SH Archive Book | - The Year 4338. Petersburg Letters.

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KorbenDallas
SH.org OP Date
2018-08-21 07:03:45
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23
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KD Archive

Not actually KorbenDallas
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I highly recommend this short novel. After reading it, you might be able to get a better grasp on the supposedly omitted parts of our history. Just remember that the author wrote it in 1835. There was no possible way he could have known all the details of the life style, which appeared to be very similar to ours in 2018.

4338.png

"The Year 4338: Petersburg Letters is an 1835 novel by Vladimir Odoevsky. It is a futuristic novel, set in the year 4338, a year before Biela's Comet was to collide with the Earth as computed in the 1820s although the comet burned up later in the nineteenth century. This work was originally conceived as the third part of a trilogy, which was also to have featured depictions of Russia in the time of Peter the Great and in the author's contemporary period, the 1830s. The first part was never written and the second and futuristic parts remained unfinished. Fragments were published in 1835 and 1840, with the fullest version appearing in 1926.

4338_3.jpg

The world described in Odoevsky's work is in some respects similar to the 21st century and yet differs significantly from the present we currently encounter. Some of the technological advances included in the Petersburg Letters are air and space travel, the telephone, artificially controlled climates and the ability to photocopy. Hallucinogenic and truth drugs, in the forms of gaseous drinks and "magnetic baths" remove hypocrisy from social life. In this envisioned future, Russia and China are the centers of global power. Russia and China united their efforts to avoid Earth's collision with another planet. In the novel, China is described as having experienced a "deadly stagnation" which came to an end with the rule of Hin Gin in the 39th century. The main character of the story is actually a Chinese student, Ippolit Tsunguev, (not a Russian character, as might be expected) who attends St. Petersburg's "Main School". His letters to his fellow students constitute the novel." - Wikipedia

V.F.Odoevskij__4338j_god._Peterburgskie_pisma.jpg

Note: attached is a PDF file with links to the translated text of the novel. You can also simply scroll down the PDF, and read the letters, but I think the links provide some additional content.

Additional translation: 4338 AD

KD: really interested to hear your opinion.
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Username: humanoidlord
Date: 2018-08-23 01:39:42
Reaction Score: 1
remenber: airships = UFOs
 
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Username: PrincepAugus
Date: 2018-09-04 19:37:54
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The comic kind of left with a cliffhanger there lol.
 
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Username: asatiger1966
Date: 2018-12-07 04:16:37
Reaction Score: 6
I think that there exist a mass conscience and when a certain number of people learn a new thing it automatically goes into the subconsciousness of everyone.I think that the sub conscience can genetically remember those large concepts as a way of continuing life.

This could be at the root of most literature especially science fiction. Writers creativity could be nothing other than genetic memory. Some of the D.C. 50s,60s comic books were very out of place, but it possibly was true at a different time.

 
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Username: BrokenAgate
Date: 2018-12-07 06:16:31
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This looks interesting! Downloaded it to read later. Of course, it is dismissed as mere fantasy, but truth hides in the strangest places.
 
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Username: KorbenDallas
Date: 2020-02-21 06:27:37
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Whoever did not have a chance, please check this book out. Its contents are insane.
 
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Username: Starmonkey
Date: 2020-02-21 13:18:06
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And check out April and the Extraordinary World, if you haven't already.
It's set in a past futuristic world that lost the technology of electricity and "TPTB" control the knowledge (mostly).
Going to check out this St Petersburg thing today...
Just getting into it... Seems like he was a pioneer of remote viewing?...
?
Now it's like the script to Armageddon...
 
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Username: TartarHeir
Date: 2020-02-21 14:44:08
Reaction Score: 1
Hi, nice book.
I checked and was surprised, maybe not so insane..
So the student was able to travel from China to St.Peterburg in 8 days, by train through tunnels and than from border of Russia by Airship. It is impressive.

Another thing is that his mentor mentions bias monopoly producing scientists. It reminds me of something....:) In his time these scumscientist had now power over state, we all know which type of society we have now

He depicts totaly different socienty which promotes common good, instead of violence and personal profit. And I think that only this type of
society is able to build monumental starforts.

It reminds of Guliver travels. Which is too considered fiction :)
 
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Username: Red Bird
Date: 2020-02-21 15:15:00
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Yeah, did he fortell of the time when everything (history, science etc) had to be in comics ‘for the people’. i see this more and more now.
 
