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(62) L’Étonnante Aventure de la mission Barsac (The Barsac Mission, 1919) (2 volumes) 122K words


The 62nd and last Extraordinary Voyage was published in 1919, 14 years after Jules Verne's death. With this, the great cycle of stories that was Verne's lifetime work is finished. Here, we readers are taken to a secret city filled with technological wonders, on the sands of the Sahara, close to the Niger River. This location is not lacking in symbolism: In the first Extraordinary Voyage, published 56 years earlier, a balloon carrying Dr. Samuel Fergusson and his companions flew over the great African desert, very close to that point. Sixty-two novels later, we return to the same place and the circle is closed.


First read or reread?: First read for me.


What is it about?: In England, the Buxton family, with a long tradition of selfless service to their country is drowned in shame. The eldest son was killed in Africa, a traitor to his country, and the second son has disappeared after stealing the money of the bank he worked for. Meanwhile, in France, the parliament debates giving voting rights to the black population in French West Africa. To find out on the ground whether those populations are ready for citizenship, a study mission is sent, led by the experienced politician monsieur Barsac. When the French mission gets to Africa, they are joined by Miss Jane Buxton, who intends to travel to the place where his eldest brother died, determined to clear his name.


This novel was published in 1919, 9 years after the previous novel in the series ("The Secret of Wilhelm Storitz") and 14 years after Jules Verne's death. In English, it is usually published in two volumes: "Into the Niger Bend" and "The City in the Sahara".

The novel, like all the posthumous Extraordinary Voyages, was published only under Jules' name. However, in the case of this last novel it was discovered much later that most of the writing had been done by Michel Verne. Michel combined two works his father had only started, one about a study mission to Africa and another about a city in the African desert.

The plot is quite eventful, combining Verne's scientific speculation with his exploration travels, humor and family revenge drama.

The beginning of the story is strong, with a terse description of the bank robbery that reads like a heist thriller. However, after an entertaining description of how the Barsac mission was formed, once the travelers get to Africa and start traveling on land, the level of the story goes down somehow.

This African trip makes up most of the first half of the novel. There are few of those geographic descriptions that we can find in some Verne novels. For some that would be a blessing, but I thought that maybe it went too far in that direction. For a travelogue, I would have liked a stronger sense of what the regions they went through were like.

A lot of the narration in this section is told in the form of long articles written by one of the characters, Amédée Florence, a journalist attached to the mission. Amédée's voice is entertaining and often funny, although much more attention is paid to the personalities of the travelers, with particular emphasis on the antics of one of them, Monsieur de Saint-Bérain, than to the purpose of the mission. Saint-Bérain, who is Miss Jane Buxton's nephew (although in this case the aunt happens to be much younger than the nephew) is one of those clumsy, easily distracted Vernian heroes, who is always getting into humorous scrapes. Perhaps this resource is used too much in this part of the novel. It becomes clear, however, that some nefarious hand is trying to sabotage the mission. I found it frustrating that the characters remained oblivious when it was so obvious for the reader.

Then, in the second part of the novel, the travelers get to the hidden city of Blackland and find out who is the enemy that conspired against their trip. This section starts weakly, with too long descriptions of the physical layout of the city, but then it gradually becomes more interesting as we see some of the futuristic technology the city has acquired and the purpose to which it is put.

I said in my review of the previous novel that "The Secret of Wilhelm Storitz" was the last science fiction novel by Verne, but after reading this one I have to rectify: I believe that the speculative content in the second part of this novel is enough to call it science fiction, including drones, remote surveillance systems and cloud seeding.

The final part of the story is epic, providing a suitable end to the novel and to the Extraordinary Voyages themselves.

I have read that in this novel Verne shows some anti-colonial ideas, featuring a revolution of the indigenous population against their colonial rulers. It's not quite like that, however. While there is an uprising against white rulers, it's not really against colonial authorities, but against an oppressive gang of outlaws who had enslaved the population. The Barsac mission itself is part of the debate about whether to grant citizenship rights to the black population of the colonies, but in the novel, particularly in the journalist's tongue-in-cheek reports, there are many remarks that would be racially insensitive by modern standards. No different to other adventure novels set in Africa during the 19th or early 20th century.

The novel does feature, however, a strong heroine, since Jane Buxton is worthy of joining the not too numerous ranks of Verne's "strong female characters", with the likes of Paulina Barnett from "The Fur Country" or Mistress Branican from the homonymous novel.

And this is it. Reaching the end of the last Extraordinary Voyage brought a poignant feeling. We have traveled over the seven continents and even under them, we have sailed on (and under) the different oceans, we have been to space and to the two poles, we have explored the limits of 19th century knowledge and technology. As I closed the book, I felt an impulse to jump on Dr. Fergusson's balloon and start the journey again, right away. But before any such thing, I still have some reading to do as part of this project: the short stories that are also part of the Voyages, which I have left till the end, and a few novels which are not part of the Voyages but that I'm including as a bonus.


Enjoyment factor: I enjoyed most of it. This one was kind of irregular, maybe as a result of being a combination of two different Jules Verne stories and featuring a lot of Michel's writing, but it was never boring, except maybe in the beginning of the second part, where the descriptions of the layout of the city became long-winded. I thought as a travelogue it was lacking, but as family drama/science-fiction it was interesting and had appealing characters. It included an incredible coincidence that allowed Captain Marcenay to receive an appeal for help from Blackland.


Next up: The short stories