Review of HG Wells' War of the Worlds.

I read War of the Worlds after seeing it on a list of subversive novels. It is a novel that attempted to get its readers to question the British invasion of countries and the way it treated their indigenous populations. Wells wrote it in part as a response to how the British slaughtered Aborigines in Tasmania. The War of the Worlds is an allegory of the conquest of a primitive society by technologically sophisticated colonists with no respect for the indigenous culture.

The novel is narrated by a philosopher and amateur astronomer. He is one of the first to notice that something is happening on Mars, and then the first alien spacecraft lands not far from his house in an English common. He goes to investigate. At first the spacecraft, which just looks like a huge cylinder, gives nothing away of what it might contain or its purpose. People gather to gawk at it and contemplate what it might be. It then opens, and the war for humanity’s survival gradually begins. 

The novel contains a lot of extended war and action scenes, with small sections of contemplation of what the Martians are up to and why. Humanity attempts to fight back but, like the inhabitants of many countries the English invaded, are totally outgunned by the Martian technology. The narrator spends much of his time fighting despair as he sees human resistance to the Martians fail. He is on the run for much of the story.

The POV character changes for a few chapters to the narrator’s brother who is, along with thousands of Londoners, trying to find somewhere safe to flee. Only then do some slightly useful female characters appear. Their main role in the novel is basically to be placed somewhere safe and out of the way, or to scream. They are not deemed likely of doing anything productive to defeat the Martians. One memorable line, “He was as lacking in restraint as a silly woman”, emphasises the role Wells thinks women would play in such a war. His writing is a product on its time, 1895.

The novel also takes a swipe at religion, where people hopelessly pray to be saved, rather than try to do some productive to save themselves. The narrator gets trapped with a curate (a vicar or priest) for a few days. His religious rants do none of them any benefit.

The novel is written in the style of someone telling you what they experienced after the event. Wells curiously breaks the fourth wall every now and then by referring directly to the “reader”. If you were not aware of the outcome of the novel, this would tell you that the narrator survived.

Overall, with its anti-imperialism sentiment, the novel appears to be subversive for its time when Royal Britannia wanted to rule the world, no matter what the cost. I very much enjoyed reading the novel and it deserves to be the renowned classic of science fiction and literature it is. I will be reading more of Wells’ novels.