“The Martians are Coming! The Martians are Coming!”

Let me just preface this review with this statement:  I am no fan of science fiction, though I have read and enjoyed some futuristic novels, when it comes to technical gadgetry or beings from other planets, my brain tunes out.  It’s just not my cup of tea as I’m fond of saying.

 

So when H.G. Wells’ War of the Worlds turned up on my Victorian Literature syllabus, I was of two minds regarding it.  It’s a classic, therefore worthy of reading.  But invasion scare novels that star super intelligent beings from Mars attacking Earth don’t really ring my bell.  Wells, however, was a prolific author publishing in the late 1800s into the early 1900s and was considered very prophetic, his books after all dealt with gas warfare long before the advent of WWI, so I gave it my best shot.

 

In War of the Worlds, Wells takes a stab at critiquing his Victorian counterparts who have invaded and colonized much of the world by having Britain invaded in her turn by superior beings from Mars who consider Britons little more than dumb animals.  The Martians, when they arrive, turn out to be hostile beings, killing indiscriminately and are apparently undefeatable until a little thing called bacteria bites them in the proverbial butt.  The story is a firsthand account told from the perspective of the Speculative Philosopher, who also critiques the newspapers of the day, that apparently aren’t publishing the truth about the invasion and properly preparing the smug British population for the forthcoming attack.  There is some gadgetry description, and the Martians, rather than being the little green men I was raised to believe, are brown fungoid brains, with little use for bodies.  They have strange tentacles, hands really, that propel them along, when not riding around in machinery.  Springing off Darwin’s evolutionary theory in The Origin of Species and The Descent of Man, it was theorized that man would eventually become only rational beings, with no need for our emotional, feeling bodies.  The Martian’s Wells portrays is a critique of this theory.

 

There’s a lot going on in this one little book, and I’d love to say I thoroughly enjoyed it, but sadly that is not the case.  If you are a sci-fi enthusiast and haven’t read anything by Wells, I strongly urge you to.  As an early pioneer of the genre, and for his prophetic writing Wells is well worth checking out.  This non-sci-fi chick however will consider it an interesting read for an English Lit class and be thankful it’s over.

 

Till next time, happy reading!

L

 

 

“So many books, so little time.”

~ Frank Zappa