Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

by

Jules Verne

Professor Pierre Arronax Character Analysis

Pierre Arronax is the protagonist and narrator of the novel. He is a 40-year-old Frenchman who is a professional naturalist (an expert in the field of natural history) and an assistant professor at the Museum of Natural History in Paris. He is the author of a book entitled Mysteries of the Unsounded Depths Undersea. At the time the novel begins, he has just spent six months doing fieldwork in Nebraska and is looking forward to returning home to France. However, his desire to go back home is interrupted by the sighting of the mysterious “monster” (which turns out to be Captain Nemo’s submarine, the Nautilus) and his invitation to join Commander Farragut aboard the Abraham Lincoln in order to track down the monster. This results in the Abraham Lincoln attacking the Nautilus and sinking in the process, presumably killing Farragut and enabling Captain Nemo to take Arronax and his crewmates, Conseil and Ned Land, captive on the submarine. The subsequent delay in Arronax’s journey home, at times seemingly endless, invokes that of Odysseus in Homer’s the Odyssey. Arronax is an intelligent and dignified man whose life is totally dedicated to the pursuit of science. Indeed, scientific research is less his job than it is his whole reason for being. Arronax has a boundless curiosity about the world, and is the most adaptable character in the novel. This allows him to treat his capture by Captain Nemo and life aboard the Nautilus with open-minded enthusiasm, rather than simply horror. However, this becomes problematic when Arronax’s co-captors—particularly Ned—become fixated on escaping. Arronax remains unsure about trying to escape, which is both a result of his relatively timid nature and his strange attachment to Nemo. Although by the end of the novel Arronax is largely horrified by Nemo, he still retains a degree of affection and sympathy for him, and expresses the idea that the two have an irrevocable bond.

Professor Pierre Arronax Quotes in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

The Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea quotes below are all either spoken by Professor Pierre Arronax or refer to Professor Pierre Arronax. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Scientific Discovery and Technological Innovation Theme Icon
).
Part 1, Chapter 1 Quotes

And that it did exist was undeniable. There was no longer any disposition to class it in the list of fabulous creatures. The human mind is ever hungry to believe in new and marvellous phenomena, and so it is easy for us to understand the vast excitement produced throughout the whole world by this supernatural apparition.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 1
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 2 Quotes

Thus may we explain this inexplicable animal, unless there exists in reality nothing at all, despite what has already been conjectured, seen, perceived, and experienced. Which condition is, of course, just within the bounds of possibility.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Page Number: 8
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 10 Quotes

A flash of anger and contempt kindled in the eyes of the Unknown, and I had a fleeting vision of some terrible past in the life of this man. Not only had he put himself beyond the pale of human laws, but he had made himself independent of them. In the strictest sense of the word, he was free, because he was outside the reach of the moral code.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 42
Explanation and Analysis:

“Yes, sir, I love it! The sea is everything. It covers seven-tenths of the terrestrial globe. Its breath is pure and life-giving. It is an immense desert place where man is never lonely, for he sense the weaving of Creation on every hand. It is the physical embodiment of a supernatural existence.”

Related Characters: Captain Nemo (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 46
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 17 Quotes

Monstrous brutes that could crush a whole man with one snap of their iron jaws! I do not know if Conseil, with true scientific ardour, stopped to classify them. But, for my part, I could not but note their silver bellies, their huge maws bristling with teeth, and thought of these from a most unscientific point of view. I regarded myself more as a possible victim than as a naturalist.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Page Number: 79
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 22 Quotes

“Why are you so astonished, M. Arronax, at meeting savages when you set foot on a strange land? Where in all the earth are there not savages? And do you for a moment suppose them worse than other men, these fellows that you call savages?”

Related Characters: Captain Nemo (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Page Number: 105
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 23 Quotes

We were growing fast to our shell like snails, and I swear it must be easy to lead a snail’s existence. Thus, our undersea life began to seem natural to us, and we no longer thought of the days we used to spend on land.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Ned Land, Conseil
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 115-116
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 3 Quotes

“That Indian, my dear sir, is a member of an oppressed race. And I still am and ever shall be one with all such people.”

Related Characters: Captain Nemo (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 142-143
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 8 Quotes

“Freedom may come high, but it’s worth paying for […] Who knows but that tomorrow we may be a hundred leagues away? Let chance but favor us, sir, and by ten or eleven o’clock we shall have landed on terra firma, dead or alive.”

Related Characters: Ned Land (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Page Number: 171
Explanation and Analysis:

It was an unforgettably sad day that I then passed, torn between the desire of regaining my freedom and my dislike of abandoning the marvelous ship and thus leaving my undersea studies incomplete.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo, Ned Land
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 172
Explanation and Analysis:

I had long guessed that, whatever motive had led him to seek freedom at the bottom of the ocean, it had not been an ignoble one. I had seen that his heart still beat for the sorrows of humanity, and sensed that his immense charity was for oppressed races as well as individuals.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo, Ned Land
Page Number: 177
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 11 Quotes

“What a beautiful situation to be in!” I chortled. “To overrun regions where man has never trod, depths to which even dead or inanimate matter may never more descend! Look, Captain, at these magnificent rocks, these uninhabitable grottoes. Here are the lowest known receptacles of the globe, where life is not only impossible unthinkable. What unknown sights are here? Why should we be unable to find and preserve some visible evidence of our journey as a souvenir?”

