Time Machine and The Invisible Man (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) (37 page)

10
(p. 45)
Morlocks:
The Time Traveller uses the term for the first time, though it is not clear what its source is. In Wells’s socialism, the situation of the Morlocks is the result of labor unions, which eventually work in their own interest and not, as he would prefer, in the interest of the technological conquest of nature.

1
(p. 47)
If only I had had a companion:
Weena is clearly no companion for the Time Traveller.

2
(p. 49)
the language they had:
The Morlocks and Eloi are so estranged as vestiges of ancient social classes that they cannot communicate ; they have no common language.

1
(p. 54)
The Time Traveller paused ... large white mallows, upon the little table:
While the Time Traveller allows no interruptions, he does interrupt himself. Here the narrator, Hillyer, interjects a comment: He describes the withered flowers, “not unlike large white mallows,” the Time Traveller finds in his pockets. These flowers, which Weena stuffed into his jacket pockets, are the only evidence of his journey.

2
(p. 54)
a Faun
. . . minus
the head:
The faun, or satyr, is a mythological creature, human but with goat-like legs; it is often associated with pastoral literature. The world of the Eloi is pastoral, but they are the sheep the Morlocks slaughter. The faun is headless because no shepherd watches over the Eloi.

3
(p. 56)
I pitied this last feeble rill from the great flood of humanity:
The Time Traveller is sorry for the Eloi, the final little brook (rill) of the flood that was humanity. He is certain now that the Morlocks eat the Eloi.

4
(p. 57)
Carlyle-like scorn of this wretched aristocracy in decay. Taking
a cue from Thomas Carlyle (
Sartor Resartus,
1833-1834), who considered aristocrats superfluous, the Time Traveller had scorned the Eloi as a useless class, but he still feels pity for them because they, unlike the Morlocks, look human. He sympathizes with their situation—they suffer “intellectual degradation” (stupidity), and they fear the dark. At the same time, he realizes the Morlocks are useful because they work.

1
(p. 58)
Wandsworth and Battersea:
The reference is to districts, formerly independent boroughs, on the south bank of the Thames, part of modern London. The Time Traveller has never left London, though now the city is on an estuary, an arm of the sea, or a creek, a small inlet or bay, rather than a river. He wonders about the evolution of sea animals but can make no observations.

2
(p. 58)
more human than she was:
The Time Traveller concludes that Weena is not human, that she is merely an animal capable of affection.

3
(p. 58)
after the fashion of the Megatherium.... huge skeleton barrel of a Brontosaurus
: These two extinct creatures—the former a giant ground sloth of the Oligocene epoch, the latter a giant, herbivorous dinosaur of the Jurassic period—represent evolutionary dead ends for Wells. They were doomed, as are the Eloi and the Morlocks, because they lacked intelligence.

4
(p. 60) footnote: The presence of a comment by an “editor” supports the notion that Hillyer published the Time Traveller’s account.

1
(p. 69)
horrible death of little Weena:
The Time Traveller mourns the loss of Weena as if she were a favorite pet. He is consoled by the fact that the Morlocks did not get to eat her. Wells humanizes the Time Traveller, making him long for his friends and house, but this emotion fades.

1
(p. 70)
Like the cattle... their end was the same:
The Time Traveller half-quotes verses from the Bible, the Book of Psalms, where God says it is He who provides grass for animals and His Word for humans. His meaning appears below, where he says mankind labored to provide itself with “comfort and ease,” that its “watchword” or slogan was “security and permanency.” Absolute balance in society ended in the Eloi and the Morlocks. For Wells, this society at peace with itself creates no challenges to the intellect, no changes to deal with.

1
(p. 74)
the work of the tidal drag was done:
Wells falls back on G. H. Darwin’s theory (see chapter V, note 7) that the earth will eventually stop rotating. The sun, grown old, barely warms the one side of the earth facing it.

1
(p. 81)
1 seemed to see a ghostly, indistinct figure ... for a moment.
Wells reverses the perspective. Now instead of the Time Traveller seeing Hillyer, it is Hillyer who sees the Time Traveller departing on his second voyage.

1
(p. 82)
he swept back into the past
: In this paragraph, Hillyer lists a number of remote periods from the past, imagining prehistoric humans as “blood-drinking, hairy savages” not unlike the Morlocks, wondering if the Time Traveller has gone as far back into the past as he went into the future.

2
(p. 83)
gratitude and a mutual tenderness:
Hillyer seems to romanticize the Time Traveller’s relationship with Weena, elevating it into love.

1
(p. 85)
A Grotesque Romance
: Wells’s subtitle locates this work in the context of supernatural writing; a romance is a story in which scenes and incidents are removed from ordinary life, as opposed to a novel, which concerns itself with realistic character and society. He is also signaling the reader that this “grotesque” (horrifying) tale may also contain encoded or secret messages; that is, he suggests that the work may be an allegory, that there is more to it than its literal meaning.

1
(p. 91)
stranger:
Wells plays “strange” off against “stranger.” Griffin is strange, almost an albino normally, and is wrapped up head to toe so people won’t see he is invisible. A stranger to the town of Iping, a metaphor of backward English society, he is a man who has transformed himself into something new.

2
(p. 91 )
Bramblehurst
: The name implies “brambles,” prickly bushes growing wild.

3
(p. 91)
Coach and Horses:
The name of the pub suggests rural, pre-industrial England.

1
(p. 101)
an unusually strange sort of stranger:
Here Wells echoes the use of the words in chapter 1.

1
(p. 101)
The Thousand and One Bottles:
The words in the title allude to the Arabic classic
The Thousand and One Nights,
in which many stories feature magic, here replaced by chemistry.

