Story By H. G. Wells
author-avatar

H. G. Wells

bc
L'Homme invisible
Updated at Apr 19, 2023, 23:30
Au terme de nombreuses expérimentations, Griffin, un chercheur en physique, parvient à se rendre invisible. Forcé de fuir sa demeure, il tente de se cacher dans un village anglais dont il perturbe la population lorsque son incroyable particularité est découverte. En proie à la folie et à une violence grandissante, il oblige un pauvre homme à le servir avant de se réfugier chez un scientifique de sa connaissance. Tentant de s’en faire un allié, il lui raconte son histoire, mais comme il souhaite exploiter ses dons dans un dessein criminel, il est condamné à subir une chasse à l’homme fatale. "L'Homme invisible" est un roman de H. G. Wells publié en 1897. Ce roman de science-fiction, l’un des premiers du genre, s’appuie sur une explication scientifique peu convaincante, mais n’en propose pas moins une aventure étonnante et des interrogations pertinentes. Le texte présente une réflexion sur la science et les rêves qu’elle laisse miroiter, de même que sur le désir de pouvoir et le dérapage vers la violence qui en découle parfois. Il démontre également que tout pouvoir, aussi fabuleux qu’il puisse sembler, a ses limites. L’histoire, marquée par la brutalité, prend place dans un monde d’hommes, dénué de personnages féminins. Évoluant de façon chronologique et relatant les observations des divers témoins, le récit s’imprègne de mystère et d’étrangeté.
like
bc
L'île du docteur Moreau
Updated at Apr 17, 2023, 23:06
Publié en 1896, "L'île du docteur Moreau" est un roman de science-fiction et d'anticipation écrit par l'auteur anglais H. G. Wells.Unique survivant d'un naufrage, Edward Prendick est recueilli sur une île des mers du sud par un personnage singulier: le docteur Moreau. Il découvre avec effroi que l'île est peuplée de créatures monstrueuses, mi-hommes mi-bêtes, vivant sous la domination de Moreau et de Montgomery, son assistant...Le personnage principal se retrouve piégé sur une île dangereuse et mystérieuse à l'atmosphère sombre et angoissante.À l'époque de l'écriture de ce livre, vivisection et souffrance animale font débat en Angleterre. Wells s'interroge sur les dérives de la science et pose la question de l'identité de la nature humaine et de la réelle différence entre l'Homme et l'animal.
like
bc
La guerre des mondes
Updated at Apr 17, 2023, 20:53
"La guerre des mondes" parait en 1898 et devient l’un des romans les plus connus de Wells. Il relate l’invasion de la Terre par les Martiens à travers le récit d’un narrateur immergé au cœur des évènements. Inspiré du choc des cultures et des agissements des Européens lors de la conquête du Nouveau Monde, il s’agit d’un des premiers ouvrages mettant en scène une confrontation entre extraterrestres et humains. Le roman donne alors naissance à une véritable mythologie de l’« Autre » dans la science-fiction. Il est également le prétexte à une réflexion d’ordre moral sur l’être humain.
like
bc
A Modern Utopia
Updated at Feb 16, 2023, 00:40
H.G. Wells' A Modern Utopia is a novel that attempts to explore the possibilities of a utopia in a modern age, while recognizing the complexities of contemporary conditions. The work employs an intricate web of philosophical and ideological musings, which are woven together to examine the nature of society and its potential for transformation.
like
bc
The New Machiavelli
Updated at Feb 16, 2023, 00:40
The New Machiavelli by H. G. Wells is a seminal work of political philosophy, drawing upon the theories of its namesake and exploring the relationship between power and morality. Written at the dawn of the 20th century, it serves as an exploration of how one can reconcile self-interest with public good in a modern context.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Jul 26, 2022, 20:14
When an army of invading Martians lands in England, panic and terror seize the population. As the aliens traverse the country in huge three-legged machines, incinerating all in their path with a heat ray and spreading noxious toxic gases, the people of the Earth must come to terms with the prospect of the end of human civilization and the beginning of Martian rule.Inspiring films, radio dramas, comic-book adaptations, television series and sequels,The War of the Worlds is a prototypical work of science fiction which has influenced every alien story that has come since, and is unsurpassed in its ability to thrill, well over a century since it was first published.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Jan 19, 2022, 14:44
"The War of the Worlds" details 12 days in which invaders from Mars attack the planet Earth, captured popular imagination with its fast-paced narrative and images of Martians and interplanetary travel. The humans in "The War of the Worlds" initially treat the invasion with complacency but soon are provoked into a defensive state of war.H. G. Wells's science fiction masterpiece "The War of the Worlds" was originally published in Pierson's magazine in 1897 and was issued as a novel the following year. A century later, it has never been out of print. The story has become an integral part of our culture, frequently retold in graphic novels and films. In 1938, it became part of one of the greatest and most horrifying media events of all times. "The Mercury Theatre on the Air", headed by twenty-three-year-old Orson Welles, broadcast over the radio an adaptation of the book that was so realistic that it caused widespread public panic, mob violence, and looting. Until the night of that broadcast, few people realised the power of broadcast media to make whole populations feel powerless when faced with breaking events.
