The Time Machine PDF

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The Time Machine...

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H.G Wells > The Time Machine http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/timemachine/quiz.html Further Reading Wells, Herbert George. The Definitive Time Machine. Harry M. Geduld, ed. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana UP, 1987.

____________________________________________________________________ Characters The Time Traveller - The Time Traveller's name is never given. Apparently the narrator wants to protect his identity. The Time Traveller is an inventor. He likes to speculate on the future and the underlying structures of what he observes. His house is in Richmond, a suburb of London. The Narrator - The narrator, Mr. Hillyer, is the Time Traveller's dinner guest. His curiosity is enough to make him return to investigate the morning after the first time travel. Weena - Weena is one of the Eloi. Although the Time Traveller reports that it is difficult to distinguish gender among the Eloi, he seems quite sure that Weena is female. He easily saves her from being washed down the river, and she eagerly becomes his friend. Her behavior toward him is not unlike that of a pet or small child. Summary and Analysis Chapter 1 & 2

Summary The Time Traveller is in his home, speaking to a group of men that includes the narrator. He is lecturing on the fourth dimension. He tells them that a cube exists not only in space, but also in time. Time is the fourth dimension. Many of them are skeptical. The Time Traveller claims that one should be able to move about in the fourth dimension just as one can move about in the other three. After all, he notes, we are constantly moving forward in time, why not move faster or slower or even backward? He produces a miniature time machine, the size of a clock, made of ivory and crystal. The Time Traveller explains that one lever sends the machine into the future and the other one sends it into the past. He asks one of the guests to push the forward lever, and the machine disappears in a small gust. He claims that the machine is now gliding forward into the future. The guests ask why they cannot still see it, since they too are moving into the future, and the Time Traveller explains that it is moving forward too quickly to be seen, like the spokes of a wheel or a speeding bullet. The guests are amazed. The Traveller then shows them a much larger machine, with which he plans to explore time. The narrator concludes that not many of the guests believed the Time Traveller, as he was a very intelligent man, likely to play elaborate pranks. The narrator returns to dinner at his house the next week. The guests include some of the men from the previous week and some new guests. They have been instructed to begin dinner without their host. When he enters, he is incredibly dusty and dishevelled. He quickly drinks some champagne, then goes to wash up. The narrator suggests to the other guests that their host has been travelling in time. The others are incredulous and make sarcastic remarks in reply. When the Time Traveller is finally ready to tell his story, the guests quickly raise objections. The Time Traveller says that he has no

energy to argue and will speak only if everyone agrees not to interrupt. The guests agree, and sit in increasingly rapt attention as the story begins.

Commentary In The Time Machine, there is a story within a story. The first two chapters make up the outer story, the frame. What follows is the Time Traveller's story. It is important to consider why Wells included a frame story. It lets the reader know that the story takes place in Victorian England, in a world of gas lamps, cigars, and gentlemen with the leisure time to discuss topics like the fourth dimension. It also sets up a good deal of suspense. The small time machine that disappears could be proof that time travel is possible, but it could also be some kind of parlour trick, an illusion created with mirrors. It opens the reader up to the idea that time travel might be possible. In the second chapter, we see the dishevelled time traveller stumble in. The reader recognizes that he must have been travelling in time. This whets the reader's palate, and also makes the story seem more plausible.

