The Time Machine and Wells’ Social Trajectory By John Huntington

1. The Time Machine and Wells’ Social Trajectory By John Huntington Presented by: Allison Norcross Brittany Norcross Chelsea Wheeler Jessica Massie

2. Lionel Stevenson- “H.G. Wells emerged from the lowest stratum of the middle class, which had previously produced only one major English novel- Dickens” (Huntington 222). • Some of Wells' accomplishments are ignored if his social origin is ignored. • The Time Machine gave voice to Wells' social angers while still allowing him to become a successful writer.

3. The Time Traveller “…hated to have servants waiting at dinner” (p. 14). • Reveals that the Time Traveller had a social conscience before he saw the consequences of the class system in the future. • Uncomfortable with the master-servant relationship, he still kept servants & enjoyed the benefits of having them. • “Not so much a sign of 'conscience' as it is a sign of a person who has been in the servant class” (Huntington 222). • The issue with how to handle a servant belonged to Wells just as much as the Time Traveller. • “The position of privilege... is also... an object of resentment” (Huntington 223).

4. The attitude towards the Morlocks is one of mixed emotions. • Conditions of the underground servants' quarters at Upparkmade Wells furious. • Anthony West- “…such rage is evidence of sympathy rather than horror and fear” (Huntington 224).

5. Wells hides the class criticism in The Time Machine by turning class differences into species differences. • Wells wanted the novel to make a great social statement without upsetting his audience and ruining his chances at success. • Denied his outrage with the class system in public. • “He repeatedly expressed irritation at Marx for basing his theories on class hostility”(Huntington 224). • Denying the reality of the problem was Wells' way of reassuring himself that he could escape his birth class

6. “It's my trump card and if it does not come off very much I shall know my place for the rest of my career” -Wells (Huntington 224). • If The Time Machine failed, Wells would have to accept his place in the class system and give up his dreams of being a successful writer. • The novel was his one chance to break free of his class. He must avoid being vulgar in his social criticism in order to be successful.

7. Wells avoids vulgarity by: • mostly ignoring class in his present day • turning class differences into species differences • identifying the Morlocks (the working class) symbolically, not realistically • making the criticism of the Eloi stylistic • not showing the lower classes the way they really are- real servants kept out of sight

8. The Time Traveller was in a utopian situation, so time travel to him was like writing a story • It was logical, displayed ingenuity, and it was a paradox befitting a cultivating parlor.

9. Wells used the book the Chronic Argonauts (his first novel about time travel to try and explain what is going to happen in the future. • He explains that there will be two types of divisions the Eloi and the Morlocks • These divisions are divided by economical situations

10. In his new and revised version of the Chronic Argonauts, The Time Machine he revises his view on social classes a bit • In 1895 the true utopia of the tale of The Time Machine, was that men were economically indistinguishable and the only thing that separated them was their intelligence • “I do not mean any split between working people and rich families drop and rise from toil to wealth continually—but between the somber, mechanically industrious, arithmetical, inartistic type, the type of the puritan and the American millionaire and the pleasure loving, witty and graceful type that gives us our clever artists, actors and writers, some of our gentry, and many an elegant rogue” (pg. 115).

11. The End