like
bc
The War In The Air
Updated at Jan 19, 2022, 14:43
"The War In The Air", war novel written in 1907 by H. G. Wells, is often referenced because in it Wells so accurately anticipated lots of details of aerial warfare – dogfights, bombing raids, even what the earth looks like from up in the air – none of which existed or were possible when he wrote the book and when the most primitive flying machines had only just been invented.In other words, it is a masterpiece of imaginative prophecy and another one of Wells’s books, in that it’s a real mish-mash of subject matter and tone.Thus he chooses to recount the outbreak of this epic world war (sometime around 1914, i.e. in his then-future) and the triumph of the mighty German airfleet – via the adventures of the comic figure of Bert Smallways, keeper of a failed second-hand bicycle shop in suburban Kent. Bathos.
like
bc
The Wonderful Visit
Updated at Jan 19, 2022, 14:43
"The Wonderful Visit" is a wonderful work of fiction by H.G. Wells, the author of "The Time Machine." It is the tale of a fallen angel who simply cannot adapt to society in a small English village. The book was a satirical treatment of Victorian England, An other-worldly creature visits a small English village, and H. G. Wells uses humour and satire to convey some of the imperfections of Victorian society, as ‘angel’ and humans view each other with equal incomprehension. The book is considered contemporary fantasy; but like most things Wellsian, that was a genre before his time. 
like
bc
H. G. Wells – The Complete Collection
Updated at Jan 19, 2022, 08:21
48 Complete Works of H.G. WellsScience FictionsAnticipationsIn the Days of the CometTales of Space and TimeThe Country of the BlindThe Crystal EggThe Door in the Wall and Other StoriesThe First Men In The MoonThe Invisible ManThe Island of Doctor MoreauThe Sea LadyThe Sleeper AwakesThe Time MachineTwelve Stories and a DreamWar and the FutureWar of the WorldsWhen the Sleeper WakesOther WorksWhat is ComingTono BungayThe Wheels of ChanceThe Wife of Sir Isaac HarmanThe Wonderful VisitThe Stolen Bacillus and Other IncidentsThe War in the AirThe Secret Places of The HeartA Short History of the WorldAn Englishman Looks at the WorldAnn VeronicaBoon, The Mind of the Race, The Wild AssesCertain Personal MattersConversations with an UncleFirst and Last ThingsFloor GamesThe History of Mr PollyThe Outline of HistoryThe Passionate FriendsThe Red RoomThe Research MagnificentThe Salvaging Of CivilisationThe New MachiavelliLove and Mr. LewishamMankind in the MakingMarriageMr. Britling Sees It ThroughNew Worlds For OldIn The Fourth Year - Anticipations of a World PeaceKippsLittle WarsA Modern Utopia
like
bc
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Updated at Dec 13, 2021, 18:43
"The Island of Dr. Moreau", science fiction novel by H.G. Wells, published in 1896. The classic work focuses on a mad scientist’s experiments involving vivisection to address such issues as evolution and ethics.This short novel employs an old device, a bogus introduction to explain how the story that follows was found in the narrator’s papers at his death. The story itself exploits the well-known theme of the shipwrecked castaway, made famous by Daniel Defoe’s "Robinson Crusoe" (1719). These are familiar materials, but H. G. Wells updates them by putting them in the context of the controversy over evolution that raged in his day. He presents Dr. Moreau as a cruel, white-haired Old Testament God.Wells described his masterpiece as “an exercise in youthful blasphemy,” referring to Moreau’s attempts to reshape God’s creatures as humans. In this respect the novel compares to Mary Shelley’s tale of Victor Frankenstein. Both novels are cautionary in warning of the consequences likely to follow when humans play God. The Greek understanding of hubris and Christian warnings against pride should have alerted Moreau to the danger of his game.