Chapter 3 & 4 Summary The Time Traveller gets on his machine and pushes the forward lever just a little. He feels a dizzying sensation, and when he looks at the clock in his lab he sees that five hours have passed. He then presses the forward lever a bit more. Night and day fly by in increasingly rapid succession. Soon the lab disappears. He can see the hazy outline of buildings as well as the sun going in a continuous path across the sky that moves up and down with the seasons. A feeling of headlong motion turns into exhilaration. He begins to worry that when he stops the machine it will land where there is already some solid object, and he will be obliterated. He becomes very frightened and pulls the lever to a stop. He ends up flying headlong through the air. The traveller finds himself in a hail storm. As it passes, he notices a giant statue of a white sphinx on a bronze pedestal. He begins to fear what man may have evolved into. Perhaps it is something very cruel or savage. He notices large buildings, and as he turns his time machine over on the right side, he notices that some figures in rich robes are observing him from the nearest building. One of the creatures approaches him. It is beautiful but very frail, reminding the Time Traveller of someone afflicted by tuberculosis . More of the creatures surround him, speaking in a "sweet and liquid tongue." They seem free of fear, and he feels safe. He removes the control levers from his time machine so that no one else can use it. The creatures have large eyes, curly hair, and thin red lips. When he points up to the sun to try to explain where he has come from, one of the creatures makes the sound of thunder, thinking that he came from the hail storm. He wonders if they are fools and is flooded with disappointment. They begin to run about and shower him with strange flowers, and he laughs at how wrongly he had imagined the future.

The creatures take the traveller into one of their large buildings. It is covered with strange hieroglyphics. They give him a meal of strange fruit. He tries to learn a few words. They laugh at his attempts to speak their language, and soon grow weary of teaching him. They seem foolish and indolent. He walks out to explore the world of 802,701 AD. There are ruins. He notices that all of the creatures live together in huge buildings. He also notices that there are no outward signs of gender, and that there are no old people. He thinks he has arrived in a communist paradise, and that these creatures are the result of a world without hardship and fear. He thinks how in his own time, human intelligence is bent toward making life easier, and now, he thinks, he sees the outcome in the frail, naive creatures. It is hardship that necessitates vigor, and keeps man intelligent and strong. Without danger, he thinks, there is no need for the family, which results in the communist way of life he sees in these creatures. But, as he is telling his story, the Time Traveller says that this theory of his was very wrong. Commentary Wells uses his story to talk about contemporary social questions such as the advent of communism. The Time Traveller thinks that these frail creatures and their communal lifestyle is the result of a world free of trouble. While this seems desirable, it also seems strange. The Time Traveller finds the creatures beautiful, but he is disappointed by their laziness and lack of intelligence. It seems that Wells may be making a negative comment on communism. Later, his story will seem to illustrate the problems of capitalism as well. It is also likely that Wells was criticizing the more general idea that human intelligence should always be used to make life easier. The late Victorian period was a time of great technical progress and social stability. Many people thought that progress was inevitable and good. Here, Wells suggests that progress can go in many different directions, and that if too much progress is made, if humans get too comfortable, they might get soft.

Chapter 5 As the Time Traveller is reflecting on his theories, night begins to fall. He heads back to his time Machine. As he approaches the spot from a distance, the machine appears to be gone, and he breaks into a desperate run. It is gone. He is sure that no one travelled in time, because he took the levers, but someone has obviously moved it in space. He believes that the creatures he has encountered so far are too weak to move the machine. He goes into a frenzy, running around the Sphinx statue, where he startles a white creature that runs away. He goes into the hall and wakes the sleeping creatures, demanding his time machine in a gruff manner, which scares the creatures. The narrator calms down and tries to reason out where his machine might be and how he can get it back. That morning, the traveller decides that since he was only away from the machine for a short time it can't have gone very far. He concludes that the machine must be hidden in the immense pedestal of the sphinx statue. He tries to open the pedestal's panels with a rock, but does not succeed. When he asks the creatures how to open it, they react with shock and disgust. He decides that he must be patient, and that it would be a good idea to get to know the creatures better. He learns more of their language and explores the area. He pays more attention to the wells dotting the landscape, and notes that air seems to be sucked down into them. He can hear the dull sound of machines coming from below. He begins to reconsider his theory that the creatures come from a decadent, automated civilization, for he notices that there are only buildings, and that the clothes of the creatures must be made somewhere. He also doesn't understand the strange wells, or how his time machine disappeared.

