What do you think?
Rate this book
Journey to Mars
Journey to Mars the Wonderful Its Beauty and Splendor; Its Mighty Races and Kingdoms; Its Final Doom is an 1894 science fiction novel written by Gustavus W. Pope. (The author called his work a "scientific novel.") The book has attracted increased contemporary attention as a precedent and possible source for the famous Barsoom novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs. A sequel, Journey to Venus , followed in 1895.
- GenresScience Fiction
545 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1894
41 people want to read
About the author
Gustavus W. Pope
13 books3 followersEarly American Science Fiction writer and physician.Wrote Journey to Mars 1894 and Journey to Venus 1895.Lived in Washington D.C.May have influenced Edgar Rice Burroughs's John Carter Mars books.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 3, 2025
Ahhh! finished, at last! That took a very long time. This is not without some interest. In fact there are many minor points and many sections that are fairly compelling. The last 100 pages is pretty decent.
It starts well fairly exciting stuff. Then we have some early sci-fi, with scientific (for the 1890’s) footnotes to back it up. The science is fairly bad even for the time, IMO. I don’t think there where too many even in the 1890’s that still thought Venus might have a moon or believed in Vulcan (not that Vulcan, this was a theoretical planet thought by some to exist closer to the sun than Mercury).
He also suggests that the electro-magnetic field moves faster than the speed of light. Or as made clear later, that it in fact is instantaneous, proposing an idea which sounds suspiciously like quantum-entanglement.
The book is also underlined with religion, our author believing the human species are 6000 years old. Whether his religion or nationality (he’s american) are related to his racism i can’t say. But he uses one of his scientific footnotes to proclaim that interracial mixing degenerates the species.
The racism was not unexpected however there is a very strong utopianism concerning Mars, and its interesting that this very patriotic american's (there is a fair bit of very over-the-top patriotism at times) ideal, which Mars clearly is, is basically 15th century France.
Nowhere in this very long work will you see the words democracy or voting, the american authors perfect society is entirely authoritarian.
As mentioned Mars is largely utopian, except for the mixed-race parts which are of course where all the bad guys live. The author didn’t even need to bring race into. The evil empire’s rulers are basically descended from General Zod, so you could have just left it at that.
So to expand, another minor element of interest is that there was a planet which was destroyed and people came to mars from there including at least one who is basically Superman, or at least superhuman. The lost planet was not Krypton in this case but Pluto (but not that Pluto).
The idea of the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter being the remains of a lost planet was a pretty common theory at the time. However no one ever called it Pluto to my knowledge, it was referred to most commonly as Phaeton. Although since it was purely theoretical i guess you can call it whatever you want.
The middle sections are the really dull part of this work. Everything around the Princess turning up is painful to get through. Over the top descriptive writing with everyone dressed as bucolic greek myth figures.
Then the third quarter is like a second rate Dumas plot-line. Including a Richlieu-esque character and since every chapter of the book starts with a quote we actually have multiple from a play called Richlieu, presumably about the cardinal.
Except, importantly this version is a good guy, like the author read the Three Musketeers and thought, ‘you know who the real hero of this story is Cardinal Richlieu’ :lol .
Anyway.. this review is too long already and i didn’t even mention the odd playful bits of humour which randomly appear or the apparently human level intelligent talking crow. Or the Linear Cities, although with the latter you know as much as i do, as we literally never get to visit them :( .
Maybe at another time this wouldn’t have been such work for me to get through, but it was and I have zero plans to read the sequel.
Made available by the Merril Collection.
It starts well fairly exciting stuff. Then we have some early sci-fi, with scientific (for the 1890’s) footnotes to back it up. The science is fairly bad even for the time, IMO. I don’t think there where too many even in the 1890’s that still thought Venus might have a moon or believed in Vulcan (not that Vulcan, this was a theoretical planet thought by some to exist closer to the sun than Mercury).
He also suggests that the electro-magnetic field moves faster than the speed of light. Or as made clear later, that it in fact is instantaneous, proposing an idea which sounds suspiciously like quantum-entanglement.