like
bc
Tono Bungay
Updated at Sep 15, 2021, 05:19
Tono-Bungay is narrated by George Ponderevo, who is persuaded to help develop the business of selling Tono-Bungay, a patent medicine created by his ambitious uncle Edward. George devotes seven years to organising the production and manufacture of a product which he believes to be "a damned swindle". He then quits day-to-day involvement with the enterprise in favour of aeronautics. But he remains associated with his uncle Edward, who becomes a financier of the first order and is on the verge of achieving social as well as economic dominance when his business empire collapses. George tries to rescue his uncle's failing finances by stealing quantities of a radioactive compound called "quap" from an island off the coast of West Africa, but the expedition is unsuccessful. His nephew engineers his uncle's escape from England in an experimental aircraft he has built, but the ruined entrepreneur turned financier catches pneumonia on the flight and dies in a French village near Bordeaux, despite George's efforts to save him. The novel ends with George finding a new occupation: designing destroyers for the highest bidder.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Jun 23, 2021, 00:58
The War of the Worlds presents itself as a factual account of the Martian invasion. The narrator is a middle-class writer of philosophical papers. Following explosions seen on the surface of planet Mars, creating much interest in the scientific community, a meteor lands on Horsell Common, near the unnamed narrator's home in Woking, Surrey. He is among the first to discover that the object is an artificial cylinder that opens...
like
bc
God, the Invisible King
Updated at Jun 9, 2021, 23:31
This book sets out as forcibly and exactly as possible the religious belief of the writer. That belief is not orthodox Christianity; it is not, indeed, Christianity at all; its core nevertheless is a profound belief in a personal and intimate God. There is nothing in its statements that need shock or offend anyone who is prepared for the expression of a faith different from and perhaps in several particulars opposed to his own. The writer will be found to be sympathetic with all sincere religious feeling. Nevertheless it is well to prepare the prospective reader for statements that may jar harshly against deeply rooted mental habits.
like
bc
The Time Machine
Updated at Jun 9, 2021, 00:28
An English scientist and gentleman inventor living in Victorian England reveals to his weekly dinner guests that time is simply a fourth dimension, and his demonstration of a tabletop model machine for travelling through it. He has built a machine capable of carrying a person through time, and returns at dinner the following week to recount a remarkable tale.
like
bc
The Invisible Man
Updated at May 27, 2021, 02:33
A mysterious man, Griffin, arrives at the local inn of the English village of Iping, West Sussex, during a snowstorm. The stranger wears a long-sleeved, thick coat and gloves; his face is hidden entirely by bandages except for a fake pink nose; and he wears a wide-brimmed hat. He is excessively reclusive, irascible, and unfriendly. He demands to be left alone and spends most of his time in his rooms working with a set of chemicals and laboratory apparatus, only venturing out at night.
like
bc
A Story of The Days to Come
Updated at May 18, 2021, 19:19
The excellent Mr. Morris was an Englishman, and he lived in the days of Queen Victoria the Good. He was a prosperous and very sensible man; he read the Times and went to church, and as he grew towards middle age an expression of quiet contented contempt for all who were not as himself settled on his face.
like
bc
The Wheels of Chance
Updated at May 18, 2021, 19:15
Mr. Hoopdriver, is a frustrated draper's assistant in Putney, a badly paid, grinding position and one which Wells briefly held; and yet he owns a bicycle and is setting out on a bicycling tour of the Southern Coast on his annual ten days' holiday. Hoopdriver survives his frustration by escaping in his imagination into a world of fantasy.
like
bc
Tono-Bungay
Updated at May 17, 2021, 18:48
Tono-Bungay is a realist semiautobiographical novel narrated by George Ponderevo, who is persuaded to help develop the business of selling Tono-Bungay, a patent medicine created by his ambitious uncle Edward. George devotes seven years to organising the production and manufacture of a product which he believes to be 'a damned swindle'. He then quits day-to-day involvement with the enterprise in favour of aeronautics.
like
bc
The War In The Air
Updated at May 17, 2021, 00:44
A global financial collapse is caused by hostile nations freezing assets, and the end of the credit system. The Panic, which is followed by The Purple Death. The War in the Air, the Panic, and the Purple Death bring about a total collapse of the whole fabric of civilisation. But Bert Smallways, fixated on his amorous attachment, returns home after many adventures to kill a rival and win the hand of his beloved Edna; they marry and have eleven children.
like
bc
The Wonderful Visit
Updated at May 17, 2021, 00:44
The Wonderful Visit tells how an angel spends a little more than a week in southern England. He is at first mistaken for a bird because of his dazzling polychromatic plumage, for he is neither the Angel of religious feeling nor the Angel of popular belief, but rather the Angel of Italian art.
like
bc
The Sea Lady
Updated at May 17, 2021, 00:43
A mermaid comes ashore on the southern coast of England feigning a desire to become part of genteel society under the alias Miss Doris Thalassia Waters. The mermaid's real design is to seduce Harry Chatteris, a man she saw some years ago in the South Seas, who has taken her fancy.
