5 h 51 minAudiobook8 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 the man who proves you wrong about flight also takes away your freedom?
At Philadelphia’s Weldon Institute, balloon enthusiasts argue over where to place a propeller. Then Robur challenges their whole idea of flight. Uncle Prudent, the club’s stubborn president, and Phil Evans, its calmer secretary, find themselves prisoners aboard the Albatross, a flying ship that makes their convictions hard to defend.
In Jules Verne’s Robur the Conqueror, invention drives a journey across American plains, the Pacific, Asia and Africa. Prudent’s frightened servant, Frycollin, shares the voyage, while Robur commands a loyal crew. Beneath the changing views lies a sharper question: what does progress mean when the inventor answers to no government and his passengers cannot leave?
What you’ll discover
- A ship above the world Step aboard the Albatross, with its deck, cabins and crew high above familiar ground.
- Two visions of flight Follow the clash between devoted balloon enthusiasts and an inventor who champions heavier-than-air machines.
- Pride under pressure Watch Uncle Prudent face a working invention that challenges the beliefs he fiercely defends.
- A journey without consent Share the unease of captive passengers as vast landscapes pass beneath their flying ship.
- Freedom against progress Weigh the claims of rules and votes against Robur’s refusal to answer to anyone.
Who will love it
For readers who love inventions, maps and journeys, and anyone curious about how people once imagined flight. It also rewards those who enjoy a moral argument inside an adventure.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A balloon club argues about the future
- A stranger says the future is heavier
- Life aboard the Albatross
- A voyage over the whole world
- Progress against freedom is the real contest
- How Verne tells the tale
Who’s who
- RoburA brilliant inventor and captain of the Albatross, who believes in heavier-than-air flight and answers to no government.
- Uncle PrudentThe proud, stubborn president of the Weldon Institute, who champions balloons and hates being proved wrong.
- Phil EvansThe secretary of the Institute, calmer than his friend, who shares his captivity and looks for a way out.
- FrycollinPrudent's timid servant, who is carried off with his master and fears every danger of the voyage.
- The Albatross crewA small band of loyal men who work the flying ship and obey Robur without question.
Formats and delivery
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- Audiobook
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- 15-minute summary
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- Paperback
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- Hardcover
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- Large print paperback
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- Large print hardcover
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Robur the Conqueror
by Jules Verne · 1886
Two balloonists are carried around the world in an inventor's flying ship, where progress clashes with freedom.
Medium level5–10 hours to read25 languages
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In short
Robur the Conqueror is an adventure novel by Jules Verne, the French writer who made science the engine of his stories. It appeared in French in 1886, in the years when inventors were racing to put engines and propellers into the sky.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A balloon club argues about the future
The story opens in Philadelphia, at the Weldon Institute, a club of men devoted to ballooning. Its president is Uncle Prudent, a rich and stubborn man. Its secretary is Phil Evans, who is calmer but just as loyal to the cause. The members are building the largest balloon ever made, which they will call the Go-Ahead.
The club is not only proud of its balloon. It holds a firm belief that flight will always depend on machines lighter than air. The members laugh at anyone who thinks a heavy machine could fly. To them, a ship that rises by its own power is a fantasy, much like a bird made of iron.
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What is Robur the Conqueror about?
It tells of two members of a Philadelphia balloon club who are kidnapped by a mysterious inventor, Robur, and carried around the world in his flying ship, the Albatross, while they argue over the future of flight.
Who is Robur in Jules Verne's novel?
Robur is the inventor and captain of the Albatross, a flying machine heavier than air. He is brilliant, forceful and secretive, and he answers to no government or society.
Is there a sequel to Robur the Conqueror?
Yes. Verne wrote Master of the World, published in 1904, in which Robur returns with a new machine. The earlier book stands on its own, so you can read it first.
The author
Jules Verne
1828–1905 · French adventure novelist
Jules Verne was a French writer born in Nantes in 1828. He lived in Paris and later in Amiens, where he died in 1905. His novels include Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864), Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea (1870), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1873).
More by Jules Verne
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