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Please post any background information or other additional material you think may be helpful and relevant to the reading. Please post spoilers where appropriator.

H. G. (Herbert George) Wells was born in Bromley, Kent in 1866. He died in 1946. He was the son of an unsuccessful tradesman and professional cricket player. He was apprenticed to a drapery early in life. He became an assistant teacher at Midhurst Grammer School where he studied by night and won a scholarship in 1884 to the Normal School of Science in South Kensington. Here he was influenced by T.H. Huxley. He struggled with poor health and as a teacher.

He married his cousin, Isabel, in 1891 which was an unhappy marriage. He eloped with his student, Amy Catherine Robbins in 1895, but he was known for affairs and criticized marriage.

He joined the Fabian Society in 1903 but was soon at odds with it. Impatient and turbulent, his career as a writer/thinker was marked by a provocative independence. His literary output was vast and extremely varied. Wells is best remembered for his scientific romances and the earliest products of a new genre - science fiction. The Time Machine was his first of this genre and published in 1895. Followed by The Wonderful Visit in the same year, and The Island of Doctor Moreau in 1896.

Here's a biography of Wells.

I've just put that link on the Dr Moreau thread Deborah, together with some other info about Wells.

Extract from another biog:-

'In the early 1920s Wells was a labour candidate for Parliament. Although Wells had many reservations about the Soviet system, he understood the broad aims of the Russian Revolution, and had in 1920 a fairly amiable meeting with Lenin, though temperamentally he was hostile to Marxism. Lenin, behind his back, called him "a dreadful bourgeois and a little philistine." Wells introduced in The Open Conspiracy the idea of a new world order, in which "suitably equipped groups of the most interested, intelligent, and devoted people" would form a world directorate to run humanity's public affairs.'



After the chaos of the First World War a number of authors and thinkers were experimenting with the idea of a 'new world order' and an international government. Indeed, this is how the United Nations came about in 1942 after the League of Nations, formed after WWI in conjunction with The International Labour Organisation, was disbanded. The aim of these organisations was (and still is) to stop wars between countries and to provide a platform for dialogue.

What happened in Russia under communism, which quickly became Stalinism after the death of Lenin, has discredited many of the ideals of people like H G Wells but looking at the cruel chaos of capitalism today modern Fabians like myself can't help thinking that we have thrown out some healthy socialist babies with the unhealthy communist bath water (and are continuing to do so):(

Thanks Madge! Your research is always amazing.

One a somewhat connected note, there was a great American Experience show on PBS that covered the Orson Welles radio show of H.G. Wells War of the Worlds. It was really enjoyable especially since we're getting to read Wells.

Madge wrote: "I've just put that link on the Dr Moreau thread Deborah, together with some other info about Wells.

Extract from another biog:-

'In the early 1920s Wells was a labour candidate for Parliament. Al..."

In reading through the intro in my book which had a great timeline (too long to reproduce and the ones online weren't very good), I, who has never been a Fabian, had to wonder whether these readings would be all the more meaningful because of how our society acts today.

Deborah wrote: I, who has never been a Fabian, had to wonder whether these readings would be all the more meaningful because of how our society acts today.

The problem is that Soviet communism came about whilst Fabian/Socialist thinking was in its infancy and democratic socialism became discredited alongside communism. Apart from the Labour Government after WWII, which set up the National Health Service and nationalised the utility companies, socialism has never had a fair crack of the whip in politics, except perhaps in Scandinavia where they have had long term socialist governments since WWII and have a very high standard of living combined with good social policies. Americans in particular, are unduly prejudiced against any form of socialism, hence the hysterical opposition against 'Obamacare' which has flourished in Europe and Scandinavia since WWII.

...there was a great American Experience show on PBS that covered the Orson Welles radio show of H.G. Wells War of the Worlds

BBC Radio 4 broadcast it last weekend - very enjoyable indeed. Folks might be able to catch it here:-

What accounted for his fascination with science fiction? He wrote a great deal on politics, but those pieces aren't read today.

BTW--he also wrote The Invisible Man, the basis for the film classic of 1933. This was Claude Rains' American debut role.

As science progressed and belief in God declined, people like Wells imagined more and more possibilities 'out there'. Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and The Last Man had started the trend