like
bc
The War in the Air
Updated at Dec 29, 2020, 20:00
The War in the Air by H. G. Wells. Following the development of massive airships, naïve Londoner Bert Smallways becomes accidentally involved in a German plot to invade America by air and reduce New York to rubble. But although bombers devastate the city, they cannot overwhelm the country, and their attack leads not to victory but to the beginning of a new and horrific age for humanity. And so dawns the era of Total War, in which brutal aerial bombardments reduce the great cultures of the twentieth century to nothing. As civilization collapses around the Englishman, now stranded in a ruined America, he clings to only one hope - that he might return to London, and marry the woman he loves.
like
bc
The Dream
Updated at Dec 27, 2020, 21:00
The Dream is a 1924 novel by H. G. Wells about a man from a Utopian future who dreams the entire life of an Englishman from the Victorian and Edwardian eras, Harry Mortimer Smith. As in other novels of this period, in The Dream Wells represents the present as an "Age of Confusion" from which humanity will be able to emerge with the help of science and common sense.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Dec 16, 2020, 22:57
The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells. With H.G. Wells’ other novels, The War of the Worlds was one of the first and greatest works of science fiction ever to be written. Even long before man had learned to fly, H.G. Wells wrote this story of the Martian attack on England. These unearthly creatures arrive in huge cylinders, from which they escape as soon as the metal is cool. The first falls near Woking and is regarded as a curiosity rather than a danger until the Martians climb out of it and kill many of the gaping crowd with a Heat-Ray. These unearthly creatures have heads four feet in diameter and colossal round bodies, and by manipulating two terrifying machines – the Handling Machine and the Fighting Machine – they are as versatile as humans and at the same time insuperable. They cause boundless destruction. The inhabitants of the Earth are powerless against them, and it looks as if the end of the World has come. But there is one factor which the Martians, in spite of their superior intelligence, have not reckoned on. It is this which brings about a miraculous conclusion to this famous work of the imagination.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Apr 10, 2020, 09:24
The War of the Worlds (1898), by H. G. Wells, is an early science fiction novel which describes an invasion of England by aliens from Mars. It is one of the earliest and best-known depictions of an alien invasion of Earth, and has influenced many others, as well as spawning several films, radio dramas, comic book adaptations, and a television series based on the story. The 1938 radio broadcast caused public outcry against the episode, as many listeners believed that an actual Martian invasion was in progress, a notable example of mass hysteria.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Apr 10, 2020, 09:24
Written between 1895 and 1897, H. G. Wells" The War of the Worlds is one of the earliest stories that detail a conflict between mankind and an extraterrestrial race. Filmed numerous times, this science fiction classic retains its power to disturb readers more than a century later.
like
bc
The Time Machine
Updated at Apr 10, 2020, 09:24
The Time Machine was the first of a number of these imaginative literary inventions. First published in 1895, the novel follows the adventures of a hypothetical Time Traveller who journeys into the future to find that humanity has evolved into two races: the peaceful Eloi — vegetarians who tire easily — and the carnivorous, predatory Morlocks. After narrowly escaping from the Morlocks, the Time Traveller undertakes another journey even further into the future where he finds the earth growing bitterly cold as the heat and energy of the sun wane. Horrified, he returns to the present, but soon departs again on his final journey. While the novel is underpinned with both Darwinian and Marxist theory and offers fascinating food for thought about the world of the future, it also succeeds as an exciting blend of adventure and pseudo-scientific romance.
like
bc
The Country of the Blind, and Other Stories
Updated at Apr 10, 2020, 07:38
"In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king." Or is he? In H. G. Wells" famous tale a stranded mountaineer encounters an isolated society in which his apparent advantage proves less than valuable. There are over thirty H. G. Wells short stories in this collection, including The Star, a gripping tale about a massive celestial object hurtling toward the Earth, as well as The New Accelerator, The Remarkable Case of Davidson"s Eyes, Under the Knife and The Queer Story of Brownlow"s Newspaper.
like
bc
The War of the Worlds
Updated at Apr 10, 2020, 07:38
H. G. Wells" The War of the Worlds is one of the first and greatest of stories that details a conflict between mankind and an extraterrestrial race. Filmed numerous times, this science fiction classic retains its power to disturb.
