278 - VERNE (Jules), 1828–1905.

VERNE (Jules), 1828–1905. Autograph letter signed “Jules Verne,” Amiens, October 3, 1893, 2/3 p. in-8, to a “dear compatriot,” mounted on paper (left margin). An interesting letter in which Jules Verne categorically denies ever having considered running for election to the Académie française. His correspondent asked him about a report recently published in *Le Journal*. Verne refutes it unequivocally: “The news to which you refer and which was reproduced by *Le Journal* is completely fabricated.” He notes that he had replied that very same day in the same terms to a journalist from *L’Éclair*: “I have never considered applying for membership in the Académie Française, and I did not realize I had such an ambition.” This clarification is all the more interesting given that the question of Jules Verne’s admission to the Académie Française was regularly raised in the press, even though he never officially submitted his candidacy. The letter thus attests, with a touch of irony, to the writer’s distancing himself from the rumors surrounding a possible academic honor. The term “compatriot” could refer here to a correspondent from Nantes or, more broadly, from the Loire-Inférieure region, as Jules Verne was born in Nantes in 1828. Includes its original certificate of export for cultural property from the Ministry of Culture and its original catalog entry (from the Abbaye bookstore, no. 309/147).