Journey to the Center of the Earth the center of the Earth. The travellers are swept away as the sea rushes into the large open gap in the ground. After spending hours being swept along at lightning speeds by the water, the raft ends up inside a large volcanic chimney filling with water and magma. Terrified, the three are rushed upwards, through stifling heat, and are ejected onto the surface from a side-vent of a stratovolcano. When they regain consciousness, they discover that they have been ejected from Stromboli, a volcanic island located in southern Italy. They return to Hamburg to great acclaimProfessor Lidenbrock is hailed as
The Man Who Fell to Earth (novel) explains bitterly that he is unable to continue his spaceship project because of his blindness and because of planetary alignments which have changed during his captivity. He records a message which he hopes to broadcast via radio to his home planet. James Sallis declared that "The Man Who Fell to Earth" was "among the finest science fiction novels," saying "Just beneath the surface it might be read as a parable of the Fifties and of the Cold War. Beneath that as an evocation of existential loneliness, a Christian fable, a parable of the artist. Above all, perhaps, as the wisest,