At the turn of the 20th Century, a star falls to earth, and life as we know it comes to an end. HG Wells' tale of a Martian invasion of Earth is one of the most enduring classics of science fiction. From its first publication in 1897, to its multiple film adaptations, the story has never lost its appeal. Told from the point of view of an unnamed narrator trying to flee from epicentreThe central focus of something. In an earthquake, the point on the Earth's surface directly above the focus. of an alien invasion in suburbanThe residential outskirts of cities or towns. Surrey, the novel wonders what would happen if humans were to encounter a species that was vastly technologically superior. As the battle between humans and Martians intensifies, the narrator is offered glimpses of a shattered social order. He and his brother see people turning on their fellow citizens. The narrator encounters a CurateTo carefully choose, arrange, and present different items in order to get a particular effect. who is unable to face up to the reality of what is happening, and an artilleryman who has a bold but futile fantasy of resistance. Then, when it seems all hope is gone, the Martians are defeated, not by heroic human resistance but by a “putrefactiveCausing rotting.” bacteria. Written when the British Empire was at the height of its power, the story puts the ambitions of governments and nations in perspective. We are offered a glimpse of how small we are in cosmic terms.
The War of the Worlds
At the turn of the 20th Century, a star falls to earth, and life as we know it comes to an end. HG Wells' tale of a Martian invasion of Earth is one of the most enduring classics of science fiction. From its first publication in 1897, to its multiple film adaptations, the story has never lost its appeal. Told from the point of view of an unnamed narrator trying to flee from epicentreThe central focus of something. In an earthquake, the point on the Earth's surface directly above the focus. of an alien invasion in suburbanThe residential outskirts of cities or towns. Surrey, the novel wonders what would happen if humans were to encounter a species that was vastly technologically superior. As the battle between humans and Martians intensifies, the narrator is offered glimpses of a shattered social order. He and his brother see people turning on their fellow citizens. The narrator encounters a CurateTo carefully choose, arrange, and present different items in order to get a particular effect. who is unable to face up to the reality of what is happening, and an artilleryman who has a bold but futile fantasy of resistance. Then, when it seems all hope is gone, the Martians are defeated, not by heroic human resistance but by a "putrefactiveCausing rotting." bacteria. Written when the British Empire was at the height of its power, the story puts the ambitions of governments and nations in perspective. We are offered a glimpse of how small we are in cosmic terms.
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Order is everywhere and nowhere in The War of the Worlds. Throughout the novel, we see traditional British social hierarchies, especially of class and gender, break down. Women arm themselves to fight off robbers who no longer show deference to the upper classes. Everyone is forced to steal what they have to to survive. The artilleryman makes the collapse of the old order clear when he says: "If you've got any drawing-room manners or a dislike to eating peas with a knife or dropping aitches, you'd better chuck 'em away. They ain't no further use." But while social order seems to be coming apart, the novel constantly points towards a vision of natural order. Humans are regularly compared to animals. From the point of view of the Martians, humans are beneath them, and they can treat us as we treat animals. In the late 19th Century, scientists often spoke about a hierarchy of animals and even falsely claimed that there was a hierarchy of human races. By staging a conflict with a creature higher up the rankings than us, the novel forces us to confront our own hierarchies and the cruelties they allow. At the same time, however, we are shown that, like our own order, this one does not really hold. The Martians are defeated by the lowest possible species, bacteria. The ultimate vision of the novel is one of disorder. This is most explicitly pointed to in the scientific law of entropy. This recently discovered scientific law showed that all systems in the universe leaked energy and would eventually break down. This is the reason why the Martians are invading Earth. Order is no match for disorder.
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The artilleryman says that what needs to be preserved of human civilisation is "not novels and poetry swipes, but ideas, science books". But The War of the Worlds is not a novel about scientists, with heroic science saving the day. Instead, the novel is an attempt to make a story out of recent scientific ideas. Two of the key scientific ideas that bear on the book are the theory of evolution, and the law of entropy (or the heat death of the universe), which Wells calls "the secular cooling that must someday overtake our planet". These two ideas emerged in the second half of the 19th Century, and they both challenged the idea that there was a permanent cosmicRelating to the universe or cosmos. order. The universe portrayed in this novel is tending towards decay, which drives the main conflict, as the Martians need Earth's resources. It also dramatises the impact of advanced technology, as we witness the power of the Martians, with their heat rays and "black smoke". The novel is about trying to confront scientific truth, and imagines how understanding scientific truths might change society.