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Username: Starmonkey
Date: 2020-02-21 18:56:21
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Well I did grow up reading Chris Claremont's Uncanny X-Men.
And although serials and periodicals can get a bit repetitive, I got a healthy understanding of mythology and personality types.
Pictures definitely seem to add to the entrainment!
Imagine a time before "words" as we know them! It might not have been so entirely remote as we think...
 
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Username: KorbenDallas
Date: 2020-02-21 19:05:32
Reaction Score: 5
Well the guy allegedly wrote this in 1830s. To me, the heat delivery alone sounds insane enough. But there are many other things in there. Jules Verne is considered to be the pioneer of the science-fiction genre. His first book was published in 1863.

Global heat delivery systems, transporting warm air from the equator to colder regions of the world. Equatorial heat delivered to ppl’s houses?
  • Oh yes, I almost forgot….we did fly to the equator, but just for a short trip to see the start of the heat storage system which runs from here practically all over the northern hemisphere – it’s really amazing. A work of many ages and of superb engineering! Picture it: here there are huge machines collecting warm air into pipes which take it to the main reservoirs. All the heat stores in every city of this great state are connected to the main reservoirs. Then from each heat store part of the warm air is passed to each building and enclosed garden and part of it, to the air travel routes. In this way, in spite of the harsh climate, we barely experienced any cold at all. So the Russians have even been victorious over their hostile weather conditions. They told me that the local society of manufacturers would like to offer our government deliveries of cold air directly to Peking, to freshen the streets.
  • In the yard there was a blizzard blowing and in spite of the enormous size of the ventilators which constantly poured a huge amount of heat into the air, I had to wrap myself up warmly in my glass cloak.
Tunnels underneath the Caspian Sea and through Himalayas. Flying through tunnels?
  • We flew through the Himalayan tunnel at lightning speed but at the Caspian tunnel we were held up by an unexpected obstacle: you doubtless will have heard about the enormous meteorite which recently fell through the southern hemisphere: well, it fell in the region of the Caspian tunnel and scattered over the road. We were obliged to get out of the electric carriage and humbly walk through the scattered heaps of meteoric iron. There was a storm out at sea and the grey Caspian roared above our heads, threatening to come down on us at any moment. In fact, if the meteor had fallen just a few yards further on then the tunnel would surely have caved in and the angry waters taken their revenge on mankind for daring to oppose them. Luckily this time human skill withstood the onslaught of nature.
Ideas of electric trains in 1830s?
  • A few paces further on we were met by a new electro-carriage, magnificently equipped with galvanic headlights, and in the blink of an eye we were racing past the towers of Erzurum.
Indicators of them having social networking with a-la FB capabilities. Not sure if the author even understood sources he was working with.
  • You ought to know that in many homes people publish their news in this way, especially if they have a wide circle of acquaintances; it replaces ordinary correspondence. In each home there is a majordomo who is responsible for publishing the journal once a week or even daily. It’s very easy to do. When the masters of the house instruct him, he simply makes a note of everything they say and then takes a picture of it and prints enough copies to send out to everyone. The newspaper has the usual details of the health or illness of the masters and other domestic news, then various ideas and commentaries, small inventions and also invitations.
Telephones?
  • There is a magnetic telegraph system connecting the houses of people who know each other which allows for unplanned communications. People who live miles apart can use it to speak to each other.
 
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Username: Timeshifter
Date: 2020-02-21 19:09:35
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Quick skim read, near the end...

'Green people land a flying machine in London. Letters from the Moon. A means has been found to travel to the moon. It is uninhabited and serves only as a source of raw materials for the Earth. This saves the Earth from perishing due to the weight of population and its demands. These expeditions are extraordinarily dangerous – even more dangerous that earlier expeditions around the Earth – and they are only attempted by the military. Travellers take various gases with them in order to create air – which is lacking on the Moon'

Space corps....

Second Letter : 'Although the post office flying machines are excellent we were constantly delayed by headwinds'
Amazon Drones?
 
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Username: KorbenDallas
Date: 2020-02-21 19:16:52
Reaction Score: 6
I think the farther back we go in time, the more those people knew and had access to, informationwise. Look at this.

