Mysterious Island is a novel by the French writer Jules Verne. The original edition, by Hetzel, contains a number of illustrations by Jules Férat .

It can also refer to the "Lincoln Island" itself, the "mysterious island" on which the story is set (a fictionous island in the Pacific, longitude 150 degrees West 30 minutes, latitude 34 degrees South 57 minutes.)

The plot

The book tells the adventures of marooned Americans on an uncharted island in the South Pacific. The story is set in the American Civil War, during the siege of Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederate States of America. As famine and death ravage the city, four men decide to escape from the city in a rather unusual way - by hijacking a balloon.

After flying in stormy weather for several days, the group crash-lands on a cliff-like volcanic unknown (and fictitious) island, which they decide to name Lincoln Island, in honor of President Abraham Lincoln. With the help of the brilliant Mr. Smith, the four are able to sustain themselves on the island, producing anything from fire, pottery, bricks, nitroglycerine, iron and simple electric alarm, and even attempt to build a sea-worthy ship. They also manage to find their position -- longitude 150 degrees West 30 minutes, latitude 34 degrees South 57 minutes.

Throughout their stay on the island, the group has to overcome bad weather, and eventually adopts and domesticates an orangutan, "Mr. Jupe".

The mystery of the island seems to come from periodic inexplicable deus ex machinas: the unexplanable survival of Smith from his fall from the balloon, the mysterious rescue of the dog Top from a sea beast, a box full of equipment (guns and ammunition, tools, ...), the finding of a message in the sea calling for help, ...

Finding a message in a bottle, the group decides to use a freshly-built small ship to explore the nearby Tabor Island, where a castaway is supposedly sheltered. They go and find Ayrton, living like a wild beast, and bring him back to civilisation and redemption. Coming back to Lincoln Island, they are confused by a tempest, but find their way to the island thanks to a fire -- which no one seems to have lit.

At a point, Ayrton's former crew of pirates arrives at the Lincoln Island to use it as their hideout. After some fighting with the heroes, the pirate ship is mysteriously destroyed by an explosion, and the pirates themselves are found dead, apparently in combat, but with no visible wounds.

The secret of the island is revealed when it turns out to be Captain Nemo's hideout, and home harbour of the Nautilus (from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea). Captain Nemo and his crew were the ones who had come to ther rescue of the heroes, given the box, sent the message about Ayrton, torpedoed the pirate ship and killed the pirates with electric guns. Nemo dies of old age, forgiven by the Major Smith, and the Nautilus is scuttled to be Nemo's tomb.

Eventually, the island explodes in a volcano eruption, and the castaways, warned by Nemo, find themselves at sea on a raft. They are rescued by the Duncan, come to pick up Ayrton, and itself informed by a message left on Tabor Island by Nemo.

Film adaptations

• 1951: by Spencer Gordon Bennet , with Richard Crane and Marshall Reed .
• 1961: by Cy Endfield. The film is also known as Jules Verne's Mysterious Island, and features creature effects by Ray Harryhausen. Captain Nemo is played by Herbert Lom.
• 1972: by Juan Antonio Bardem and Henri Colpi , with Omar Sharif
• 1982: A Hong Kong production by Cheh Chang
• 1995: A television series with Alan Scarfe playing the role of Major Smith.

The Japanese anime Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water, by Gainax, is also partly inspired by the book.

It is also the name of a land at Tokyo DisneySea and features two rides based on Jules Verne's books.

External links

• Free eBook of L'Île Mystérieuse at Project Gutenberg (original French text)