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Pessimistic view of man's ultimate progress
“With a Kindle in one's hands, downloading and reading many older books that are no longer in copyright is both free and simple. Having thus come into possession of H.G. Wells' The Time Machine the other day by way of experimenting with the Kindle, I found myself reading it at once, and so, almost without meaning to begin it, I've finished. In the book, first published in 1895, an unidentified narrator relates what he and others were told by the so-called Time Traveller, at whose house they were accustomed to congregate on successive Thursdays. The Time Traveller had built a time machine which he showed to the assembled one week. The following week, arriving at his own house for dinner late, sockless, and apparently injured, he told them of the experiences he'd had in the future since their last meeting. The Time Traveller had in fact gone very far into the future, looking to discover the ultimate fate of the earth, but he spent most of his time in the year 802,701. There he was greeted by strange descendants of humanity, the Eloi--small, childlike, sexless, pasty people, all of them having "the same girlish rotundity of limb." They spoke an uncomplicated, mellifluous language and all dressed similarly. (Here is the antecedent for that Star Trek trope, noted by Jerry Seinfeld, wherein everyone in the future always wears the same outfit.) The Eloi were strangely uninquisitive, apparently fearless, and they seemed to live in a sort of paradise, where man had thoroughly subjugated nature to his needs and, having nothing further to fear or for which to strive, had become soft. So, at least, the Time Traveller thought at first. But his first impressions turned out to be horribly mistaken, and the novel, in the end, is deeply pessimistic about the ultimate progress of mankind, Wells having taken the development of the relationship between the haves and the have-nots to its distressing extreme.
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-11-11.
-- Debra Hamel” -
1 of 2 members found this review helpful.
Different Way of Writing Back Then
“I attempted to read one more "classic" story - H.G. Wells' The Time Machine.
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-07-07.
The way people wrote stories back in the day is very different than what I'm used to. For the books I read, I don't know all the answers until the final twist.
For books that fall under the genre, "Classic" (i.e. Jekyll & Hyde, Invisible Man, etc...) you already know how things turn out.
Take this book for example. The Time Traveler invites his audience to his flat for dinner. As they are waiting for him to join them at the table, he stumbles out of a doorway and proceeds to tell them the story of his adventure traveling through time.
There shouldn't be any suspense because you already know that he survives the ordeal. Perhaps the purpose of this book, like it's classic cousins, is to inform the reader of some deeper point than just to deliver an action adventure story.
Having said all that, I am glad I finally picked it up and finished it.” -
1 of 2 members found this review helpful.
time machine
“I thought this was a mostly good book,but some parts were a little creepy. Also some words were a little too big (but hey, more dictionary practice!).On the plus side, the plot is interesting, and it is a definitely a book i d recommend. It seemed to me like it was a cross between mystery and science fiction. For younger kids, I'd advise a retold version because of some of the big words and creepy parts. Overall, I'd say this is a good book to read.”
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-06-08. -
Way Ahead of His Time
“Wells departs from the traditional fiction role to pursue something truly unique and untested in attempts at the science fiction genre of his time. He diverts from the magic of Jules Verne, embarking on a new realm, on his own journey. Where Verne's interests lie in maritime stories of a more mundane nature, as fantastic as these were, we see Wells far more interested in what becomes of a people, of civilization, of earth. We see a writer who looks deeply into the human psyche, wondering how we perceive the passage of time.
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-05-24.
Ok, so the book starts out straight enough, with four blokes discussing how such a machine could work. He convinces us that a unique perspective will reshape the cutting edge. They are blown away when the ostensible time traveler returns in only moments, having indicated that he spent days in this futuristic world of the haves and have-nots, of the Morlocks and the Eloi. When one of these delicate creatures dies, he learned, the others let it go as part of their every day events. Of course, when the traveler is battle-scarred, made weary of his adventures and tired of the vegetarian diet the Eloi provided him, his colleagues are not convinced but confused. Then, during the events of the new moon, when all is bleak outside, do these Morlocks attack the Eloi. He faces a terrifying sequence. Then he discovers his time machine had vanished from where he left it when he arrived. Let's not give the plot away now. Find out how he gets it back, and how he relates these things to his friends who await his return. It turns out that the Morlocks are highly developed individuals, having abandoned their mechanized world long ago, choosing to "harvest" the Eloi like cattle, allowing them to graze on the vegetation.
Wells is brilliant the way he orchestrates this tale, pitting one aspect of society against the other, making you wonder about how things could end up that way even from our modern perspective. Wells is, no doubt, years and years ahead of his time. Although it's easy enough for a high school student to read, the depth will make you return to his intense literary style again and again. I did.
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1 of 1 members found this review helpful.
A High School Student's Review
“From the beginning of time the human race has always had a special concern for the future. What lay in store and what will become of life here on Earth? What will happen to the Earth after it endures horrific natural disasters? Thousands of years later we as a civilization still worry about the future and how we will get through it. In The Time Machine by H.G. Wells we read about the fascinating journey of a single man hundreds of thousands of years into the future using a machine that he spend countless times working to perfect. It is when he travels 800,000 years into the future that he truly is shown what will happen to the human race.
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-05-04.
After having read War of the Worlds, I am convinced H.G. Wells is a brilliant author, and in his book The Time Machine he expresses his thoughts and his opinions on what will happen to the Earth after an apparent "Doomsday." He avoids any possible time paradoxes that may occur from interfering with time. The only problem that I had with the book was how he went so far into the future of the Earth (800,000 years) and humans still existed, which can be questionable if a species can survive for that amount of time. Wells then uses his amazing logical thinking skills to write a novel based solely on this single concept.
The Time Machine is an excellent book, that, as a child, I did not fully understand. When I was younger, I truly did believe that the concept of time travel was possible and that I was just too young to know about it. I very much desired to travel into the future to see what I would be doing at an older age and how I would look. Now that I am old enough to genuinely understand the book I still hold on to those same desires, although they have been slightly altered as I now recognize time travel to not be quite as easy as I thought. I am also surprised by how many of the people commenting on the book saw the movie first. Also, in response to Akachei's comment, I think that Wells did a fine job of comparing the two classes, because in the present time this scenario may not seem practical, but 800,000 years into the future, this could be life.
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