Je mets en gras la phrase qui ne trompe pas...Mors Ultima Ratio a écrit :Je l'ignorais.Lensman a écrit :Verne était un peu jaloux de Wells (il y a une interview célèbre).Mors Ultima Ratio a écrit :
Tu ne vois pas Vernes comme l'oncle malicieux de Wells?
Oncle Joe
“There is an author whose work has appealed to me very strongly from an imaginative stand-point, and whose books I have followed with considerable interest. I allude to Mr. H.G. Wells. Some of my friends have suggested
to me that his work is on somewhat similar lines to my own, but here, I think, they err. I consider him, as a purely imaginative writer, to be deserving of very high praise, but our methods are entirely different. I have always made a point in my romances of basing my so-called inventions upon a groundwork of actual fact, and of using in their construction methods and materials which are not entirely without the pale of contemporary engineering skill and knowledge.
“Take, for instance, the case of the ‘Nautilus.’ This, when carefully considered, is a submarine mechanism about which there is nothing wholly extraordinary, nor beyond the bounds of actual scientific knowledge. It rises or sinks by perfectly feasible and well-known processes, the details of its guidance and propulsion are perfectly rational and comprehensible. Its motive force even is not secret: the only point at which I have called in the aid of imagination is in the application of this force, and here I have purposely left a blank for the reader to form his own conclusion, a mere technical hiatus, as it were, quite capable of being filled in by a highly-trained and thoroughly practical mind.
“The creations of Mr. Wells, on the other hand, belong unreservedly to an age and degree of scientific knowledge far removed from the present, though I will not say entirely beyond the limits of the possible. Not only does he evolve his constructions entirely from the realm of the imagination, but he also evolves the materials of which he builds them. See, for example, his story ‘The First Men in the Moon.’ You will remember that here he introduces an entirely new anti-gravitational substance, to whose mode of preparation or actual chemical composition we are not given the slightest clue, nor does a reference to our present scientific knowledge enable us for a moment to predict a method by which such a result might be achieved. In ‘The War of the Worlds,’ again, a work for which I confess I have a great admiration, one is left entirely in the dark as to what kind of creatures the Martians really are, or in what manner they produce the wonderful heat ray with which they work such terrible havoc on their assailants.
“Mind,” continued M. Verne, “in saying this, I am casting no disparagement on Mr. Wells’ methods; on the contrary, I have the highest respect for his imaginative genius. I am merely contrasting our two styles and pointing out the fundamental difference which exists between them, and I wish you clearly to understand that I express no opinion on the superiority of either the one or the other. But now,” added he, rising, “I fear that I am beginning to weary you. The minutes pass so quickly in conversation, and see, we have already been talking for more than an hour.”
L'interview complète est là:
http://jv.gilead.org.il/evans/Gordon_Jo ... of_JV.html
Oncle Joe
