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La Folie, Louis-Guillaume De

Entry updated 11 March 2024. Tagged: Author.

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(1739-1780) French polymath, industrial chemist and author, member of l'Académie de Rouen, whose surname also appears as de la Follie. His Proto SF tale, Le Philosophe sans Prétention ou L'Homme Rare: Ouvrage Physique, Chymique, Politique et Moral, Dédié aux Savants ["The Unpretentious Philosopher or the Rare Man: A Physical, Chemical, Political and Moral Work, Dedicated to Scholars"] (1775) as M[onsieur] D L F, features the first description of a Spaceship – or in fact Airship of any sort – powered by electricity. The frame story, told by an Arab, contains an inner tale recounted by a former resident of Mercury, who describes his experience of Space Flight in an elaborate, newly invented ship (see Inventions), which he has crash-landed on Earth. In her Voyages to the Moon (1948), Marjorie Hope Nicolson emphasizes the historical significance of this tale, because La Folie's description of the Solar System is scientifically up-to-date (the Mercurian mentions in passing, for instance, that space has no up or down); and because the vehicle described is, for the first time, wingless. It is a machine for Transportation. This novel was eventually translated into English by Brian Stableford as The Unpretentious Philosopher (2012). [JC]

Louis-Guillaume de la Folie [or Follie]

born Roen, France: 11 March 1739

died Rouen, France: 2 February 1780

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