Le Vingtième siècle - La Guerre au vingtième siècle - Le Vingtième Siècle. La Vie électrique. Ensemble complet des œuvres de science-fiction consacrées au Vingtième siècle

Albert ROBIDA
Complete set of Robida's science fiction work.
Le Vingtième siècle - La Guerre au vingtième siècle - Le Vingtième Siècle. La Vie électrique. [The 20th Century - War in the 20th Century - The 20th Century. The Electric Life]
Georges Decaux | Paris 1883 [1887] [1892]| 21 x 31 cm - 32 x 25 cm - 20 x 29 cm| publisher's cloth
First editions, illustrated with in-text and hors texte color and black and white drawings by Albert Robida.
These three albums are the whole components of Robida's science fiction work.
Copies with publisher's illustrated cloth are rare and sought-after.
¸ Le Vingtième siècle: publisher's illustrated cloth in full green glazed calico signed Engel, a large bichrome gilt heightened Souze illustration continuing onto the spine and the boards, covers preserved.
Some scattered foxing. Spine ends a little rubbed.
¸ La Guerre au vingtième siècle: publisher's illustrated cloth in full green glazed calico signed A. Lenègre et Cie, blank spine with tiny rubbings on the spine-ends, first board illustrated with a gilt heightened Souze bichrome drawing, pink paper endpapers illustrated with futurist, underwater scenes, all edges red.
Ex-libris from the Yves Guermont library glued on the first paste down.
This album is one of the artist's rarest.
¸ Le Vingtième Siècle. La Vie électrique: publisher's illustrated cloth in full green glazed calico signed Engel, spine presenting a small red and gilt heightened illustration, first board Souze bichrome in the foreground showing a scientist in his laboratory, in front of a modern town overlooked by a strange flying engine, second board also presenting a beautiful illustration (a flying house above the clouds), all gilt edges.

It is in the context of the 1880s-1890s, strongly marked by “electromania,” that Albert Robida produces his science fiction series consisting of three volumes, Le Vingtième Siècle (1883), La Guerre au vingtième siècle (1887) and La Vie électrique (1892). The universal and industrial exhibitions – particularly the 1881 exhibition introducing the era of electricity – flourish in metropolises that are undergoing great change; true emblems of a utopian world made better by the appearance of new technologies. Robida, who participated in the founding of La Caricature magazine in 1880 and is already well established as an artist, takes to the pen with the idea of writing a dystopia, exaggerating the peculiarities of his era, using temporal extrapolation to caricature them. His novels take place between 1950 and 1970, thus he becomes one of the first masters of the science fiction genre.
“Robida was the fist to show a future where all the technical innovations, as crazy as they could appear to his contemporaries, are perfectly integrated, and used by everyone, natural, in short, a future civilization. Without having Verne's knowledge and scientific help, relying on his own imagination and his intuition, he is the only one of all of the nineteenth century and early twentieth century science fictionists to have presented, in advance, a picture of our present that is not too far removed from the reality that we live today...” (Pierre Versins, «Albert Robida» in Encyclopédie de l'utopie des voyages extraordinaires et de la science-fiction, 1972).
The journey through time in which Robida takes his reader emphasises the many advances made possible thanks to scientific progress and particularly the invention of electricity. The writer-artist gives life to an abundance of civil and military transport equipment: flying machines, tubes (very high speed trains that can travel up to 1400 km/h), under-water ocean liners, tanks, deep-sea divers, torpedo boats, etc. He pays particular attention to telecommunications and invents the “téléphonoscope,” the ancestor of both Skype and the continuous news channels. Robida remains critical when faced with the emergence of these communication methods that are quickly becoming ever-present and virtualise human relations: “Young people are courting through the téléphonoscope after meeting through a marriage agency.” (Dominique Lacaze “Albert Robida maître de l'anticipation” in Revue des Deux Mondes, July-August 2015).
The massive emergence of new technologies promotes worldwide commercial and financial exchange; economic power surpasses political power and these new relationships inevitably give rise to new grounds for war.
The beautiful part is also in relation to the theme of nature and the control of climates and seasons: “Roles are overturned, today the tamed Nature gives in to man's thoughtful will, man who knows how to make changes as he pleases, according to what is needed, the eternal rotation of seasons and, according to the different needs of the land, give each region what it asks for, the amount of heat it needs, the coolness after which it sighs or the refreshing showers demanded by the overly dried ground! Man no longer wants to shiver unnecessarily or futilely cook in his own juices.” (La Vie électrique). The food industry is, in turn, completely redesigned: natural products – that were transported all the same to residents via pipelines! – are replaced using chemistry to produce synthetic foods, even functional foods.
Aware of the devastating effects of the expansion of cities and the development of mass tourism, Robida already understands the need to create virgin areas, spared from all technology: “'A law of social interest' has created the Armorique National Park, made up of the Finistère and Morbihan departments, which must be sheltered from technical progress. No téléphonoscope here, no tube, not even the aerochalet. We travel by stagecoach and tourists are housed in medieval-look hostels. The park is intended for the preservation of nature and especially the regeneration of the “overworked from the electric life” who go there for restorative breaks.” (Dominique Lacaze).
Far from focusing only on material modernisation, Robida is also interested in the social aspects of progressism. Not only does he abolish the death penalty at the beginning of the twentieth century, but he also banishes prisons and replaces them with retirement homes, in which residents rehabilitate themselves gently by giving themselves over to line fishing, gardening and billiards. During the “decennial vacation,” the people have the opportunity to engage in protest demonstrations taking place during the change of government, serving as an outlet for the population and ending with a big Republican banquet: “The regular revolution is a safety valve that removes any danger of explosion... It is a wise revolution, a health revolution so to speak!” (Le Vingtième Siècle).
However, the greatest revolution for Robida, is undoubtedly his concern for female emancipation; women have access to professional fields that were closed to them at the time the novels were written: the bank, the stock market, scientific research and even the army with female combat battalions. They enjoy the right to vote and can now hold important political positions, including access to deputation. A “radical feminine party” is even created in Le Vingtième Siècle: “The feminine party intends [...] only to shower with praise those who, challenging old and antiquated prejudices, have politically thrown themselves at women to result in lifting the secular taboo!”
Copies with publisher's illustrated cloth are rare and sought-after.