Study notes: Around the World in Eighty Days
Phileas Fogg bets he can circle the world in eighty days and leaves London that night with his servant Passepartout. They use ships, trains, and an elephant. A detective follows them because he thinks Fogg is a bank robber. Verne loves timetables. The suspense is often a missed connection, not a monster. The book is a picture of the nineteenth-century transport network, and of an English gentleman who treats the schedule as a moral duty.
Themes
Time as a game. Loyalty between unlike people. The world is connected, and also full of other people’s emergencies.
People to follow
Phileas Fogg, Passepartout, Detective Fix, and Aouda.
Talk about
- Is Fogg brave or only punctual?
- Where does the journey harm someone who did not make the bet?
- What does Passepartout understand that Fogg does not?
Public-domain text.