y would H.G. Wells never give a name to his hero/protagonist in The War of the Worlds? What is the significance of his anonymty?
2.Wells attended the Normal School of Science where he became a biologist. His prime passions, however, remained reading and writing. What effect did this combination of interests have on H.G. Wells’ style as a writer?
3.The character of the curate represents organized religion in The War of the Worlds. What is H.G. Wells saying about the role of organized religion in dealing with the Martians and metaphorically, with the real world’s political and social problems? Do you agree or disagree with his assessment?
4.Criticize or defend H.G. Wells’ conclusion to the Martians’ invasion. Was the Martians’ defeat appropriate or should the novel have ended differently? What does the ending say about the control humans have over life?
5.In Well’s novel, after the Martians have died, the protagonist reflects upon how similar the Martian’s attack was to the destruction that people have wrought upon one another. Discuss some examples from history in which one group of people has attempted to destroy another group of people. What, if anything, could be done to try to prevent such acts from happening in the future? 6.H.G. Wells has been accused by some critics as advocating social engineering, an idea whereby society attempts to hasten the rise of the strong and the demise of the weak. In The War of the Worlds, do you think that Wells was agreeing or disagreeing with this idea?
Recall elements or scenes from contemporary science fiction books, movies, or television programs that are similar to what you’ve come across in the 1898 novel. Make the point that writers both influence future generations and often reach to the past for their own inspiration.
Questions by Chapter: Chapter 1: The Eve of the War From what perspective is humanity viewed? What qualities in the Martians make them dangerous to humanity? Mars' reddish color led to speculation that it had at one time held more oxygen in its atmosphere, now locked up in iron oxide. Wells' treatment of it as an old and nearly-exhausted world was commonplace at the time he was writing, and his adoption of this view influenced much later Martian fiction. The American bison seemed poised on the brink of extinction in 1898, though it has since been brought back; but the dodo was entirely killed off by English explorers of Mauritius in the 17th Century, becoming in fact synonymous with extinction, as in the expression "dead as a dodo." In the 18th Century the British almost eliminated the native inhabitants of Tasmania, an island off the coast of Australia, when they turned it into a penal colony. Wells several times draws parallels between the Martians' treatment of Earth and Britain's treatment of its colonies. The use of gigantic guns rather than rockets to launch space vehicles may have been inspired by Jules Verne's From the Earth to the Moon (1865). In Orson Welles' production, the narrator is Ogilvy, the astronomer, introduced against the background of the ticking clockwork described here. What effect does it have on the novel to have an ordinary, unnamed narrator, not technically trained and often far from the center of activity? What irony is created by the topic of the series of papers he is writing? The bicycle had been recently invented, and Wells was learning how to ride one during the writing of the novel.
Chapter 2: The Falling Star In the second paragraph, what evidence is there that Wells is trying to avoid making his narrator a perfect observer? Why do you suppose he does this? How is Ogilvy's first reaction to the movement of the cylinder top ironic? In the absence of broadcasting , the telegraph was the fastest means of communication, and ordinary people received the news by one of several different editions of newspapers during the day. What error do the first reports of the landing make?
Chapter 3: On Horsell Common What methods does Wells use to make these events seem realistic?
Chapter 4: The Cylinder Unscrews What is a Gorgon, and why might Wells have chosen to compare the Martians to one? In what way does Wells make his narrator distinctly unheroic?
Chapter 5: The Heat-Ray X-rays were discovered by Roentgen in 1895; and novelists immediately began imagining all manner of other rays which could be used as weapons; but Wells is probably thinking here as well of ancient accounts of "Greek fire" projected against enemies to terrifying effect. What is the narrator's reaction to the attack?
Chapter 7: How I Reached Home Wells' description of psychic numbing as a result of trauma seems very modern. Why is it important that the narrator not be an omnicompetent swaggering hero in the Arnold Schwarzenegger mold? What seems to be the narrator's attitudes toward working class people? Gravity acts "like a cope of lead" on the Martians; this phrase recalls the punishment of hypocrites in Canto 23 of Dante's Inferno, (read t