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In 1859, Charles Darwin published The Origin of Species. He set out his theory that different species of life came to exist through a process he called natural selection. The struggle to survive meant that only creatures that were well adapted to the environment reproduced, passing on those adaptations. Many in VictorianThe era when Queen Victoria was on the British throne, from 1837 to 1901. Britain initially refused to believe such theories, arguing that they went against the creation story in the Bible. Others thought they presented a bleak view of existence, in which all of life was a competition at best, and a war at worst. For some, the theory of evolution also legitimised a hierarchy of human races - they believed that White Europeans were superior and more evolved than other humans. Wells' novel portrays the Martians as more advanced than humans. But by showing how they are not adapted to their environment, he points out that the theory of evolution is not about a hierarchy of species. It is simply a process of change and adaptation. That is what all of the characters in the novel do. They adapt to their new environment and they struggle to survive.
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In 1897, over one quarter of the world's population lived under British rule. The British justified their empire by claiming that their civilisation was superior to those they conquered, and The War of the Worlds makes ironic use of such claims. The narrator compares the Martian invasion to the genocideThe annihilation of a people, either through killing of its members, or through the suppression of its culture. of the indigenousEthnic groups who are the original or earliest-known inhabitants of an area or country: for example, Native Americans in the USA. Tasmanians conducted under British rule. "Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?", he asks, making it clear that Britain might not have the moral high ground. Beginning in the 1870s, there was a boom in invasion literature. Some experts see these stories expressing guilt about the Empire, while others see them as expressing fears about other European powers rising to pre-eminence. In the 1890s Britain and other European powers were engaged in what is called the scramble for Africa, attempting to control territory in Africa to extract natural resources.
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Perhaps the most memorable parts of the novel are the depiction of the horrors of war. We see battles between the best technology the British Empire has to offer, and the advanced weaponry of the Martians. When the Martians first emerge and use the heat-ray - "this flaming death, this invisible, inevitable sword of heat" - it becomes clear how unbalanced the battle will be. The technology of warfare had advanced in leaps and bounds in the 19th Century. By the time of the American civil warA war between people from the same country. , the machine gun had made it possible for one soldier to mow down dozens. It is clear that Wells was thinking about where technology would take war next. He speaks of weapons involving "black smoke"; chemical weapons such as mustard gas would soon be used in World War One. However, the novel is not just about the technology of war, it is about the experience of escaping war. Almost all the characters in the novel are refugees of one kind or another, and it attempts to bring home the horrors of war not just for those fighting but for everyone who finds themselves among its victims.
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Keywords
Epicentre - The central focus of something. In an earthquake, the point on the Earth's surface directly above the focus.
Suburban - The residential outskirts of cities or towns.
Curate - To carefully choose, arrange, and present different items in order to get a particular effect.
Putrefactive - Causing rotting.
Cosmic - Relating to the universe or cosmos.
Victorian - The era when Queen Victoria was on the British throne, from 1837 to 1901.
Genocide - The annihilation of a people, either through killing of its members, or through the suppression of its culture.
Indigenous - Ethnic groups who are the original or earliest-known inhabitants of an area or country: for example, Native Americans in the USA.
Civil war - A war between people from the same country.
The War of the Worlds
Glossary
Epicentre - The central focus of something. In an earthquake, the point on the Earth's surface directly above the focus.
Suburban - The residential outskirts of cities or towns.
Curate - To carefully choose, arrange, and present different items in order to get a particular effect.
Putrefactive - Causing rotting.
Cosmic - Relating to the universe or cosmos.
Victorian - The era when Queen Victoria was on the British throne, from 1837 to 1901.
Genocide - The annihilation of a people, either through killing of its members, or through the suppression of its culture.
Indigenous - Ethnic groups who are the original or earliest-known inhabitants of an area or country: for example, Native Americans in the USA.
Civil war - A war between people from the same country.