H.G.Wells is also trying to tell humanity that all forms of life on earth will die and the world as we know it will be destroyed. H.G.Wells believes that humans in this day and age will be the cause of the destruction of humanity, and the destruction of the human world.
In Wells novel the Time Machine, well uses the time traveller to show that if society is ruled by a class system, that humanity itself will slowly drift apart, until humans no longer resemble their former self. Wells believes that if class systems are ruled out then we may avoid this sinister division of humanity.
As the time traveller land in the future comes upon a race of humans. His first impression of these creatures is of grace and beauty. The time traveller says about the first race he meets, to his audience ‘He struck me as being a very beautiful and graceful creature, but indescribably frail’.
The time traveller begins to notice little things about these small people, how they are dressed. He describes their clothes as ‘Clad in purple tunic, girdled at the waist with a leather belt. Sandals or buskins’. Wells describes them as this to imply that they are upper class people.
As the reader carries on throughout the book, you begin to discover more things about the eloi. The eloi's lifestyle is one of great relaxation, of pleasure and ease, they are simple minded people. They seem very childlike by the way they act and by the way they seem to think. As the time traveller arrives in the future, the eloi seem to lose interest in him very easily, and make no attempt to try and communicate with him. The time traveller quotes ‘as they made no effort to communicate with me, but simply stood around me smiling and speaking in soft cooing notes to each other’. There is a simple reason for this lack of interest in the time machine and the time traveller. The eloi’s intelligence has demeaned over the thousands of years, so the eloi have slowly become incompetently stupid.
The time traveller discovers very quickly how short the attention span of these creatures is. When the time traveller discovers that his time machine has disappeared, he eventually comes to the conclusion that something has taken it down the hatch on the white sphinx statue. He foolishly attempts to ask the eloi how to open the hatch, but they simply express a look of shock and disgust, but seem to lose track of the subject after a moment.
These creature’s express the minimum amount of intelligence to simply survive. The time traveller later comes across many of these eloi’s, all bathing in the Thames, and notices one of the creatures drowning, but not one of the eloi show the slightest sign of worry or panic, but simply carry on with their business, this is a good example of the intelligence of these creatures, even when a life is at stake.
As the time traveller arrives in the future he describes the surroundings of this world. He tells that there are many beautiful flowers growing everywhere, as the time traveller arrives, the eloi cover him in many beautiful exotic flowers (many of which he had never seen before). There is grass as soft as cotton itself, but there is a certain neglected feel to the area, like the area had never been touched for many thousand years. ‘my general impression of the world I saw over their head was of a tangled waste of beautiful flowers, along neglected and yet weed less garden’. This quote tries to explain how odd the scenery is, because some areas seemed to be tended for, but the rest is left neglected. The scenery carries a feeling of isolation to anyone who sets foot on this ground, and this creates an eerie sensation.
The time traveller also notices how the buildings also carry a neglected feel to it, and how they looked very dilapidated. The time traveller tells his guests ‘the thing that struck me the most was its dilapidated look. The stained glass windows, which displayed only a geometrical pattern, were broken in many places, and the curtains that hung across the lower end were thick with dust, and it caught my eye that the corner of the table near me was fractured’. The time traveller already knows of the lack of intelligence in the eloi, so he believes that the eloi’s lack the sense to maintain the world that they live in, this is the reason the time travellers believes that the buildings look very dilapidated.
These fantastic buildings that look terribly neglected were made by those of the time traveller’s age, and the lack of usefulness in the eloi ensured that the buildings would never have the chance of greeting humans of intelligence ever again. ‘No doubt the exquisite beauty of the buildings I saw was the outcome of the last surgings of the now purposeless energy of mankind before it settled down into perfect harmony with the conditions under which it lived’. This quote explains how the buildings were created by those of Well’s time, and over the thousand of years, the evolution of humans slowly lost the intelligence or sense to maintain the beautiful buildings, and that as the eloi came to be, the buildings remained derelict.
The time travellers first impression of the eloi is that they are very simple minded, and they posses nothing but basic life procedures. The time traveller is shocked to discover that the eloi are afraid of the dark, as he believes they are so simple minded they do not know of emotions, the time traveller is puzzled by the fear of the dark with these eloi’s. The time traveller comes across a small ape like creature running down one of the wells; this is his first sighting of the other divided part of humanity, the morlocks.
The time traveller’s first impression of the morlocks is one of imperfection, he seems to think of it as a machine that is not fully operational, the time traveller describes the morlocks as ‘my impression of it is, of course imperfect; but I know it was a dull white, and had strange large red eyes; also that there was the flaxen hair, on its head and down its back’.
Wells explains what class the morlocks are through the time traveller. He explains of the nature of the animal and how it has adapted to its lifestyle. ‘ In the first place there was that bleached look common in most animals that live largely in the dark- the white fish of the Kentucky caves for instance, then those large eyes with the capacity for reflecting light, are common features of nocturnal things- witness the owl and the cat. This quote explains how the animal which the time traveller saw (the morlocks), has adapted to its environment and how it has the former human has changed to do so.
