PENGUIN ACTIVE READING

Teacher Support Programme Teacher’s notes   LEVEL 2

Round the World in Eighty Days

Jules Verne journey. They have adventures in Egypt, India, Hong
Kong, China, Japan and America. They are followed all
the time by a determined policeman, Detective Fix, who
is convinced that Fogg is a bank robber. Fix slows down
Fogg’s progress on several occasions. Also, in India his
journey is interrupted when he decides to save a young
girl, Aouda, from certain death, and in America when
he rescues Passepartout from the Indians. Fogg arrives
back in Liverpool and is arrested by Fix. This delays him,
apparently crucially, for a day and Fogg and Passepartout
think they have arrived back in London one day too late.
Fogg then realises his love for Aouda is more important to
him than money and asks her to marry him. In the end,
Passepartout discovers that by travelling round the world
About the author
to the east, they have actually gained a day, and therefore
Jules Verne is sometimes considered to be the father of
Fogg has won the bet after all.
science fiction. However, in Round the World in Eighty
Days, he shows that he is also the master of the ‘road’ type Chapters 1–2: Phileas Fogg dismisses his servant, and
story, in which the action is constantly moved forward by employs a new, French servant Jean Passepartout. Then
the physical movement of the main characters from place he goes to his club. There, his friends are talking about a
to place. bank robbery. Then Fogg bets his friends £20,000 that he
can travel around the world in eighty days. He has to be
Jules Verne studied law in Paris and then became secretary
back in the club on 21 December. Fogg returns home and
of the Theatre Lyrique before working as a stockbroker.
tells Passepartout to prepare for the journey. His friends
His first fictional works were plays and the words for
say goodbye to Fogg and Passepartout at the railway
operas. Then, at the age of thirty-four, he wrote the
station. Some days later, the police receive a letter from
adventure story Five Weeks in a Balloon which was quickly
Detective Fix telling them he is following Phileas Fogg,
followed by the science fiction classic Journey to the Centre
who he believes is the bank thief.
of the Earth, published in 1864.
Chapters 3– 4: Fix, Fogg and Passepartout arrive in
Verne was very good at combining an exciting adventure
Suez, Egypt. Fix talks to Passepartout in the street and
story with a fantastical idea, supported by scientific
learns that Fogg is in a great hurry, has a lot of money
knowledge or speculation. Verne was fascinated by
and is travelling to Bombay. Fix gets on the same ship to
exploration and he wrote a history of this, spanning from
Bombay. In Bombay, Passepartout gets into a fight in a
the Phoenician times to the mid-nineteenth century. In
temple because he is wearing shoes. Fix wants to arrest
all his well known works, his characters use the latest
Fogg, but the warrant is still in the post from England.
‘inventions’ to explore the moon, ocean depths, the centre
They take a train from Bombay to Calcutta, but it stops
of the earth, or as in this story, simply to travel further
half way and they have to complete some of the journey
and faster than ever before. Amongst the inventions he
on an elephant. They see a lot of people taking a dead
predicted in his writings are flights into space, submarines,
man and his beautiful young wife, Aouda, to a temple.
helicopters, air conditioning, guided missiles and motion
The guide tells Fogg that the people are going to burn the
pictures.
woman with her dead husband.

Summary Chapters 5 – 6: Fogg decides they must rescue Aouda. The

The story begins in a gentlemen’s club in London in next morning, the people prepare the fire for the drugged
1872. Phileas Fogg is introduced and we learn that he Aouda and her dead husband. Suddenly it appears as if
is a cold man and very strict in his habits. Fogg makes a the dead man gets up and carries Aouda away from the
bet with his friends in the club that he can travel around people. In fact, it is Passepartout. They continue their
the world in eighty days. They accept the bet of £20,000 journey to Calcutta and Fogg tells Aouda he will take her
and Fogg and his servant Passepartout set out on their to Hong Kong to escape from her dead husband’s family.

