| One of the most chilling books I have read in the past six months is Jules Verne’s "lost" novel, Paris in the Twentieth Century.
According to a number of credible sources, Verne wrote this futuristic novel in 1863. Verne’s publisher, Pierre-Jules Hetzel, considered the novel’s theme to be too pessimistic (and potentially damaging to Verne’s rising literary career) to be published at that time. Verne followed Hetzel’s advice, and shelved the manuscript indefinitely. The manuscript was subsequently discovered by Verne’s great-grandson in 1989, and the novel was finally published (in French) in 1994. An English translation was published three years later.
Paris in the Twentieth Century, the story of a young man who is cold-bloodedly “weeded-out” by a society where intellectualism and creativity have become thoroughly corporatized, shook me to my core. The parallels between Verne’s futuristic 20th Century Paris (in which the sole purpose of privately-funded and corporate-controlled "public" education is to produce future cogs for the internationally “borderless” corporate wheel) and today’s creeping privatization, corporatization, and globalization of public elementary/secondary schools and public colleges/universities, are shocking.
If you are the parent of a son or daughter currently attending (or planning to attend) a public educational institution, I recommend that you read this novel. It will open your eyes, and if you are a public education advocate, I guarantee that you will be appalled by what you see. |