A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder

by James De Mille, Mint Editions (Contribution by)

Overview

A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder (1888) is a novel by James De Mille. Originally serialized in Harper’s Weekly, the novel was published posthumously and, at first, anonymously. Although De Mille’s work predated such popular Lost World novels as H. Rider Haggard’s She (1887) and King Solomon’s Mines (1885), it was published nearly a decade after his death, leading critics to assume he had merely written a derivative work of fiction. Recent scholarship, however, has sought to emphasize De Mille’s talents as a writer and importance in the historical development of literary science fiction. “The wind had failed, a deep calm had succeeded, and everywhere, as far as the eye could reach, the water was smooth and glassy. The yacht rose and fell at the impulse of the long ocean undulations, and the creaking of the spars sounded out a lazy accompaniment to the motion of the vessel.” Sailing in their yacht, a crew spots a copper cylinder afloat on the sunbeaten sea. Hauling it aboard, they open it to reveal a manuscript sealed from the elements containing the story of Adam More. Shipwrecked while returning to Britain from Tasmania, the sailor found himself stranded on a strange desert island near Antarctica. Soon, he stumbles upon a lost world of prehistoric plants and animals, a land of indescribable beauty and wonder. In the harsh volcanic landscape, he discovers a race of humans whose values are entirely foreign to his Western frame of mind. This edition of James De Mille’s A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder is a classic work of American science fiction reimagined for modern readers.

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Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781513291024
Publisher:	Mint Editions
Publication date:	11/16/2021
Series:	Mint Editions (Fantasy and Fairytale)
Pages:	216
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

James De Mille (1833-1880) was a Canadian novelist and professor. Born in Saint John, New Brunswick, De Mille was the son of a merchant. As a young man, he traveled to Europe with his brother before returning to North America to pursue his Master of Arts degree at Brown University. Upon graduating in 1854, he married Anne Pryor and found employment at Acadia Universityas a Classics professor. In 1865, he was appointed professor of English and rhetoric at Dalhousie Universityin Nova Scotia. Over the next fifteen years, he wrote over a dozen novels and short story collections, many of which were intended for a young adult audience. His most popular work, A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder (1888), was published posthumously as a serial in Harper’s Weekly, in which many of De Mille’s earlier works had appeared during his lifetime. Although his career was cut short by his death at the age of 46, De Mille is considered a pioneering practitioner of the Lost World genre of science fiction.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
James De Mille: A Brief Chronology
A Note on the Text
A Kosekin Glossary

A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder

Appendix A: Antarctic Exploration
Antarctica Exploration Timeline

1. From James Cook and Tobias Furneaux, A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World (1777)
1. Book 1, Chapters 2-3, January 1773
2. Book 2, Chapter 6, January 1774
2. From Charles Wilkes, Synopsis of the Cruise of the .S. Exploring Expedition During the Years 1838-1842 (1842)
3. From Captain Sir James Clark Ross, A Voyage of Discovery in the Southern and Antarctic Regions (During the Years 1839-43) (1847)
1. Volume 1, Chapter VII, 10 January 1841
2. Volume 1, Chapter VII, 27 January 1841
3. Volume 1, Chapter VIII, 28 January 1841

Appendix B: Nineteenth-Century Geology and Paleontology

1. From Richard Owen, Geology and the Inhabitants of the Ancient World (1854)
1. Pterodactyle
2. Iguanodon
3. Hylaeosaurus
4. Megalosaurus
5. Teleosaurus
6. Enaliosauria (Ichthyosaurus and Plesiosaurus)
7. Labyrinthodon
2. From Louis Figuier, The World Before the Deluge (1866)
1. “whale of the saurians”
2. Ideal Landscapes
3. Coal Period Vegetation: From Louis Figuier, The World Before the Deluge (1866)
4. From Elijah H. Burritt, Atlas Designed to Illustrate the Geography of the Heavens (1845)

Appendix C: Savages and Cannibals

1. From James Cook, A Voyage Towards the South Pole and Round the World (1777)
1. Volume 1, Book 2, Chapter 5, November 1773, Queen Charlotte’s Sound, New Zealand
2. Volume 2, Book 3, Chapter 5, August 1774, Vanuatu Archipelago
2. From Charles Darwin, Journal of Researches into the Geology and Natural History of the Various Countries Visited by H.M.S. Beagle (1846)

Appendix D: Historical Mythology: Caves and Troglodytes

1. From Plato, The Republic of Plato (c. 380 BCE): The Allegory of the Cave
2. From Penny Cyclopaedia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (1843)
3. From Thomas Hodgkin, “On the Ancient Inhabitants of the Canary Islands” (1848)

Appendix E: Scientific Romance and Lost Worlds

1. From John Cleves Symmes Jr., Symzonia; Voyage of Discovery (1820)
2. From Edgar Allan Poe, “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym” (1838)
1. Preface
2. A History of Antarctic Exploration
3. From Edward Bulwer Lytton, The Coming Race: or The New Utopia (1871)
1. Orientalism
2. Gender
4. From Jules Verne, A Journey into the Interior of the Earth (1877)
5. From Samuel Butler, Erewhon or Over the Range (1880)
6. From Jonathan Swift, Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver (1726)

Appendix F: Reviews

1. New York Times, 21 May 1888
2. Brooklyn Daily Eagle, 3 June 1888
3. The Week, July 1888
4. The Athenaeum, 15 December 1888

Works Cited and Recommended Reading

Editorial Reviews

Daniel Burgoyne’s Broadview edition of A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder is a refreshing, re-energised insight into an old classic. It is both scholarly and accessible, bringing important scholarship, key graphics, and of course the work itself, into fresh perspective. What I especially value is the way the volume will appeal to both general readers and critics, and the way that more recent scholarship on the novel has been updated and synthesized to produce new understandings of this unusual Canadian phenomenon.” — Gerry Turcotte, President, St. Mary’s University College, Calgary, Alberta

From the Publisher

"Daniel Burgoyne's Broadview edition of A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder is a refreshing, re-energised insight into an old classic. It is both scholarly and accessible, bringing important scholarship, key graphics, and of course the work itself, into fresh perspective. What I especially value is the way the volume will appeal to both general readers and critics, and the way that more recent scholarship on the novel has been updated and synthesized to produce new understandings of this unusual Canadian phenomenon."

Gerry Turcotte