Wells’ also wrote about Victorians losing their faith in religion and the church. Some Victorians believed that god was punishing them as a world war was looming and some even doubted his existence, as there was no proof for it. To illustrate this, Wells created the curate as a highly religious character who had faith in god and also questioned why god had brought this war upon them. The following quote illustrates this, when the curate said “The end! The great and terrible day of the Lord! When men shall call upon the mountains and the rocks to fall upon them and hide them--hide them from the face of Him that sitteth upon the throne!”. This may have been an attempt by Wells to voice his opinion, saying that Victorians should go to church and should not question the lord. However this is rather contradictory to some of Wells’ previous works, which showed that he is not a particularly religious man and his beliefs lay more within science than religion. The intended effect on the reader is that they may question the actions of themselves and their fellow humans if they read the book and consider that god may punish them for not having faith in religion. All of these historical themes are illustrated in the book, and they all lead to the reader relating the plot to reality, therefore they fear the consequences of war and punishment by God.
Wells uses various different themes throughout the book to encapsulate the reader in the book and create this climate of terror. He uses punctuation to create anxiety and tension by using short sentences and lots of commas to give the text a high pace, leaving the reader enthralled in the story. He also at times slows the pace down, mainly at the beginning of chapters. He suspends the story and goes into deep analysis and description of what had previously been going on, knowing that the reader wants to see some action. This creates great suspense for the reader, resulting in them being anxious building up gradually to the climax of the book.
An ongoing question throughout the book is whether the narrator’s wife is dead or not. He constantly thinks about his family and thinks the worst for them. “My mind was occupied by anxiety for my wife. I figured her at Leatherhead, terrified, in danger, mourning me already as a dead man. I paced the rooms and cried aloud when I thought of how I was cut off from her, of all that might happen to her in my absence”. He exaggerates a lot throughout this book, this technique is known as hyperbole. This makes the reader curious as to whether his family is safe, making the reader feel a sense of anticipation towards the climax, where all the reader’s unanswered questions will be answered.
A technique Wells uses frequently is shown when he gives the reader little fragments of information or description, but not quite enough for them to form a full mental picture of what is going on. This is good use of imagery as it lets the reader interpret the detail given to them in their own way, leaving the reader to create their own mental image. He will then keep giving the reader bits of information, which then leaves the reader wanting more. A good example of this is in a very significant chapter of the novel, he doesn’t give the reader a lot of information, he only tells the reader what the narrator what the narrator thinks is taking place, it is fittingly named “the stillness”. He is trapped in a house and the curate has just been killed. “On the twelfth day my throat was so painful that, taking the chance of alarming the Martians, I attacked the creaking rain-water pump that stood by the sink, and got a couple of glassfuls of blackened and tainted rain-water”. He is inside the house and waiting for the Martians to leave so that he can escape, he has no necessities such as food or water and he gives a brief summary of each day in around three or four lines, rather like a diary of some sort, which was a very peculiar way of reciting the goings on, however it worked very well as it kept you on the edge of your seat and gave you a sense of curiosity and anticipation as to what will happen next. This adds to the tension and the climate of terror for the reader.
He starts off this chapter with short paragraphs each containing quite long sentences. He uses six paragraphs to describe the 11th to 15th day, this helps to build up tension as it slows the pace of the reading down and makes you think about it a lot more, which suspends the story a lot, knowing that this will create a sense of curiosity and anticipation in the reader.
A recurring theme of dead bodies is evident, especially in chapter one of book two e.g. “and intervals along the road, were dead bodies lying in contorted attitudes” and “black dust that had once been smoke – and dead bodies”. This is almost hinting that death cannot be that far away for the narrator and for the human race, thus creating a build up of tension towards the climax of the story. The reader is just waiting for the moment that the Martians capture the narrator, building up anxiety for the reader. In chapter 4 of book two, a different type of tension is created. Previously tension was gradually built up, where as this is not the case in this chapter. The use of the word “suddenly” catches the reader unaware e.g. “Suddenly I heard a noise”. This unexpected event creates a sense of panic and is also a very useful way of creating trepidation amongst the reader.
