Yet another book that feels like I have read it before, maybe multiple times, because of how familiar the material, the plot, the theme, and the language in this books are.
I’ve read a handful of Wells’s books in the past– namely The War of the Worlds. And so I really felt like I had read this one. And if I have, it’s likely that I read the Great Illustrated Classics edition. You know the ones, right?
Anyway, what I didn’t realize about this book is how shallow and shameless the division of the future races are. It’s like reading a teenager’s recap of Nietzsche in sci-fi form, with a heavy dose of socialist theory mixed in. I think the desperation and in-bred fear of every good time travel book comes through well, especially given how rare time travel tropes were. And of course, the book itself delves into these same tropes, predating and previewing the kinds of books to come. So I like that a lot.
What I don’t like is: a) the year 800,000 is ridiculous as a concept. Given that we’ve only been around 100,000 years, going that far into the future and expecting anything remotely human is silly. I am glad that there aren’t humans, but even the splitting of the species into rough sketches of human attributes is weak. B) the racism. Wells’s time traveller buys into suspect theories of human anthropology, that races’ difference are based in anything besides economic opportunity, slavery, and political capital.
But it’s the basis of so much, and I am trying to expand my base. So now I’ve actually read it.
To come: Jules Verne.
(Photo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Time_Machine)
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