Student Reader: The Time Machine

H.G. Wells published The Time Machine in 1895. It was his first published novel, although Wells had been making money by writing and publishing short stories. The story did not invent the idea of travel through time, but it helped to popularize it and, in particular, turned the notion of a device that could allow the user to travel in time—a time machine—into a popular trope of science fiction.

Although Wells’s novel proposes a fantastical scientific discovery—time travel—it was not the mechanics or the scientific theories of how such a device might operate that really interested him. The novel was an opportunity for the author to explore and lay out his ideas about what the future development of human civilization might look like. Wells was a socialist, and his politics were based on his experiences and observations about what life was like for the working classes in England at the end of the 1800s. These experiences were combined in Wells’s mind with ideas like social Darwinism (the theory that suggested that “strong” humans should triumph over the “weak”), notions of class struggle, and the concept of inevitable scientific “progress.” These led Wells to have a dim view of what the future held—not progress toward a utopia, but a gradual divergence of human classes based on the rich exploiting the working class so thoroughly that they would devolve into a subterranean species.

The Time Machine is really a book in which the anxieties about industrialization, progress, science, and society are allowed to play out. We see how the conquest of nature leads humanity not into a paradise but into a dead end. The book offers a stark social message but is also highly entertaining. It is filled with adventure, mystery, intrigue, and horror. Wells’s descriptions, his characterization, and his clever exploration of themes make The Time Machine a true classic in the science fiction genre.The idea of travel through time, but it helped to popularize it and, in particular, turned the notion of a device that could allow the user to travel in time—a time machine—into a popular trope of science fiction.