Rating: 
Summary: Technology versus the Humanities
Review: Although it is true of the plot of this book being rather weak, the overall message of art, imagination, and creativity being lost and technology dehumanizing all is a powerful one for this day and age. We argue now for funding of the arts, but do we really know what art truly is or is it a result of our present environment skewing our view on things?
Rating:
Summary: An uncanny description of life in the modern world
Review: An entertaining, funny and immensely readable story of Michel and his life in Paris in 1960, this "lost novel" goes well beyond a mere technical description of all the modern conveniences. It forces the reader to ask the question are we really better off with all the technology that surrounds our lives. From an elaborate train system whisking Parisians around the city to smog and the decline of the arts, Verne has pretty well described modern life from his perch in the mid 19th century. As we near the year 2000, we should all take a look at the effects that modern society has on family life, marriage, the environment and culture. This book should be on all university reading lists.
Rating:
Summary: Good but...
Review: I first read the book after I checked it out at the library, I am always the one who enjoys old science fiction. The book I thought was excellent, and while I was reading it I felt like one of the four main people in the story. It is sopposed to be a prediction of what 1960 would be like. Every thing was predicted right except for the idea that science and business controls all. The book lacked an ending and two unsolved problems but overall it was great.
Rating: 
Summary: A breezy read, poor fictionally, in short a must-buy.
Review: I learned a lot about 19th c. french authors, & 19th century's view of the future. This is a genuine scientific extrapolation about the future & is therefore A. one of the first & B. one of the most accurate. His sociocultural predictions were ,surprisingly, his most prescient. Sadly, as fiction this is very didact & not very engaging. The romance element seemed especially poor since the woman was ,in least as I recall, even worse developed than the others. Still, it's historically interesting. In my opinion Disch is full of it & science fiction started in Europe, & this supports that.
Rating:
Summary: Another Classic by Jules Verne
Review: It's amazing to think that Jules Verne wrote these creative thoughts way back in the late 1800s. He was one heck of a genius. I think he wrote this for his son. The main character was named MICHAEL (like his only son). I truly enjoyed the book--but it doesn't work as well in the 21st Century. Time may have surpassed him; however, his cleverness for a well-written novel shines.
Rating:
Summary: Another Classic by Jules Verne
Review: It's amazing to think that Jules Verne wrote these creative thoughts way back in the late 1800s. He was one heck of a genius. I think he wrote this for his son. The main character was named MICHAEL (like his only son). I truly enjoyed the book--but it doesn't work as well in the 21st Century. Time may have surpassed him; however, his cleverness for a well-written novel shines.
Rating:
Summary: A futurist's view in the 1860's of modern technology
Review: Jules Verne is best known as an early science fiction writer. As most readers know, his "Inventions" include the atomic submarine (20,000 Leagues ...). In "Paris..." he is more of a futurist in the vein of George Orwell. In fact Orwell's writing style in "1984" is very similar to this book.Verne forsees the 20th century clearly but misses some important 19th century innovations. He writes about elevated rapid transit trains and computers. However, his Paris does not have inside toilets, an invention from a few years after the book was written. The plot - and there is one is - expounds the difficulties which a non-technical person has in a highly technical society. It is a first class tragedy. The society has no use for "The classics." Books, plays, etc. are written by committees with the aid of computers. Even the job of soldiering as an occupation is gone since modern technology has made war obsolete. Summing up, "Paris in the 20th Century" is fascinating to read while remembering when it was written and the plot although weak, still carries the book through to its sad conclusion.
Rating:
Summary: A futurist's view in the 1860's of modern technology
Review: Jules Verne is best known as an early science fiction writer. As most readers know, his "Inventions" include the atomic submarine (20,000 Leagues ...). In "Paris..." he is more of a futurist in the vein of George Orwell. In fact Orwell's writing style in "1984" is very similar to this book.
Verne forsees the 20th century clearly but misses some important 19th century innovations. He writes about elevated rapid transit trains and computers. However, his Paris does not have inside toilets, an invention from a few years after the book was written. The plot - and there is one is - expounds the difficulties which a non-technical person has in a highly technical society. It is a first class tragedy. The society has no use for "The classics." Books, plays, etc. are written by committees with the aid of computers. Even the job of soldiering as an occupation is gone since modern technology has made war obsolete.
Summing up, "Paris in the 20th Century" is fascinating to read while remembering when it was written and the plot although weak, still carries the book through to its sad conclusion.
Rating:
Summary: An interesting look ahead
Review: Jules Verne's "Paris in the Twentieth Century" is a fascinating look at how one 19th century person predicted the 1900s. Seemingly typical for this genre (think Huxley's Brave New World or Orwell's 1984), Verne pits a lonely humanist against the crush of an efficient and overbearing technocracy. Read in the context of the history of the 1860s -- Napoleon III had established the Second Republic in 1852, of which he was emperor, Paris itself was in the midst of a major reconstruction and renovation, and the future of liberal humanism may have been seen to be suffering setbacks -- "Paris" is an important window into the thinking of French scientifically-inclined intellectuals.
Rating:
Summary: A fascinating prediction
Review: Michel Dufrenoy is a man born out of time. Possessing the soul of an artist, he lives in a time when the artist is despised, and the industrialist is utterly triumphant. Where can Michel go to fit in? What place can an artist find in the Paris of 1960? Jules Verne wrote this short book in 1863, but his publisher rejected it as unrealistic. In many ways, what Verne wrote was prescient. He wrote about electric lights, asphalt streets and motorcars, but he went far beyond that. He foresaw the future degradation of art ("I've even heard of a certain Courbet, at one of his last exhibitions, showed himself, face to the wall, in the performance of one of the most hygienic but least elegant actions of life!"), and the deconstruction of history in mass entertainment ("...History must be raped if she is to bear a child. And she was made to bear any number, who themselves bore no resemblance to their mother!") This book is highly polemical in nature. Verne makes quite clear his distaste for capitalism and its concomitant mindset. Also, this story offers no great insight, but merely warns. I found the story fascinating for its seeming precognition, but did not find the story particularly entertaining. Therefore, I give this book a qualified recommendation--read this book as an interesting historical document, but not as an entertaining story.
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