c Pearson Education Limited 2008 Round the World in Eighty Days - Teacher’s notes   of 3
 PENGUIN ACTIVE READING
Teacher Support Programme Teacher’s notes   LEVEL 2

Round the World in Eighty Days

In Calcutta, Fogg and Passepartout are taken to the police beginning to achieve his goal, but is diverted from his
station. Passepartout is threatened with prison because purpose when people are in danger. He wants to save the
of what happened in the temple in Bombay, but Fogg beautiful Aouda from her fate and risks his life to rescue
decides to pay the bail money and is released. Detective Passepartout from the Indians. As the journey progresses,
Fix witnesses this and is very angry. Fogg’s icy character begins to melt, culminating in his
Chapters 7–8: The group, including Fix, travel to Hong realisation that his love for Aouda and Passepartout’s
Kong. In a bar in Hong Kong, Fix tells Passepartout that friendship are more important to him than having money
he is a policeman and that Fogg is a bank robber. The or winning the bet.
captain of the Carnatic tells Passepartout that the ship will Science: As in other Verne novels, the power of science, in
leave that evening and not the next day as Fogg thinks it this case science in the form of various forms of transport,
will. Passepartout wants to tell Fogg about this change of is used to make the world a smaller place. The record
plan but falls asleep in a bar because Fix put something breaking challenge narrated in the book could not have
in his drink. When Passepartout wakes up, he gets on the been achieved, or even contemplated, in a world without
Carnatic alone. The next morning Fogg and Aouda cannot trains and powered ships. However, Verne does concede
find Passepartout and they discover that their ship, the that nature is still a powerful force. The weather, animals
Carnatic, left the previous evening. Fogg looks for another and unforeseen accidents all play a part in frustrating
ship. He finds a seaman who will take them to Shanghai Fogg’s attempt to go round the world.
and Fix, Fogg and Aouda travel there in a terrible storm. Humour: The detective in the novel could be seen as a
Chapters 9–10: The group travels to Yokohama and clumsy, comical character. His efforts to arrest Fogg always
meets up with Passepartout. Passepartout sees Detective come to nothing, partly due to Fogg’s cunning and partly
Fix and hits him. Fix tells Passepartout that he wants to because the arrest warrant never catches up with him. He
help Phileas Fogg get to England so he can arrest him is also completely wrong in thinking that Fogg is a bank
there. The group arrive in San Francisco. From there they robber.
take a train to New York. They are attacked by Indians
and the train driver is killed. Passepartout manages to stop Discussion activities
the train near a fort and the soldiers come to help. The
Before reading
Indians run away, but they take Passepartout and three 1 Discuss: Put students into groups and ask them
other people with them. Fogg and thirty soldiers rescue to make a list of famous travellers and explorers
Passepartout. The delay means they cannot arrive in New throughout history e.g., Christopher Columbus,
York in time to catch their ship to England. Marco Polo, Captain Cook, Livingstone, Neil
Armstrong and the Apollo missions. Get feedback
Chapters 11–12: In New York, Fogg looks for a ship and write the list on the board. Tell students to
to take them to Liverpool. Fogg pays the captain of the discuss the following questions.
Henrietta and they arrive in Liverpool on 21 December. When did they travel? How did they travel? Where did
they go? Why did they go? How did things change because
Fogg is taken to the police station. Here, Fix admits
of these people? What have we got today because of these
he made a mistake and that Fogg is not a bank robber. people?
Fogg hits him. They get a train to London but arrive five
minutes too late to win the bet. Fogg and Aouda decide Chapters 1–2
to get married. Passepartout goes to the church to make After reading
2 Pair work: Put the students in pairs and ask them
arrangements and when he comes back, he tells Fogg that to make a list of things that they would pack in a
they have made a mistake and that they have arrived in small bag for a journey around the world. About five
England one day earlier than they had thought. They rush things are sufficient. Write their suggestions on the
to the club and arrive just in time to win the bet. board. Tell the students they now have to vote for
the three things they think are the most useful from
Background and themes the complete list. Go through the list and count the
number of votes each item receives to see which three
Love and friendship: At the beginning of the book, the class as a whole considers to be the most
Phileas Fogg is portrayed as a cold and distant character, important.
obsessed with punctuality. He is determined from the

c Pearson Education Limited 2008 Round the World in Eighty Days - Teacher’s notes  of 3
 PENGUIN ACTIVE READING
Teacher Support Programme Teacher’s notes   LEVEL 2