The truth eventually dawns on the time traveller, and he tells his guests how the races have split from the eloi (upper class) and the morlocks (working class). ‘ At first proceeding from the problems of our own age , it seemed as clear as daylight to me that the gradual widening of the merely temporary and social differences between the capitalist and the labourer was the key to the whole position’. Wells is justifying just how the eloi and the morlocks just came to be. He explains that the problems originate from his own age, of how the seemingless widening between the upper and lower class, and the whole position that existed in the age of the time traveller was the key to the whole situation that exists in the future. The eloi are small indescribably frail little creatures, they lack intellect; they are beautiful little creatures, dressed in thick robes, and leather belts, and silk woven sandals and shoes. The eloi’s look very human like but vastly lack human sense. The eloi are described as being ‘a very graceful and beautiful creature, but indescribably frail’.
On the other hand the morlocks are the opposite of the eloi, the morlocks are described as by the time traveller as imperfect. They look hideous; they live underground and eat meat (Eloi). They posses less of the human feature but posses much of the human mind in sense, making them seem more human like than the eloi could ever be.
Wells believes that the human race began its path of separation in his age, and that the class system groups were the upper and lower class. ‘Social differences between the capitalist and the labourer was the key’, is how the time traveller tries to describe it.
The very different lifestyle of the classes is the key to the separation of the human race. The morlocks lived a life of hardship and toil. They worked long hours of the day for very little pay. The working class worked throughout the day avoiding sunlight. The workers required strength and energy to fulfil their jobs, so their diet differed from those of the upper class.
The upper class lived a life of ease and pleasure. Their lifestyle demanded nothing to be done in it; they did not need to use a single muscle in their body. As their body required nothing their diets differed from those of the lower class, and it was their diet which caused their stunt in growth.
As the time traveller makes his hasty escape, in all the confusion, to escape from the morlocks he plummets himself millions of thousands of years into the future. The whole of the world is beyond imagination, the sun seems to have slowed down considerably until it seemed to have totally faded.
‘ The blinking succession of day and night, which was usually indicative of a slower pace, returned, and grew more and more marked. This puzzled me at first. The alternations of night and day grew slower and slower, and so did the passage o the sun across the sky, until they seemed to stretch through centuries.’ This quote shows how the world is being destroyed as the sun is beginning to come to a halt.
The whole of the earth had been plummeted into a twilight age of total darkness, and the only source of light was that of the circling of the stars, as the sun had long gone.
The air is much more rarefied as many of the worlds plants have been destroyed, and it is much harder to breath, the time traveller notices the lack of oxygen as soon he steps into the atmosphere. The atmosphere is very different to the one of the time traveller’s age, tiny noises are noticed with the slightest ease, and a harsh scream from a butterfly stabs through the surroundings as easily as a knife through paper.
The sun seems only to be appearing from the south east of the world , as if the world had stopped rotating, and the sun was no longer a dominant powerful substance in our universe. The time traveller notices the lichen on the rocks, but it puzzles him to see that the rocks are only half covered in lichen, and then he realises that the only source of light is appearing from the south east side, and as lichen is a green moss like substance it is fond of growing in damp and dry conditions.
Life itself has somewhat diminished severely from its former ruling guardians, millions of humans ruled the world in the time travellers time and many life forms existed, but far into the future all life forms have diminished into the lowest graded form possible, of to just be alive. The life forms that exist are one of ugliness and imperfection. The time traveller witnesses two life forms while far into the future, the first is a large white butterfly, which emitted a harsh scream , which sends a shiver down the back, the time traveller describes it as ‘the sound of its voice was so dismal that I shivered and seated more firmly upon the machine’.
The second creature the time traveller comes upon is a huge crab like creature stumbling on its many legs slowly and purposefully towards the time traveller.’can you imagine a crab as large as a younder table, with its many legs moving slowly and uncertainly, its big claws swaying, its long antennae, like carters whips, waving and feeling, and its stalked eyes gleaming at you on either side of its metallic front.’, the time traveller comes upon a dozen of these crab like creatures and very closely escapes them by plunging himself forwards a hundred years or so.
Wells is trying to create a destroyed ruined impression of the future world. He is trying to express how terrible the world could be if humanity carries on in the manner it still is. Wells is trying show the apocalypse of the world, in this terrible desolated imperfect vision.
To escape the morlocks the time traveller, travels even further into the future. The world is slowly decaying, and the planets have been gathered closer to the sun by a considerable amount, the world looks destroyed and ruined. ‘As the darkness thickened, the eddying flakes grew more abundant, dancing before my eyes; and the cold of the air more intense. At last one by one, one after the other, the white peaks of the distant hills vanished into blackness’ the world is being destroyed before the time traveller’s eyes, and he is telling his guests how eventually the world will be destroyed.
Humanity and all signs of life seem to have become extinct. The time traveller does not recognise any signs of life, and notices how quiet the world seems to be. ‘Beyond these lifeless sounds, the world was silent. Silent? It would be hard to convey the stillness of it all. All the sounds of man, the bleating sheep, the cries of birds, the hum of insects, the stir that makes the background of our lives, all that was over.’ The human life and all other forms of life had been destroyed.
The book ‘The Time Machine’ is a message to society rather than just a fantastic science fiction book, it carry’s an important message. A class system exists today, and this class system is already causing major differences between different classes, and wells believes that if society is ruled by a class system, then humanity will divide and end up destroying itself like in the time machine. The message that this book carries is ‘the class system that exists today, should be abolished before humanity ends up destroying itself and the world around it’.
