Maracot Deep: The Riffles Howe Affair

The book includes the science fiction novel "The Maracotta Abyss" by the famous English writer Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930), as well as his story "The Deed of Raffles Howe". In both of these works Doyle shows his extraordinary writing skills, incredibly twisting the intriguing plot. All texts are translated by Dmitry Mochnev. The book is decorated with illustrations that appeared on the pages of various foreign periodicals that first printed Doyle's works. At the end of the edition there are also illustrations for "The Maracott Abyss", made by French artist René Giffey (1884-1965) for the magazines "Le Pele-Mele" and "Sciences et Voyages".
The science fiction novel Marakota Abyss was first printed in a separate edition in 1929. It became the last major work of Arthur Conan Doyle (1859-1930). In "Abyss" the writer skillfully played the interest of the reading public to the depths of the ocean, which in the early twentieth century still remained a kind of white spots on the maps of our planet. Doyle's talent and imagination allowed him to go far beyond the style of "scientific expeditions", which was developed in European literature by Jules Verne. Doyle masterfully twists the intriguing plot of his novel, introducing readers to the Atlanteans - inhabitants of the deep-water trench of the Atlantic Ocean. In the last years of his life Doyle was fond of spiritualism and so-called occult knowledge. In the novel, this fascination is noticeable in the last part of the "Abyss", in which the heroes encounter in one of the abandoned temples with immortals all-powerful lord of the "otherworld". Publishers in Soviet Russia could not afford to print Doyle's lengthy and mystical fabrications about "the eternal struggle between good and evil" and about diabolical forces. Therefore, in 1927-1929, when the novel was published in the domestic magazines "Around the World", "World of Adventures" and "World Pathfinder" its text was given in abridged form. Fully "Marakotova Abyss" was published in Russia at the end of the twentieth century. No less interesting and Doyle's story "Acts of Raffles Howe", on the pages of which the writer realizes the long dream of alchemists to turn lead into gold. According to Doyle such a trick is able to undermine the entire world economy. The book is decorated with illustrations that appeared on the pages of various foreign periodicals that first printed Doyle's works. Many of them are made by the fine artist Anton Otto Fischer (1882-1962). He had a long and fruitful association with the magazine "Saterday Evening Post", where, among other things, stories by popular writers were printed. Among them were Robert Stevenson, Jules Verne, Herman Melville, Jack London, and Arthur Conan Doyle. The novel "Marakota Abyss" was printed in the first third of the twentieth century, not only British and American magazines. He had success in France, where his text was published on the pages of magazines "Le Pele-Mele" (1928-1929) and "Sciences et Voyages" (1930). To illustrate The Abyss, the French publishers engaged the then famous artist René Giffi (1884-1965). He was not only an excellent cartoonist - in the history of European art, Giffi's name is inextricably linked to the development of the comics field. His illustrations for The Maracotta Abyss are published at the end of this edition.