like
bc
The Time Machine
Updated at Mar 19, 2020, 05:46
The Time Traveller (for so it will be convenient to speak of him) was expounding a recondite matter to us. His pale grey eyes shone and twinkled, and his usually pale face was flushed and animated. The fire burnt brightly, and the soft radiance of the incandescent lights in the lilies of silver caught the bubbles that flashed and passed in our glasses. Our chairs, being his patents, embraced and caressed us rather than submitted to be sat upon, and there was that luxurious after-dinner atmosphere, when thought runs gracefully free of the trammels of precision. And he put it to us in this way—marking the points with a lean forefinger—as we sat and lazily admired his earnestness over this new paradox (as we thought it) and his fecundity. “You must follow me carefully. I shall have to controvert one or two ideas that are almost universally accepted. The geometry, for instance, they taught you at school is founded on a misconception.” “Is not that rather a large thing to expect us to begin upon?” said Filby, an argumentative person with red hair. “I do not mean to ask you to accept anything without reasonable ground for it. You will soon admit as much as I need from you. You know of course that a mathematical line, a line of thickness nil, has no real existence. They taught you that? Neither has a mathematical plane. These things are mere abstractions.” “That is all right,” said the Psychologist.
like
bc
The Time Machine
Updated at Mar 19, 2020, 05:46
"The Time Machine" is a science fiction novella by H. G. Wells, published in 1895 and written as a frame narrative. The work is generally credited with the popularization of the concept of time travel by using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposely and selectively forwards or backwards in time. The term "time machine", coined by Wells, is now almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle. Herbert George Wells (21 September 1866 – 13 August 1946) was an English writer. He was prolific in many genres, writing dozens of novels, short stories, and works of social commentary, satire, biography, and autobiography, and even including two books on recreational war games. He is now best remembered for his science fiction novels and is often called a "father of science fiction", along with Jules Verne and Hugo Gernsback.
like
bc
The Invisible Man
Updated at Mar 19, 2020, 05:46
First published in 1897, The Invisible Man is one of the first science fiction stories. The disturbing tale centers on Griffin, a scientist who has discovered the means to make himself invisible. His initial, almost comedic, adventures are soon overshadowed by the bizarre streak of terror he unleashes upon the inhabitants of a small village. Notable for its sheer invention, suspense, and psychological nuance, The Invisible Man has been filmed many times and continues to enthrall science-fiction fans today as it did the reading public nearly 100 years ago.
like
bc
The Door in the Wall
Updated at Mar 19, 2020, 05:46
One confidential evening, not three months ago, Lionel Wallace told me this story of the Door in the Wall. And at the time I thought that so far as he was concerned it was a true story. He told it me with such a direct simplicity of conviction that I could not do otherwise than believe in him. But in the morning, in my own flat, I woke to a different atmosphere, and as I lay in bed and recalled the things he had told me, stripped of the glamour of his earnest slow voice, denuded of the focussed shaded table light, the shadowy atmosphere that wrapped about him and the pleasant bright things, the dessert and glasses and napery of the dinner we had shared, making them for the time a bright little world quite cut off from every-day realities, I saw it all as frankly incredible. “He was mystifying!” I said, and then: “How well he did it!. . . . . It isn’t quite the thing I should have expected him, of all people, to do well.” Afterwards, as I sat up in bed and sipped my morning tea, I found myself trying to account for the flavour of reality that perplexed me in his impossible reminiscences, by supposing they did in some way suggest, present, convey—I hardly know which word to use—experiences it was otherwise impossible to tell. Well, I don’t resort to that explanation now. I have got over my intervening doubts. I believe now, as I believed at the moment of telling, that Wallace did to the very best of his ability strip the truth of his secret for me. But whether he himself saw, or only thought he saw, whether he himself was the possessor of an inestimable privilege, or the victim of a fantastic dream, I cannot pretend to guess. Even the facts of his death, which ended my doubts forever, throw no light on that. That much the reader must judge for himself. I forget now what chance comment or criticism of mine moved so reticent a man to confide in me. He was, I think, defending himself against an imputation of slackness and unreliability I had made in relation to a great public movement in which he had disappointed me. But he plunged suddenly. “I have” he said, “a preoccupation—” “I know,” he went on, after a pause that he devoted to the study of his cigar ash, “I have been negligent. The fact is—it isn’t a case of ghosts or apparitions—but—it’s an odd thing to tell of, Redmond—I am haunted. I am haunted by something—that rather takes the light out of things, that fills me with longings . . . . .”
like
bc
The Time Machine
Updated at Mar 19, 2020, 05:46
First published in 1895, The Time Machine follows the adventures of a Victorian time traveler who journeys into the future to discover a strange society in which nothing is what it seems. Beautiful little people play and laugh among wonderful flowers and palaces above ground. But the Earth covers some frightening surprises...
like