Round the World in Eighty Days

Chapters 3– 4 After reading
Before reading 9 Pair work: Write the following words on the board:
3 Research: In groups students find out as much as garden, buffaloes, soldiers, thief, guns, Indians. Have the
they can about either Egypt or India. This should students talk and write in pairs to say how these
include information about history, population, words were used in Chapters 9 and 10.
language, main cities, the weather, customs, music,
Chapters 11–12
festivals, typical food etc. Students give either an oral
or written and illustrated presentation about the While reading (p. 54. After the sentence ‘Do you
country. know that I love you?’)
10 Write: Divide the class in half and tell one group
After reading they are Phileas Fogg and the other Aouda. In pairs,
4 Discuss: Ask the students ‘Why were the men in the students then write a love letter saying why they want
temple angry with Passepartout?’ to marry. Suggest the following reasons, some are
Elicit the answer. Talk about how different cultures/ real and some are invented. Encourage them to be
religions often have their own norms about imaginative.
appropriate behaviour. Put students in groups to Student A: (Fogg ) Aouda is very beautiful. She has no
talk about what the dominant norms are in their family or any money. She is a good cook. She likes
own culture or religion and in any other cultures or playing cards.
religions they are familiar with. Student B: (Aouda) Fogg is very rich. He lives in
London. He is strong. He is very nice.
Chapters 5 – 6
After reading After reading
5 Write and guess: Put students in pairs and ask them 11 Write and ask: Write ‘Who was the captain of the
to choose a short paragraph from Chapters 5 and 6. Henrietta?’ on the board and elicit the answer
Tell then to write it again, making five changes to (Captain Speedy). Ask students to write another
words in the text. Students then read out their question about something in Chapters 11 and 12.
paragraphs to the other students, who have to identify Check their work as they do this. Now have students
the mistakes. stand up and mingle, asking and answering each
other’s questions.
Chapters 7– 8 12 Write: Put students in pairs to write a short
Before reading description of one of the main characters in the book.
6 Pair work: Tell the students that Phileas Fogg and his (Phileas Fogg, Passepartout, Detective Fix, Aouda).
friends are going to Hong Kong. Put the students into 13 Discuss: Put the students in small groups to imagine
pairs and ask them to talk about Hong Kong: what will happen in the future.
Where is it? Is it a big or small? Are there a lot of people Fogg
there? What kind of food do people eat? Is it noisy? Is the Will he be a good husband?
weather hot or cold, dry or wet? Will he go round the world again?
Passepartout
After reading Will he work for Fogg in the future?
7 Discuss: At the end of Chapter 8, the Tankadere is Will Fogg give him some money from the bet?
travelling in very bad weather. Put the students in Detective Fix
small groups and ask them to think of a journey they Will he be a policeman in the future?
or someone they know has made that was frightening. Will he see Fogg again?
Alternatively, students can invent a frightening Aouda
journey. Will she go back to India?
Were you in a car, a train, a ship or a plane? Where were Will she like London?
you when things started to go wrong? What happened?
What did you think at the time and after? Vocabulary activities
Students then tell their stories to the rest of the class. For the Word list and vocabulary activities, go to
www.penguinreaders.com.
Chapters 9 –10
Before reading
8 Write: Tell the students that Fogg is going to travel
across America. Put the students in small groups and
give them five minutes to make a list of every famous
thing or person they know that is American. These
could be famous actors, politicians, sportspeople,
cities, food, buildings, or geographical features. The
group with the longest list wins.
c Pearson Education Limited 2008 Round the World in Eighty Days - Teacher’s notes  of 3