Meanwhile, the Time Traveller rescues one of the creatures from drowning in the river, which has shifted a mile or so from the bed of the Thames. Her name is Weena, and she seems like an affectionate, precocious child to him. She greets him when he returns to the area of the white sphinx statue, making it feel like home. Like the other creatures, she is very afraid of the dark. Her fellow creatures sleep in great clumps in the halls of the buildings, and she is very reluctant to let the narrator sleep elsewhere. One morning, the narrator wakes up at dawn and goes out on the porch of one of the buildings. He imagines he sees white figures moving around in the dull pre-dawn light. On his fourth morning, he enters an old ruin and finds two big eyes staring back at him. It is a white, ape-like creature. The animal flees, stumbling through the daylight. He tries to track it, but it seems to have disappeared down one of the nearby wells. He deduces from this new creature's appearance and behaviour that it lives underground, and he begins to understand the wells as being a huge ventilation system for an underground race. He imagines that the underground creatures are the labourers of the future society, and that they are only allowed to come out at night. He thinks of how in his own time there is a growing gap between the idle rich and labourers, and how the wealthy own huge estates where others are not allowed. He imagines that the overworld creatures have forced the underground creatures to work for them and have denied them access to the sunshine of the surface. He soon learns from the peaceful surface creatures that these underground creatures are called "Morlocks" and that the surface creatures themselves are called "Eloi." When he tries to ask Weena more questions about the Morlocks, however, she becomes very upset. Commentary In this long fifth chapter, the Time Traveller learns much more about the world of the Eloi. His adventures in this time constitute the bulk of Wells's novella. The fifth chapter also contains much of the political message of the book. Again, the reader sees in the Time Traveller's remarks a thinly veiled criticism of contemporary social mores in Victorian England. The world of the Eloi is a dystopia, or a negative utopia. Just as a utopian story presents a perfect society and recommends how such a state of existence can be achieved, a dystopia shows how society will go wrong if certain trends continue. While the time traveller's first theory on how Eloi society functions appeared to be a critique of communism, in this chapter he identifies the operations of capitalism as the source of tension between the Eloi and the Morlocks. Wells imagines the separation of workers and capitalists taken to the extreme. This makes sense, given the context Wells was writing in. London is the archetype of the nineteenth century industrialized city that is filled with miserable workers and rich industrial leaders. Wells, like most Englishmen, was very conscious of class status. Growing up, he went to a school where the working class was prominent, and he automatically allied himself with the upper classes, however much he was turned off by their decadence. This is similar to how the Time Traveller feels a great deal more sympathy for the Eloi than for the Morlocks, in spite of his disgust for the frailty of the Eloi.

Chapter 6 & 7

The Time Traveller concludes that in order to recover his machine he must enter into the world of the Morlocks. In the distance, he sees what he describes as the Palace of Green Porcelain. Instead of visiting it,

he decides that he must descend into one of the wells. When Weena sees him descend, she is very worried. He clambers down one of the wells for a long time, finally finding a small alcove where he can rest. He awakes to the touch of clammy fingers. Lighting a match, he sees several Morlocks running into the distance. He explores further and finds a vast chamber filled with Morlocks and the throbbing machines that pump air through the caves. The Morlocks are eating some kind of meat. Suddenly, the matches that he is using to ward off the Morlocks run out, and they seize him. He narrowly escapes back up the well. Horribly frightened, he decides that he must find some way to defend himself from the Morlocks. He has to revise his theories. Over the next few days, he realizes that the meat the Morlocks were eating was probably Eloi, hunted at night. He now thinks that he understands why the Eloi dread the night. They speak of imminent "Dark Nights," and he realizes that the moon is waning. He imagines that his theory about the division of labour being carried to the extreme was right, that at one point the ancestors of the Morlocks must have been driven underground to work for the ancestors of the Eloi, but that now the balance of power has shifted. In their restful ease, the Eloi have grown weak, while the Morlocks have grown strong. He imagines that both are the descendents of man, and that the instinct against cannibalism must have gone out of style. He also imagines that his journey into the underworld must have horribly upset the Morlocks. Nervous, the traveller hastens to find a safe place to spend the night. He decides to try to find safety in the Palace of Green Porcelain. With Weena on his shoulders, he begins to journey toward it. Weena walks alongside him for a while, stuffing his pockets with flowers, two of which he produces for his guests. He resumes his story. The journey takes longer than he thought, and as night falls they find themselves on the border of a great forest. The Time Traveller is out of matches, and is afraid to enter the woods with Morlocks about. He sets Weena down on top of a hill, and lets her sleep while he keeps watch. The night passes without harm. Commentary The Time Traveller makes a journey into the underworld. This is a common element in fiction, especially in myths. In many ways, Wells's tale is like a myth, in that it is a story of a completely different world full of symbolic meaning. The Time Traveller formulates a third theory on the world of the Eloi. Not only has capitalism led to a ghastly division of labour in which the workers must live underground, but the workers are now exacting revenge on their former masters. The Morlocks eat, hunt, and terrorize the Eloi, just as the ancestors of the Eloi metaphorically preyed on their subjugated workers. This theory seems to represent some of Wells's own anxieties. Capitalist societies often produce tales about fears of an uprising from below. In Wells's tale, the uprising is an unavoidable evolutionary consequence. It should be noted that while Wells seems to attack communism earlier in the book, the Time Traveller's third and ultimate theory still incorporates the idea of class warfare, a way of looking at society that is a key element of Marxism.