2
(p. 101)
the twenty-ninth day of February:
Wells uses this leap-year date to enhance the strangeness surrounding Griffin. No year is mentioned because Wells wants the events to seem recent yet vague.

3
(p. 101)
Fearenside:
This name, which can be pronounced “fear inside,” labels these rural people as backward bumpkins.

1
(p. 106)
I
have told the circumstances of the stranger’s arrival: Wells shifts to a first-person narrator, like a reporter or witness, to give more immediacy to his story.

2
(p. 107)
he would go out muffled up invisibly:
Griffin must make his invisibility invisible by covering it up.

3
(p. 107)
the Scarlet Coat:
This inn is named for the red coat worn by fox hunters.

4
(p. 108)
Mr. Gould, the probationary assistant in the National School:
The National Society for the Education of the Poor taught the doctrines of the Church of England. From 1870 on, they taught all children until the age of eleven. Mr. Gould tests students who seek membership in the Church along with those who wish to become clergymen.

5
(p. 108)
an Anarchist in disguise:
An anarchist is one who believes all forms of government to be coercive and undesirable. In the nineteenth century, the word evoked a terrorist using bombs to destroy authority of any kind. Mr. Gould’s assessment of Griffin is partially correct; he does want to destroy the status quo.

6
(p. 108)
Silas Durgan
. . .
compared the stranger to the man with the one talent
: Silas Durgan confuses the biblical talent, a unit of currency, with the word that means skill or ability. His bogus theology reflects the ignorance of the rural population.

7
(p. 109)
Whitsuntide:
The week beginning with Whitsunday (“white Sunday,” so named because of the white robes worn by people baptized at that time). Whitsunday is an English name for Pentecost, the seventh Sunday after Easter, a Christian feast that commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit on Christ’s disciples, allowing them to speak and be understood by people of many languages.

1
(p. 112)
The facts ... came to us chiefly through the medium of the vicar and his wife:
Wells now makes his narrator seem like a citizen of Iping.

2
(p. 112)
Club festivities:
The reference is to a kind of fair in Iping, featuring games of chance and rides.

1
(p. 114)
specific gravity:
The reference is to the difference between the density of a substance in pure and impure form. The Halls water down their beer with sarsaparilla.

2
(p. 116)
it was afterwards ascertained:
The narrator shifts now into the role of historian.

3
(p. 116)
‘Tas sperits:
“That’s spirits:’ Mrs. Hall has read about mediums and seances and knows ghosts move furniture.

4
(p. 117)
The Anglo-Saxon genius for parliamentary government:
Wells mocks the British parliamentary system for being all talk and no action.

1
(p. 119)
second-hand ordinary bicycles:
The bicycle was a symbol of progress; by mentioning it, Wells notes the modernization taking place even in Iping.

2
(p. 119)
union-jacks and royal ensigns (which had originally celebrated the Jubilee):
The reference is to national flags and the flags of the monarch, Queen Victoria, hung out to celebrate her fiftieth year on the throne in 1887. For Wells, the monarchy was anachronistic.

1
(p. 126)
The eighth chapter is exceedingly brief.
The narrator deals with his report as if it were a book.

1
(p. 131)
bread and cheese:
Whatever Griffin eats remains visible until assimilated or absorbed by his body.

2
(p. 132)
I want you to help me.... But you
will—must: Griffin chooses the unreliable Mr. Marvel to be his assistant, a hint at his human fallibility. When he announces he is ”a man of power,“ he is interrupted by a sneeze. His true weakness is clear.

1
(p. 135)
subsequent proceedings interested him no more:
Wells quotes a line from a poem by the humorous American author Bret Harte ( 1836-1902), ”The Society upon the Stanislaus,“ about a fight in a mining-camp bar. Harte was popular at the time in England.

1
(p. 142)
white kilt that could only have passed muster in Greece:
A white skirt could only have been thought proper attire for a man in nineteenth-century Greece, where such costumes were worn.

2
(p. 143)
But his temper
. . .
for the mere satisfaction of hurting.
Grif fin’s temper is now dangerously short, and he attacks because inflicting pain gives him pleasure.

1
(p. 147)
Port Stowe:
Wells transforms Southampton into a fictitious port.

1
(p. 154)
conversed in American:
Wells implies that American English is another language.

2
(p. 155)
what country I’m in:
The American knows he is in England, where gun laws are more stringent than in the United States.

1
(p. 161)
Griffin, of University College:
Griffin’s name appears for the first time. A griffin or griffon is a mythological animal of two natures, combining eagle and lion. It may suggest Griffin’s double nature, human and more-than-human. Earlier (p.106) he is called “piebald,” of two colors.

1
(p. 165)
It’s grotesque:
The word “grotesque” here means horrible. This wording marks the book’s link to the tradition of horror literature going back to the Gothic romances of the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries, in the style of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818).

2
(p. 165)
I must have a partner:
For the second time, Griffin realizes how alone he is and how much he needs help. Kemp is a step above Mr. Marvel, but he too proves unreliable.

3
(p. 168)
Then he took an envelope and addressed it to “Colonel Adye, Port Burdock”:
Kemp writes a note to the chief of police. Is this because of fear or because he thinks he is acting for the common good? Griffin’s rage on waking would convince Kemp of the latter.

1
(p. 170)
Chesilstowe:
The reference is to a beach on the English Channel where the sea has arranged the gravel in a specific pattern. Griffin may have been inspired by the gravel to see an order or a reality invisible to others—that solid bodies may be made to stop refracting light. He may also see a social reality—namely, that existing society is a chaos which a man of science might transform into order.