stop.
Start with The Mysterious Island. It ties everything together. If you want something faster, go with Michael Strogoff. For the hardcore sci-fi fans, track down the Frederick Paul Walter translation of The Mighty Orinoco or The Sphinx of the Ice Realm (which is a sequel to an Edgar Allan Poe story).
Verne wasn't just a guy writing about submarines. He was a guy trying to map the entire world and the future within the pages of a novel.
Next Steps for the Vernian Explorer:
- Audit your shelf: Check if your copies are "Abridged." If they are, donate them and find a modern, unabridged translation (Oxford World's Classics is a good bet).
- Go Chronological: Pick up Five Weeks in a Balloon to see where the obsession with transport and geography started.
- Explore the "Palik Series": These are published by the North American Jules Verne Society and contain first-time English translations of his more obscure plays and short stories.
- Watch the 1954 Disney film: Honestly, it’s one of the few adaptations that actually captures the spirit of the Nautilus, even if it simplifies the plot.
The world of Jules Verne is way bigger than a list of five books. It’s a 54-volume atlas of the human imagination.