Hans Phaall

Edgar Allan Poe submitted this story to the Southern Literary Messenger in the summer of 1835.  The tale of Hans Phaall is more than slightly preposterous.  However, Poe lauded his establishment of verisimilitude with authentic scientific references, which would characterize science fiction - a literary genre launched by Jules Verne later in the 19th century. His descriptive views of earth from space are rich with detail generated from Poe's imagination. This is impressive, as an actual image of the earth would not be appear until 1968 when the crew of Apollo 8 captured a photograph of "earth rising" from behind the moon.  This interactive book is illustrated with historical images and videos.