Throughout the book the Martians have come to within touching distance of capturing the narrator. In the narrator’s moments of hiding, there are many instances where he is silent. The language used in these moments is very effective at building up tension e.g. “ I for my part scarce dared breathe”. This is a great technique for creating suspense and expectation in a story as it keeps the reader enthralled. The use of the word “scarce” appears often in the story, e.g. “we scarce dared move” and “we could scarcely hear each other breathing”. This creates a sense of mystery and anticipation in the mind of the reader as to “will they or will they not be captured?”.
Wells uses metaphors frequently throughout the novel. An example of this is his reference to the sun. The sun is setting when the Martians take their first victim. Then there is a period of darkness, when they are killing men and setting out to take over the world. When the narrator discovers them dead, the sun is rising. Light and hope have returned and men no longer have to live in fear. The sun is therefore a metaphor or symbol for mankind’s hope. Also Wells’ reference to the pits has a metaphorical meaning. Typically pits contain monsters and this is the case here, as this is where the Martians are found. When the cylinders land, the strength of their impact creates them, and it becomes their birthplace in a manner of speaking. The pits parallel the emergence of life on Earth, becoming symbols of the birth of a new time and species. However, at the end of the story, the pit is where the Martians are laying dead. So they not only represent the start of life but also the end.
Just by reading the novel you are able to realise instantly that Wells is a believer in Darwin’s theory of survival of the fittest and natural selection. He states that humans are so naïve because they still believe that they are the superior race and they are at the top of the food chain, but then the Martians arrive and attempt to wipe out this so called “superior race” in approximately 2 months. This is a message mainly to white Victorians stating that they are not superior no matter what they think, and there should be racial equality throughout the world. The Martians’ unfeeling conquest is meant as a criticism of British imperialism. They subjected those in the colonies to a status below that of citizen, and occasionally, below human.
One of the recurring themes in this novel is the repeated simile of humans being related to ants or other minuscule insects. Whenever the Martians attack a large group of people, the Martians cause havoc and the people flee. Wells always refers to the scattering of people as “Ants”. An example of this is the sentence “‘This isn’t a war,’ said the artilleryman. ‘It never was a war, any more than there’s war between man and ants.’” It is just as if a human was killing an ant, the human does not think about it and it is completely insignificant to them, just as the Martians are doing to the humans.
A Victorian audience would feel that Wells does create a thrilling climate of terror, but maybe a modern audience would not find this book as thrilling. I feel that this is because nowadays we have a much greater knowledge of life on other planets. We therefore know that the possibility of such an event occurring nowadays is highly unlikely. Whereas a Victorian audience had no such knowledge of life on other planets, and therefore believed that an alien invasion was a possibility. We have had people go into space to see if they could find something in space living, but nothing yet has been found however in the nineteenth century the people then did not know about space travel and did not know a lot of facts about space only fictional tales. In this day and age, many of us have viewed horror films and have been frightened by the visual effects and sounds. This increases our tolerance for being frightened, and therefore when you then read a book you feel that it is nowhere near as frightening as a horror film, mainly because you have no visual or audible aid in literature as you do in film.
In conclusion, Wells does successfully create a climate of terror for an audience of his generation and we must appreciate his influence on science fiction literature and film in modern times. He not only wrote an encapsulating novel, but also incorporated relevant political and social issues of his contemporaries into his book. To relate to how Victorians would have felt about this novel and its effect on society, we could relate to a modern day equivalent of Martian invasion. A good example of this is how modern day citizens currently feel about terrorism. We all fear a large-scale war; we all fear terrorist attacks, just as Victorians feared the world war and the narrator feared the Martians and the end of the human race, as we know it today.