Take the word "Germans" as an example. Our scientists have dedicated so much work to it, but they still can’t unearth what its true meaning was. The Physicist had hit one of my sore points. As a student of history it’s easy to wind me up with that sort of criticism. I decided to show off my learning.
  • The Germans were a people who lived to the south of ancient Russia," I said. This is already beyond dispute. The Germans were subjugated by the Allemanns, then in the place of the Allemanns the Teutons appeared. The Teutons were then conquered by the Nemtsi, or more correctly, by the Germains, and then the Germains by the Deutsche. This last was a well studied ethnicity with a language that has been partially preserved in some fragments of writing by their poet Geothe…
  • Yes! That’s what we used to think – said Khartin. But now antiquaries are practically all of the opinion that the Deutsche were something quite different and the Germans were some sort of caste or class, which people from different tribes were able to join.
  • "well I must admit, that’s a completely new idea for me, I can see that our research is not quite up to speed on your latest discoveries.
 
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Username: Starmonkey
Date: 2020-02-21 19:31:16
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Look out, Tommy. The Germans are coming!
Maybe that's where all of the building materials came from. The MOON.
 
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Username: Timeshifter
Date: 2020-02-21 19:52:53
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'Books are invented that, using a machine, change the letters in several other books simultaneously'

Cloud files, One drive etc.
  • The time will come when books are written by telegraphic dispatch. It should be possible to write anything except perhaps tables, maps and some theses on loose leaf papers. Type setting will only be used for newspapers and business cards. Correspondence wil be replaced by electrical conversations. Novels will survive, but not for long. They will be replaced by theatre, and textbooks will be replaced by public lectures. There will be plenty of work for new scientific researchers. In the mornings to fly (there will be aircraft instead of horse-drawn carriages) to a dozen lectures, read twenty newspapers and as many pamphlets, quickly write a dozen pages and then hurry to the theatre. But the main task will be to train the intellect not to get tired. It will have to move instantaneously from one subject to another. They will need to sharpen their minds so that the most complex operations quickly become easy. A mathematical formula will be found that allows the reader to find exactly the page he needs in an enormous book and quickly calculate how many pages he can safely skip over.
Windows, Apple, Google, internet, wiki, smart device, perfectly explained here.

'There are machines for producing novels and drama' (photography/ film)
 
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Username: KorbenDallas
Date: 2020-02-21 19:53:45
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And this here is the Vasilyevsky Island - Wikipedia

vas-isl.jpg

Yesterday, one of the scientists here took me to the Cabinet of Curiosities. It’s in a huge building right in the middle of the Neva and which looks like a whole city on it own. There are arches joining it to the river banks, and from the windows you can see an enormous fountain which protects the coastal part of Petersburg from flooding. A nearby island, which in ancient times was called Vasilevskiy Island is also part of the Cabinet. It has an indoor garden with trees and bushes, and there are animals walking around freely there – although they’re behind bars they have plenty of space to roam. It’s an absolute work of art! It is entirely build on arches which are constantly heated by warm air – so only a few steps separate the tropical and temperate climate zones. The garden is like a miniature version of the entire planet, so walking round it is like a journey round the world. The creatures of each country are exhibited in the corresponding places, and the whole thing is laid out just like a globe. Above the garden, in the centre of the Cabinet building on the Neva itself, is a gigantic heated pool. There you can see rare species of fish and amphibians. On both sides are halls with the natural kingdoms of dry land – flora and fauna all displayed in chronological order starting with the creatures from before the flood up to the present day. Even a quick look round it all made me realise how Russian scientists manage to become so extraordinarily knowledgeable. It’s sufficient to make a thorough tour of the Cabinet, and without reading any books, you can receive the training of a well-informed naturalist. The collection of animals is truly wonderful. So many species have disappeared or changed completely! I was especially taken with the very rare exhibit of a giant horse, which still had its wool. It is very similar to those little horses which ladies like to keep with their bedroom dogs – but the ancient horse was an incredible size. I could hardly reach up to its head.
 
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Username: jd755
Date: 2020-02-21 20:05:39
Reaction Score: 1
Amazing isn't it how the this was the only part 'finished', though by whom and when is another pair of unaswered questions.
Fragments were published, why?
Were they different fragments on different dates or the same fragments published twice?
No translation unitl 2013 despite its 'fullest version' being published in 1926.
WHat does that mean?
is there more to come, surely if it were complete it would say complete, or maybe that's just me.
On the subject of translation google translate is going behind a sign in wall soon.
 
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Username: Timeshifter
Date: 2020-02-21 20:37:12
Reaction Score: 0
This part reminded me of the TV show Warehouse 13
 
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Username: Tool18
Date: 2020-02-25 17:04:25
Reaction Score: 1
Wow, that was facinating. I find it amazing that he was very accurate with many things. Considering it was written in 1835, this is quite amazing. Thanks for that read! Well worth it, I would recommend to anyone.
 
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