The book is also underlined with religion, our author believing the human species are 6000 years old. Whether his religion or nationality (he’s american) are related to his racism i can’t say. But he uses one of his scientific footnotes to proclaim that interracial mixing degenerates the species.
The racism was not unexpected however there is a very strong utopianism concerning Mars, and its interesting that this very patriotic american's (there is a fair bit of very over-the-top patriotism at times) ideal, which Mars clearly is, is basically 15th century France.
Nowhere in this very long work will you see the words democracy or voting, the american authors perfect society is entirely authoritarian.
As mentioned Mars is largely utopian, except for the mixed-race parts which are of course where all the bad guys live. The author didn’t even need to bring race into. The evil empire’s rulers are basically descended from General Zod, so you could have just left it at that.
So to expand, another minor element of interest is that there was a planet which was destroyed and people came to mars from there including at least one who is basically Superman, or at least superhuman. The lost planet was not Krypton in this case but Pluto (but not that Pluto).
The idea of the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter being the remains of a lost planet was a pretty common theory at the time. However no one ever called it Pluto to my knowledge, it was referred to most commonly as Phaeton. Although since it was purely theoretical i guess you can call it whatever you want.
The middle sections are the really dull part of this work. Everything around the Princess turning up is painful to get through. Over the top descriptive writing with everyone dressed as bucolic greek myth figures.
Then the third quarter is like a second rate Dumas plot-line. Including a Richlieu-esque character and since every chapter of the book starts with a quote we actually have multiple from a play called Richlieu, presumably about the cardinal.
Except, importantly this version is a good guy, like the author read the Three Musketeers and thought, ‘you know who the real hero of this story is Cardinal Richlieu’ :lol .
Anyway.. this review is too long already and i didn’t even mention the odd playful bits of humour which randomly appear or the apparently human level intelligent talking crow. Or the Linear Cities, although with the latter you know as much as i do, as we literally never get to visit them :( .
Maybe at another time this wouldn’t have been such work for me to get through, but it was and I have zero plans to read the sequel.
Made available by the Merril Collection.
January 28, 2021
"Journey to Mars" cuenta la historia del teniente Frederick Hamilton, de la marina estadounidense, que tras sufrir un accidente en una expedición al Polo Sur, se encuentra con una colonia de marcianos en el continente antártico, con los cuales emprende un viaje al cuarto planeta. Allí conoce la naturaleza y la sociedad marciana, se enamora de una princesa, y vive diversas aventuras.
Tiene algunos episodios muy emocionantes, que incluyen riesgosas hazañas en el Polo Sur, escape de peligros en el espacio, una batalla entre narvales y peces espada gigantes, vuelos en águilas colosales, duelos de esgrima y una improbable fuga de una lúgubre prisión para rescatar a una bella princesa. Pero Pope es un narrador inexperto: su novela tiene más de 500 páginas y abunda en descripciones estériles y episodios que no llevan a ninguna parte.
Lo más interesante de este libro es su introducción, pues se trata de uno de los primeros textos sobre ciencia ficción. Allí Pope dice que ésta es la literatura que corresponde al mundo de grandes cambios y avances científicos y tecnológicos en que le ha tocado vivir; que las obras que se insertan en dicho género no tienen por qué ser cuentos de hadas de simple evasión, sino tratar temas humanos, y que deben apegarse con suma fidelidad a los conocimientos científicos.
Tiene algunos episodios muy emocionantes, que incluyen riesgosas hazañas en el Polo Sur, escape de peligros en el espacio, una batalla entre narvales y peces espada gigantes, vuelos en águilas colosales, duelos de esgrima y una improbable fuga de una lúgubre prisión para rescatar a una bella princesa. Pero Pope es un narrador inexperto: su novela tiene más de 500 páginas y abunda en descripciones estériles y episodios que no llevan a ninguna parte.