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo
Page Number: 193
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 14 Quotes

“I, Captain Nemo, on this 21st day of March, 1868, have reached the South Pole on the 90th degree. And I hereby take possession of this portion of the globe, equal in extent to one-sixth of the continents now known to man.”

“In whose name, sir?” I asked.

“In my own, M. Arronax.”

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo (speaker)
Page Number: 217
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 16 Quotes

Around the “Nautilus,” above and below it, was an impenetrable wall of ice. We were prisoners to the Great Ice Barrier.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Page Number: 223
Explanation and Analysis:
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Professor Pierre Arronax Quotes in Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

The Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea quotes below are all either spoken by Professor Pierre Arronax or refer to Professor Pierre Arronax. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Scientific Discovery and Technological Innovation Theme Icon
).
Part 1, Chapter 1 Quotes

And that it did exist was undeniable. There was no longer any disposition to class it in the list of fabulous creatures. The human mind is ever hungry to believe in new and marvellous phenomena, and so it is easy for us to understand the vast excitement produced throughout the whole world by this supernatural apparition.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 1
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 2 Quotes

Thus may we explain this inexplicable animal, unless there exists in reality nothing at all, despite what has already been conjectured, seen, perceived, and experienced. Which condition is, of course, just within the bounds of possibility.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Page Number: 8
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 10 Quotes

A flash of anger and contempt kindled in the eyes of the Unknown, and I had a fleeting vision of some terrible past in the life of this man. Not only had he put himself beyond the pale of human laws, but he had made himself independent of them. In the strictest sense of the word, he was free, because he was outside the reach of the moral code.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 42
Explanation and Analysis:

“Yes, sir, I love it! The sea is everything. It covers seven-tenths of the terrestrial globe. Its breath is pure and life-giving. It is an immense desert place where man is never lonely, for he sense the weaving of Creation on every hand. It is the physical embodiment of a supernatural existence.”

Related Characters: Captain Nemo (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 46
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 17 Quotes

Monstrous brutes that could crush a whole man with one snap of their iron jaws! I do not know if Conseil, with true scientific ardour, stopped to classify them. But, for my part, I could not but note their silver bellies, their huge maws bristling with teeth, and thought of these from a most unscientific point of view. I regarded myself more as a possible victim than as a naturalist.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Page Number: 79
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 22 Quotes

“Why are you so astonished, M. Arronax, at meeting savages when you set foot on a strange land? Where in all the earth are there not savages? And do you for a moment suppose them worse than other men, these fellows that you call savages?”

Related Characters: Captain Nemo (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Page Number: 105
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 23 Quotes

We were growing fast to our shell like snails, and I swear it must be easy to lead a snail’s existence. Thus, our undersea life began to seem natural to us, and we no longer thought of the days we used to spend on land.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Ned Land, Conseil
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 115-116
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 3 Quotes

“That Indian, my dear sir, is a member of an oppressed race. And I still am and ever shall be one with all such people.”

Related Characters: Captain Nemo (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 142-143
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 8 Quotes

“Freedom may come high, but it’s worth paying for […] Who knows but that tomorrow we may be a hundred leagues away? Let chance but favor us, sir, and by ten or eleven o’clock we shall have landed on terra firma, dead or alive.”

Related Characters: Ned Land (speaker), Professor Pierre Arronax
Page Number: 171
Explanation and Analysis:

It was an unforgettably sad day that I then passed, torn between the desire of regaining my freedom and my dislike of abandoning the marvelous ship and thus leaving my undersea studies incomplete.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo, Ned Land
Related Literary Devices:
Page Number: 172
Explanation and Analysis:

I had long guessed that, whatever motive had led him to seek freedom at the bottom of the ocean, it had not been an ignoble one. I had seen that his heart still beat for the sorrows of humanity, and sensed that his immense charity was for oppressed races as well as individuals.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo, Ned Land
Page Number: 177
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 11 Quotes

“What a beautiful situation to be in!” I chortled. “To overrun regions where man has never trod, depths to which even dead or inanimate matter may never more descend! Look, Captain, at these magnificent rocks, these uninhabitable grottoes. Here are the lowest known receptacles of the globe, where life is not only impossible unthinkable. What unknown sights are here? Why should we be unable to find and preserve some visible evidence of our journey as a souvenir?”

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo
Page Number: 193
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 14 Quotes

“I, Captain Nemo, on this 21st day of March, 1868, have reached the South Pole on the 90th degree. And I hereby take possession of this portion of the globe, equal in extent to one-sixth of the continents now known to man.”

“In whose name, sir?” I asked.

“In my own, M. Arronax.”

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker), Captain Nemo (speaker)
Page Number: 217
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 16 Quotes

Around the “Nautilus,” above and below it, was an impenetrable wall of ice. We were prisoners to the Great Ice Barrier.

Related Characters: Professor Pierre Arronax (speaker)
Page Number: 223
Explanation and Analysis: