Review by Marian Powell   —   January 25, 2000

The lines were originally written by H.G. Wells for his novel. It is astonishing to realize that in 1898, no one had ever written about aliens from outer space invading earth. Science Fiction novels on other themes were being written by Jules Verne and a few others. Mary Shelley begun the field with Frankenstein and The Last Man. But War of the Worlds is the first novel with that theme and it is still one of the greatest. Even today, it is a page turner, so this is a public service announcement. Warning: If you pick up War of the Worlds intending just to glance at it, you may find yourself hooked, trapped by the story, unable to put it down. It's amazing therefore that this is a lost book. I suspect that people are scared off by hearing that its a famous classic. Classics are supposed to be dull, fit only for required reading lists. Nothing could be further from the truth with War of the Worlds.

Basically, it is a good, fast moving story. It keeps you glued to your chair both by its plot, but also by its writing. This is not fast food writing. This is not the kind of writing that you consume like french fries, enjoy and forget instantly. The prose is beautiful, every word seemingly chosen with care to build up a scene or create a mood. The quote that began this review is one example. Here is another to describe the collapse of the government and the end of law and order, "All organizations were losing coherency, losing shape and efficiency, guttering, softening, running at last in that swift liquefaction of the social body."

Right from the start, the reader is given a growing sense of danger, dread and horror. The narrator (who seems to be Wells, himself) describes the ancient, doomed civilization of Mars. It is doomed because Mars itself is a dying planet and the Martians must look elsewhere if they are to survive. They look to the earth and they have a technology so advanced and a moral sense so non-existent, that people do not exist for them except as a nuisance to be gotten rid of.

Having given the reader that background information, Wells describes the landing of a mysterious object near the small English town where he is living happily with his wife. The object is regarded at first as a meteorite, then as a curiosity and then as an enigma as it slowly opens. No one sees it as dangerous until it lashes out with a deadly heat ray, killing people. (Clearly Wells anticipated the invention of the laser!) When these first deaths occur, the narrator hastily sends his wife to stay with relatives a few miles away, not anticipating any real danger, but just being sensibly cautious. He himself quite matter of factly returns home and is suddenly plunged into the midst of chaos and danger. The Martians are on the move. More and more of the strange objects are landing. The Martians ignore all efforts to communicate and contemptuously destroy all human efforts at attack or defense. The Martians begin a sweep of the countryside, slaughtering everyone in their path.

The surviving population begins a panic-stricken flight towards the safety of London. Everyone knows they will be safe in London for the armed might of the British Empire is hastily assembling. This book was written when the famous saying, "The sun never sets on the British Empire" was a simple statement of fact. England had the greatest army and navy in the world. Her military was armed with the finest weapons, the newest technology. She was invincible. (This is why in a few years England was to rush eagerly into World War I, confident that victory would be easy.)

So everyone expects that the moment the British army goes into action against the Martians, the Martians will be doomed. Instead, the Martians simply annihilate the British army. The highest technology known to man is slapped aside like the stinging of mosquitoes. That is all man is to the invader, a pesky insect. Or, as a soldier who is the sole survivor of his unit tells the narrator, their best efforts were: "It's bows and arrows against the lightning." I doubt that we, reading it today, can fully grasp how shocking that must have sounded to the average Victorian reader.

That was Well's intention -- to shock the reader. It's no accident that he used the simile of bows and arrows against the lightning. Great Britain (along with the other Western powers) had been able to conquer "savages" around the world because the British had the lightning (guns) and the "savages" had only bows and arrows. Out of those victories came a sense of moral superiority the concept that Western civilization was superior instead of admitting that it was only Western technology that was momentarily superior. Wells was a writer on social issues and he used science fiction to show what would happen if the British Empire came up against aliens who were as far beyond them as they were beyond the "savages" they had conquered and who treated them as they did the "savages." In War of the Worlds, it is made very clear that the Martians really don't behave any worse towards humans than humans behave towards each other. In fact, he comments early in his story, "Before we judge of them (the Martians) too harshly, we must remember what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought...Are we such Apostles of Mercy as to complain if the Martians warred in the same spirit?"

Wells wanted his readers to think and feel what it means to be a conquered people who are conquered and destroyed not through lack of courage or effort but simply because the enemy's technology is superior. I have no idea how many readers of the day understood the message and learned humility from it. War of the Worlds began that popular part of science fiction that imagines invasions from outer space, the most recent being the blockbuster Independence Day. Here the message is, unfortunately, that even though alien technology is superior, humans are able to cleverly find a way to defeat the enemy. That makes for a good, exciting story, but it is not the message Wells was giving.

War of the Worlds does have a happy ending. The aliens are defeated, but not by the cleverness and resourcefulness of man. Something else defeats them and saves the human race. The message of War of the Worlds then is as timely today as it was in 1898. Man is not the master of the earth, much less the universe. Man needs to learn to walk humbly upon the earth and value what he has before it all is lost.

If you have any comments, you may contact the reviewer at mepowell@cybermesa.com.