Lo más interesante de este libro es su introducción, pues se trata de uno de los primeros textos sobre ciencia ficción. Allí Pope dice que ésta es la literatura que corresponde al mundo de grandes cambios y avances científicos y tecnológicos en que le ha tocado vivir; que las obras que se insertan en dicho género no tienen por qué ser cuentos de hadas de simple evasión, sino tratar temas humanos, y que deben apegarse con suma fidelidad a los conocimientos científicos.
December 29, 2021
Wonderful space opera listening 🎧
A will written fantasy space opera written over 100 years ago by Gustavus W. Pope. What great adventures in space travel to Mars and exploring the planet as a guest of the royals and the adventure ends with the adventurers returning too Australia. I highly recommend this novel to readers of fantasy space operas. Enjoy the adventure of reading 📘 or listing 🎧 to books 🎉😎 2021
A will written fantasy space opera written over 100 years ago by Gustavus W. Pope. What great adventures in space travel to Mars and exploring the planet as a guest of the royals and the adventure ends with the adventurers returning too Australia. I highly recommend this novel to readers of fantasy space operas. Enjoy the adventure of reading 📘 or listing 🎧 to books 🎉😎 2021
October 26, 2025
Pope was actually good with words. He had a phenomenal vocabulary and his descriptive writing is poetical. But every scene is just blanketed in layer after layer of verbiage with very very little happening. And the story is immensely, exaggeratedly longgggg. I yelled at the author many times to “get on with it!” But he didn’t listen. You may ask why I continued. Well, this has been put forth by some as an influence on Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Barsoom novels, and it is certainly a very early (preceding ERB) example of Sword & Planet fiction. It’s just not a good one. As for a connection to ERB’s work, I believe it likely to have been an influence and I'll soon have a more detailed review up on my Swords & Planet page on Facebook. Below is a capsule version.
There’s just too much to tell in this immensely long book. Hamilton’s ship comes into contact with visiting Martians, who are really humans for the most part with different skin colors. Hamilton saves a prince from sure death and is invited along on a trip to Mars. He meets a princess, Suhlamia Angelion, and they fall in love, but there’s a villain who tries to keep them apart. The villain is a half breed, having both Martian inheritance and “Plutonian” inheritance. But note that this is not our Pluto, which wasn’t discovered until long after this book was written in 1930. This pluto represents the planet that circled the sun where the asteroid belt lies and was destroyed. There’s one single sword fight, but it is at least well done if overly long. Then there’s an illegal arrest of Hamilton, an escape, a return to his princess, and then a meteor storm that threatens to destroy Mars, a trip back to earth, which seemingly was only a plot device to get the manuscript back to earth, and then the book ends with the ship and Hamilton returning to Mars to save his princess from destruction.
From an historical perspective of one who is interested in the history of sword & planet fiction and ERB’s work in that field, it’s worth reading, or at least scanning. If you’re looking for excitement, though, you’ll not find it here.
There’s just too much to tell in this immensely long book. Hamilton’s ship comes into contact with visiting Martians, who are really humans for the most part with different skin colors. Hamilton saves a prince from sure death and is invited along on a trip to Mars. He meets a princess, Suhlamia Angelion, and they fall in love, but there’s a villain who tries to keep them apart. The villain is a half breed, having both Martian inheritance and “Plutonian” inheritance. But note that this is not our Pluto, which wasn’t discovered until long after this book was written in 1930. This pluto represents the planet that circled the sun where the asteroid belt lies and was destroyed. There’s one single sword fight, but it is at least well done if overly long. Then there’s an illegal arrest of Hamilton, an escape, a return to his princess, and then a meteor storm that threatens to destroy Mars, a trip back to earth, which seemingly was only a plot device to get the manuscript back to earth, and then the book ends with the ship and Hamilton returning to Mars to save his princess from destruction.
From an historical perspective of one who is interested in the history of sword & planet fiction and ERB’s work in that field, it’s worth reading, or at least scanning. If you’re looking for excitement, though, you’ll not find it here.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews