Artemis II Echoes Jules Verne's Vision of Moon Exploration

Sat, 11 Apr 2026 08:20:00 +0200

NASA's Artemis II mission launched on April 1, 2026, marking humanity's return to the Moon after 50 years since Apollo. The article draws parallels between this achievement and Jules Verne's 1865 novel 'From the Earth to the Moon,' noting how Neil Armstrong once referenced it during Apollo 11. Verne foresaw not just technology but the political, social, and economic contexts of spaceflight, proposing a moonshot by the Baltimore Gun Club post-Civil War as a nationalist yet globally unifying project. The novel portrays American exceptionalism, with the launch from Florida and a French passenger made an honorary U.S. citizen, while the world funds and follows the endeavor via telegraph. Similarly, Artemis II blends nationalism in the U.S.-China space race with international unity, as Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen declared it for 'all humanity,' and crew emphasized Earth's interconnectedness. Verne's characters view the Moon as a new frontier to colonize, mirroring Artemis rhetoric of p