Axel begins Journey to the Center of the Earth as the meek, put-upon assistant of his domineering uncle Lidenbrock. He reiterates often that he feels “compelled to obey” Lidenbrock, reluctantly yielding to the professor’s whims without voicing his complaint. For instance, when Lidenbrock is trying to solve Saknussemm’s cipher, he won’t let anyone in his household leave to purchase food. Axel does not challenge these terms, and he eventually reveals the decryption out of hunger. He has no desire to join Lidenbrock’s expedition to the center of the earth, but he finds himself overwhelmed by Lidenbrock’s will and agrees to accompany him. Gräuben, Axel’s fiancée, encourages him to take the journey because it will finally make him “a man, an equal, free to speak, free to act […]”. The adventure does just that: as Axel must evaluate life-and-death situations, he develops the ability to advocate for himself. He argues with Lidenbrock’s decisions throughout the journey, and Axel’s judgment often proves correct.
By the end of the expedition, though, Axel has come into his own as an adventurer. Lidenbrock still leads the group and provides key information as they venture forward, but Axel thinks and acts on his own terms. At the novel’s conclusion, Axel is the one who solves the final puzzle that Lidenbrock could not: he realizes how and when their compass stopped pointing north. Lidenbrock becomes the “happiest of sages,” while Axel becomes the “happiest of men.” Contrary to his uncle, Axel is content to live an ordinary life as an independent man. In this way, his character arc emphasizes that growing up does not depend on surpassing one’s elders; rather, it depends on becoming an individual distinct from them.
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Maturity and Independence Quotes in Journey to the Center of the Earth
“[…] other distinguished geologists agree with [Poisson] in thinking that the interior of the globe is neither formed of gas nor water, nor of the heaviest minerals known, for in that case the earth’s gravity would be twice less.”
“Oh, figures can be made to prove anything!”
“And facts, too, my boy. Is it not unquestionable that the number of volcanoes has considerably decreased since the early days of the world, and if great central heat existed, would it be likely to get less powerful?”
“If you enter the field of suppositions, uncle, I have nothing more to say on the subject.”
“Axel, it is a grant thing to devote one’s self to science. What glory awaits Mr. Lidenbrock, and will be reflected on his companions! When you come back, Axel, you will be a man, an equal, free to speak, free to act, free too––”
The girl blushed, and did not finish the sentence.
“When science has spoken, it is for us to hold our peace.”
I went back to the parsonage, very crestfallen. My uncle had vanquished me by scientific arguments.
As a true nephew of Professor Lidenbrock, and notwithstanding my mental preoccupation, I was interested in observing the mineralogical curiosities displayed in this vast cabinet of natural history, and, at the same time, was going over in my mind the whole geological history of Iceland.
We were quite fit for this existence of troglodytes. I scarcely thought of sun, or stars, or moon, or trees, or houses, or towns, or any of those terrestrial superfluities which are necessary to sublunary beings. We were fossils now, and thought such useless marvels absurd.
“[…] if there is any law of increase in temperature, the heat here ought to be 1,500.”
“Ought to be, my boy.”
“And all this granite would be in a state of fusion, as it could not possibly remain in a solid state.”
“You see, however, that it is nothing of the sort, and that facts, as usual, give the lie to theories.”
How long this state of insensibility had lasted I cannot say, I had no longer any means of reckoning time. Never was solitude like mine, never was abandonment so absolute.
The whole fossil world lives again in my imagination. I go back in fancy to the biblical epoch of creation, long before the advent of man, when the imperfect earth was not fitted to sustain him. Then still further back, when no life existed. […] All life was concentrated in me, my heart alone beat in a depopulated world.
What another had done I would dare, and nothing to me seemed impossible.
The soul of the professor had passed into me. The spirit of a discoverer pervaded me. I forgot the past, I disdained the future! Nothing existed for me on the face of our planet, in whose bosom I was plunged, neither town nor country, neither Hamburg nor Königstrasse, nor my poor Gräuben, who must think me lost for ever in the bowels of the earth!
From that day my uncle was the happiest of sages, and I the happiest of men; for my lovely Virlandaise […] was installed in the Königstrasse house in double quality of niece and wife. I need not add that her uncle was the illustrious professor Otto Lidenbrock, corresponding member of all the scientific societies, geographical, and mineralogical […].