Chapter 8-10

Weena and the Time Traveller enter the Palace of Green Porcelain, and find that just as it appears, it is made out of green porcelain. They also find that it is a ruined museum. Among a chemistry exhibit, the Time Traveller salvages some camphor, an inflammable substance often used in torches. He is thrilled to find

some preserved matches--he had run out--and he marvels at the completely decayed remains of books that he finds in one of the halls. Exploring a giant hall of machinery, he notices that Weena is scared. Looking into the dark end of the hall, he hears the sound of Morlocks. He breaks a lever off one of the machines, and flees. Exiting the museum, he intends to rush back to the area of the sphinx statue, but he is exhausted because he has not slept in two days. As they near the woods again, they hear Morlocks beginning to stir behind them. Night has fallen. Using the camphor and some dry brush he had collected, the Time Traveller starts a large fire to guard their retreat into the woods. It spreads quickly. He and Weena proceed at a rapid pace, but eventually find themselves surrounded by Morlocks. The Time Traveller hurriedly starts a small fire, pulling down dry timber to feed the flames. Incredibly tired, he nods off to sleep, feeling safe by the fire. He awakes to feel the Morlocks grasping him. He struggles, grabbing hold of the lever he took from the museum. He swings wildly, killing a few Morlocks. Suddenly, the rest flee, and he sees that the first fire has become a giant forest fire. He can't find Weena anywhere, and he runs after the Morlocks, hoping that they will lead him to safety. He finally comes to a clearing with a large hill, filled with confused, blinded Morlocks. They are helpless. When morning comes, he gets his bearings atop the hill and heads back in the direction of the white sphinx statue. He plans to pry open the pedestal with his lever. When he arrives, to his surprise, the pedestal is open, and he sees his time machine inside. He smiles, guessing at the Morlocks' plan of action. He walks into the pedestal, and the panels slide shut behind him, just as he had suspected. He confidently begins to strike a match, but realizes he has nothing to strike it against. The Morlocks pounce, and he desperately struggles onto the saddle of the machine, barely screwing in the forward lever. He pushes it forward, and escapes into the future. Commentary With this chapter Wells finishes his tale of the year AD 802,701. Having sketched out the structure of that society and thus implicitly made his political points, he moves on to conclude the adventure story. Fire, which was originally a source of wonder to the Eloi, now becomes a dangerous weapon. It is a weapon that would not be powerful in contemporary times, but which seems like terrible magic in the future. It is a common feature of time travel stories to allow the hero to escape from troubles with some kind of weapon or skill he brings from his own time. It is exciting; it communicates a certain loyalty to the time of the reader. Another common element of the time travel story, or of any story where the hero travels to a fantastic place, is that some kind of violence or trouble forces him to leave quickly. Otherwise, the character might forever stay in the fantastic place, and never return to tell about it. Also, because the hero has to leave quickly, he does not have time to fully explore...