Recovery of the Lunar Capsule — Autour de la Lune, Italian Edition 1870s
An American flag planted atop a ribbed metal capsule bobs in choppy open seas — the triumphant, absurd return of Jules Verne's moon travelers. Rescue sailors crowd a small boat alongside the projectile as a steam-and-sail warship looms through cloudy skies in the background. This engraving captures the climactic ocean recovery scene from Autour de la Lune, the pioneering proto-science-fiction novel imagining a manned lunar voyage fired by giant cannon.
The vision of a crewed cannonball capsule splashing down in the Pacific predates NASA's Apollo splashdowns by nearly a century — conceptually audacious. The execution is restrained Victorian realism rather than sensationalist pulp spectacle.
“196 INTORNO ALLA LUNA. Codesto voto dovea avverarsi assai presto per tutti quasi gli abitanti dell'Unione. Barbicane, Michele Ardan, Nicholl, i delegati del Club-”
