Jules Verne: Paris in the Twenty-Second Century

The story of Michel Dufrenoy, a poet in love and a dreamer, who loses himself and becomes mired in a purely pragmatic world full of commerce, haste and the desire for wealth. Jules Verne wrote his novel Paris in XX. century as the third in the order already in 1863, but the publisher refused to publish it because of his pessimism. The author paints a very gloomy picture of society in a hundred years. The novel was rediscovered in 1989 and published in France 5 years later with great success. The almost apocalyptic notion of a consumer society in which everything is set only on the need to generate profit is contrasted with basic human values and desires. The radio dramatization is loosely based on the novel, but shifts the plot, incl. many technical realities, through the present towards the future. With ease and exaggeration, he plays with the seemingly impossible, which is now gradually and shamefully turning into a possible reality.