Jules Verne was born in 1828 in France. Young Jules was interested in
machinery, sailing and writing. Together with his brother Paul, he
explored the river near their home in an old sailboat.
Jules' father was a lawyer and he wanted his son to continue his
career. So Jules was sent to Paris to study law. Jules, however, decided
soon that his main interest was writing. He joined the club of
scientific writers. This group was interested in balloons so Jules soon
wrote an adventure story called "Five Weeks in a Balloon". His favourite
subject at school was geography, so he wanted to describe in his books
as many parts of the world as possible.
Jules Verne's books are still popular now because they are good
adventure stories. But in his books Verne also forecast many inventions
that we have now. He believed that someday people would have airplanes,
submarines, television, dirigibles and powerful weapons.
His most popular books are "Twenty Thousand Leagues under the
Sea" and "Around the World in Eighty Days".
Verne had a notebook where he wrote every idea or bit of
information he came across that might be useful for his books. In his
study he had a large map of the world with all routes of his heroes
marked on it.
During his life, Jules Verne has written more then 50 books. He
died at the age of 77.
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