H. G. Wells
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on the 21st of September 1866. He grew up as the fourth and last child of Joseph Wells, a former domestic gardener who worked as a shopkeeper and professional cricketer, and Sarah Neal, a former domestic servant. An inheritance had allowed the family to acquire a shop selling china and sporting goods, but it failed to prosper due to old stock and poor location. His father earned only a meagre income from the shop while receiving an unsteady amount of money playing cricket for the Kent county team.
A defining incident occurred in 1874 when an accident left young Herbert bedridden with a broken leg. To pass the time he began reading books from the local library brought by his father. These stories stimulated his desire to write and gave him access to other worlds and lives. Later that year he entered Thomas Morley's Commercial Academy, a private school founded in 1849 following the bankruptcy of Morley's earlier institution. The teaching there was erratic and focused mostly on producing copperplate handwriting and doing sums useful to tradesmen.
In 1877 his father fractured his femur which effectively ended Joseph's career as a cricketer. Subsequent earnings as a shopkeeper were not enough to compensate for the loss of the primary source of family income. No longer able to support themselves financially the family sought to place their sons as apprentices in various occupations. From 1880 to 1883 Wells endured an unhappy apprenticeship as a draper at Hyde's Drapery Emporium in Southsea. He worked a thirteen-hour day and slept in a dormitory with other apprentices. His experiences at Hyde's later inspired novels like The Wheels of Chance and Kipps.
Wells rendered his works convincing by instilling commonplace detail alongside a single extraordinary assumption per work. This approach became known as Wells's law. Joseph Conrad hailed him in 1898 as the Realist of the Fantastic. His most notable science fiction works include The Time Machine published in 1895 which was his first novella. The Island of Doctor Moreau appeared in 1896 followed by The Invisible Man in 1897. The War of the Worlds arrived in 1898.
He conceived the idea of 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 almost universally used to refer to such a vehicle today. In writing The Time Machine he realized that the more impossible the story he had to tell the more ordinary must be the setting. The circumstances in which he now set the Time Traveller were all that he could imagine of solid upper-class comforts.
His best-known statement of the law appears in his introduction to a collection of his works published in 1934. He explained that while writing The Time Machine he employed scientific ideas and theories as justifications for the impossible. The earliest depiction of uplift appears in The Island of Doctor Moreau where a mad scientist creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. This novel deals with philosophical themes including pain cruelty moral responsibility human identity and human interference with nature.
As a futurist Wells foresaw the advent of aircraft tanks space travel nuclear weapons satellite television and something resembling the World Wide Web. In his novel The World Set Free published in 1914 he imagined an atomic bomb of terrifying power that would be dropped from aeroplanes. This was an extraordinary insight for an author writing in 1913 and it made a deep impression on Winston Churchill.
Scientists of the day were well aware that natural decay of radium releases energy at a slow rate over thousands of years. The rate is too slow to have practical utility but total amount released is huge. Wells's novel revolves around an unspecified invention that accelerates process of radioactive decay producing bombs that explode with no more than force of ordinary high explosives but which continue to explode for days on end. Nothing could have been more obvious to people of earlier twentieth century than rapidity with which war was becoming impossible yet they did not see it until atomic bombs burst in their fumbling hands.
In 1932 physicist Leó Szilárd read The World Set Free same year Sir James Chadwick discovered neutron. He wrote in his memoirs that book had made very great impression on him. In 1934 Szilard took ideas for chain reaction to British War Office and later Admiralty assigning patent to keep news from reaching wider scientific community. He stated knowing what this would mean because he had read H.G. Wells he did not want patent to become public.
Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells in 1891. The couple agreed to separate in 1894 when he had fallen in love with one of his students Amy Catherine Robbins who later became known as Jane. They moved to Woking Surrey in May 1895 living in rented house Lynton now number 141 Maybury Road for just under 18 months before marrying at St Pancras register office in October 1895. His short period in Woking was perhaps most creative and productive of whole writing career.
He had multiple love affairs throughout life. Dorothy Richardson was friend with whom he had brief affair leading to pregnancy and miscarriage in 1907. In December 1909 he had daughter Anna-Jane with writer Amber Reeves whose parents William and Maud Pember Reeves he met through Fabian Society. Between 1910 and 1913 novelist Elizabeth von Arnim was one of his mistresses. In 1914 he had son Anthony West by novelist and feminist Rebecca West twenty-six years his junior.
Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with twenty-two-year-younger Dutch adventurer and writer Odette Keun living together in Lou Pidou house they built in Grasse France. He dedicated longest book The World of William Clissold to her. When visiting Maxim Gorky in Russia 1920 he slept with Gorky's mistress Moura Budberg then still Countess Benckendorf and twenty-seven years his junior. In 1933 when she left Gorky and emigrated to London their relationship renewed and she cared for him through final illness.
Wells died on the 13th of August 1946 aged 79 at home number 13 Hanover Terrace overlooking Regent's Park London. His body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on the 16th of August 1946. Ashes were subsequently scattered into English Channel at Old Harry Rocks most eastern point of Jurassic Coast about 3.5 miles from Swanage in Dorset. In preface to 1941 edition of The War in the Air Wells stated epitaph should be I told you so You damned fools.
Science fiction historian John Clute describes Wells as most important writer genre has yet seen noting work central to both British and American science fiction. He was nominated for Nobel Prize in Literature in 1921 1932 1935 and 1946. Wells influenced real exploration of space so much that impact craters on Mars and Moon named after him. In United Kingdom his work key model for British scientific romance with writers like Olaf Stapledon J.D. Beresford S. Fowler Wright and Naomi Mitchison drawing on example.
In United States Hugo Gernsback reprinted most of Wells work in pulp magazine Amazing Stories regarding it texts of central importance to self-conscious new genre. Later American writers including Ray Bradbury Isaac Asimov Frank Herbert Carl Sagan and Ursula K. Le Guin all recalled being influenced by Wells. A self-declared fan of Wells John Wyndham author of The Day of the Triffids echoes Wells obsession with catastrophe and its aftermath.
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Common questions
When and where was H. G. Wells born?
Herbert George Wells was born at Atlas House, 162 High Street in Bromley, Kent, on the 21st of September 1866.
What are the most notable science fiction works by H. G. Wells and when were they published?
H. G. Wells published The Time Machine in 1895 followed by The Island of Doctor Moreau in 1896 and The Invisible Man in 1897. He released The War of the Worlds in 1898 which became one of his most famous novels.
How did H. G. Wells influence the development of nuclear weapons?
In his novel The World Set Free published in 1914 H. G. Wells imagined an atomic bomb dropped from aeroplanes that would explode with no more force than ordinary high explosives but continue to explode for days. Physicist Leó Szilárd read this book in 1932 and later took ideas for chain reaction to the British War Office after Sir James Chadwick discovered the neutron.
Who were the wives and partners of H. G. Wells throughout his life?
H. G. Wells married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells in 1891 before separating in 1894 to marry Amy Catherine Robbins who became known as Jane. Between 1924 and 1933 he partnered with Odette Keun living together in Grasse France and later maintained a relationship with Moura Budberg until his death.
When and how did H. G. Wells die and what happened to his ashes?
H. G. Wells died on the 13th of August 1946 aged 79 at home number 13 Hanover Terrace overlooking Regent's Park London. His body was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium on the 16th of August 1946 and his ashes were scattered into English Channel at Old Harry Rocks about 3.5 miles from Swanage in Dorset.