6 h 41 minAudiobook7 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if a soldier wakes after decades and expects a changed France to salute his vanished empire?
In Edmond About’s The Man with the Broken Ear, Meiser’s strange experiment makes suspended animation possible: dry a living body, then restore its water. Young engineer Léon Renault takes on the task of reviving a preserved man. What he gets is Colonel Fougas, a loud, proud officer of Napoleon’s army, ready to take command.
Fougas expects the world to honor his emperor and himself. But Europe has changed, and Paris follows habits he does not understand. His arrival tangles the hopes of Renault and Clémentine, a young woman close to him. About turns this collision into brisk comedy, while asking how a nation’s love of past glory shapes its present.
What you’ll discover
- A wonderfully stubborn soldier Meet Fougas, whose courage and towering vanity make adjusting to a changed world a comic struggle.
- Science with a smile Explore an early tale of suspended animation that treats its strange premise with amusement rather than dread.
- An engineer’s living problem Follow honest, curious Renault as reviving a preserved man brings complications into his own life.
- Glory under a sharp eye Look beneath the laughter at national vanity and France’s attachment to the memory of Napoleon.
- A narrator worth following Enjoy About’s brisk commentary on French habits, scientific fashions, and the folly of his characters.
Who will love it
For readers who love early science fiction, satire, and French history told with a light hand, and anyone who enjoys comedy about a person stranded in the wrong age.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A scientist's strange experiment begins everything
- A young engineer takes home a living problem
- Colonel Fougas wakes and takes command
- A soldier out of time meets modern France
- Glory, memory and the satire beneath the comedy
- A light voice with a sharp point
Who’s who
- Colonel FougasA proud, loud officer of Napoleon's army, preserved and revived, who expects the modern world to honor his emperor and himself.
- Léon RenaultA young engineer, honest and curious, who takes on the task of reviving a preserved man and must live with the results.
- MeiserA German scientist whose method of drying and restoring a living body makes the whole story possible.
- ClémentineA young woman close to Renault's hopes, whose future becomes tangled with the arrival of the revived soldier.
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- Large print hardcover
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Der Mann mit dem gebrochenen Ohr
by Edmond About · 1862
An engineer revives a soldier of Napoleon's army, whose pride and old loyalties stir up trouble in a changed France.
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From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A scientist's strange experiment begins everything
The story starts from a scientific curiosity. A German scientist named Meiser has worked on a way to remove the water from a living body and then restore it, so that a person could be kept intact for many years. In the logic of the novel, a body that is dried carefully enough does not decay, and with the right treatment it can be brought back to life.
About does not weigh the reader down with laboratory detail. He gives just enough to make the idea feel like a real piece of nineteenth century chemistry, the kind of thing a newspaper reader of 1862 might half believe. That plain, confident tone is part of the comedy. The marvel is treated as an ordinary matter of method.
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What is The Man with the Broken Ear about?
It is a comic novel about a young engineer who revives a preserved soldier of Napoleon's army. The soldier, Colonel Fougas, wakes in a changed France, and his old loyalties and pride cause trouble for those around him.
When was The Man with the Broken Ear written?
Edmond About published it in 1862, during the Second Empire under Napoleon III. It is a work of fiction, not a true story, though it draws on real nostalgia for the first Napoleon.
Is The Man with the Broken Ear science fiction?
Yes, it is counted among the early French science fiction tales. Its central idea is a method of drying and restoring a living body, but the book uses that idea mainly for comedy and satire.
The author
Edmond About
1828–1885 · French novelist and critic
Edmond About was a French writer, journalist, and critic. He was born in Dieuze in 1828 and died in Paris in 1885. His novels include The King of the Mountains, published in 1857, and The Man with the Broken Ear, published in 1862. He was elected to the Académie française in 1884.
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