The Mysterious Island
Publisher: Standard Ebooks
Published: 2016
Language: eng
Subjects: Science fiction; Adventure stories; Castaways -- Fiction; Islands of the Pacific -- Fiction
Description: <p><i>The Mysterious Island</i> tells the tale of five Americans who, in an attempt to escape the Civil War, pilot a hot-air balloon and find themselves crashed on a deserted island somewhere in the Pacific. <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/jules-verne">Verne</a> had been greatly influenced by works like <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/daniel-defoe/the-life-and-adventures-of-robinson-crusoe"><i>Robinson Crusoe</i></a> and <i>The Swiss Family Robinson</i>, and that influence shines brightly in this novel of engineering ingenuity and adventure. Verne imparts the escapees with such over-the-top cleverness and so many luckily-placed resources that modern readers might find the extent to which they tame the island comical. Despite that, the island contains genuine mysteries for the adventurers to solve.</p>
			<p>The standard translation of <i>The Mysterious Island</i> was produced in 1875, and is credited to <abbr>W. H. G.</abbr> Kingston. Despite its popularity, it’s widely criticized for abridging and Bowlderizing important parts of the text. The translation presented here, produced by Stephen <abbr>W.</abbr> White in 1876, is considered a much more accurate translation, despite it also abridging some portions.</p>