Planet of the Apes

Read the classic, chilling dystopian novel that inspired one of the world's most iconic film franchises

'A scintillating mix of sci-fi adventure and allegory' Los Angeles Times

In a spaceship that can travel at the speed of light, Ulysse, a journalist, sets off from Earth for the nearest solar system. There he finds Soror, a planet which resembles his own, but where humans behave like animals, and are hunted by a civilised race of primates.

Captured and sent to a research facility, Ulysse must convince the apes of their mutual origins. But such revelations will have always been greeted by prejudice and fear...

'A drastic warning about where mankind's apparent desire to destroy itself might lead' The Mirror

Review

A scintillating mix of sci-fi adventure and allegory ― Los Angeles Times

In 1963, at the most glacial moment of the Cold War, Frenchman Pierre Boulle wrote a novel called Planet Of The Apes - a drastic warning about where mankind's apparent desire to destroy itself might lead ― The Mirror

Boulle called on his own experiences as a prisoner of war in South-east Asia during the Second World War, using the relationship between man and apes as a metaphor for the treatment handed out to prisoners by brutish Japanese guards ― Daily Express

It's like a good myth or fairy-tale that stays with you... Part of the strength of this material is its disruptive, questioning nature. Who came first? Where are we going?

The subtext is strongly anti-slavery, anti-racist and anti-war ― Observer

About the Author

Pierre Boulle was born in 1912 at Avignon. Boulle spent the Second World War fighting in Yunnan, Calcutta and Indo-Chine, where he was captured by the Japanese. After the war he lived in Malaya, the Cameroons and, finally, Paris, where he settled until his death in 1994.