Author: ASTOR, John Jacob.
Title: A Journey in Other Worlds. A romance of the future.
Description: London, Longman 1894. Octavo publisher's blue cloth elaborately blocked in silver and lettered in gilt; 10 illustrations, nine by Dan Beard; 24 page publisher's list dated September 1894 at the end. Edges a bit rubbed and the title page a bit browned. Quite a good copy. ¶ First English edition, pretty much concurrent with the New York edition. William Waldorf Astor has been described as the richest novelist ever and without knowing the breakdown of the family fortunes I can't argue that, but John Jacob may well be the richest science fiction writer still. William's pair of novels were no great shakes and neither is this in literary terms. But it is a scientific and utopian romance involving a voyage to Jupiter and Saturn, no worse than most of the didactic science fiction of the period and does provide enough thrills and plenty of monsters. It is set in the year 2000 and Astor's vision of world history over the intervening century can be, with equal or no profit, admired or derided. Astor was caned by the New York Times reviewer - affronted by his view that time wasted learning the classics would be better spent learning science - who remarked that Astor's description of a "weird scene might also serve in a description of a Dutch Christmas festival".

Keywords: literature science fiction sci-fi thrillers c19th fantasy America utopia