The War of the Worlds

In the spirit of the season, I have chosen to read what is perhaps the most infamous Halloween story of all time. I am talking not about this novel itself, of course, but about the October 30th, 1938 radio broadcast version by Orson Welles (not to be confused with author H. G. Wells) that turned six million confounded listeners into a panicked mob. Yep. The state of New Jersey was under the impression that Martians had landed and were destroying everything. I guess those poor greatly depressed bastards couldn't tell a fictional story from a news report. But that's neither here nor there. What's important is that even though The War of the Worlds was yet another late nineteenth century classic, I actually kind of enjoyed it. Like, maybe even a lot. What's extra pleasant about this surprise is that it never should have been a surprise at all; I really liked Wells' The Time Machine when I read it a few months ago. As was the case then, when I was impressed by Wells' concept of a time machine way back in 1895, I was equally impressed this time around by his ideas about interplanetary travel. Consider that the first man to enter outer space, Yuri Gagarin, did so in 1961, just 49 years ago. This book was published in 1898, a whopping 63 years before that happened. Pluto wasn't even discovered until 1930. NASA wasn't founded until 1958. It's easy to lose temporal resolution when thinking about the past, but guys - Wells was like, way ahead of his time on this one. He wasn't the first guy to tell a story about an alien invasion, but he did so with such attention to detail and then-scientific plausibility. I'm not saying the physics and biology were bulletproof - far from it. Back in those days, it was thought that Mars was red because of red vegetation growing on it, an anachronism that becomes a plot point in the story. But for over a century and right up to this day, many of Wells' original ideas found in this tale continue to inspire science fiction writing and, in some cases, real science. Robert H. Goddard, the father of modern rocketry, was wholly inspired by the fictitious space travel found in The War of the Worlds. But the best part about this book wasn't simply that it was an archetype-defining classic or a piece of scientific genius. What's most marvelous about it is that it's actually a really decent book. Like, well-written with deliberate moods and themes and a pretty enjoyable story. Just as Wells used time travel in The Time Machine to push an anti-industrial agenda, here he seems to take delight in drawing parallels between Martian conquest and European imperialism. So far, the man is two for two at totally impressing me. To recap, he's a science fiction icon who was always at the forefront of creativity in the genre and he managed to tell decent stories laden with political ideologies. What's not to love? Oh, and the now cliche but then clever way that this book ends just makes me hate the end of M. Night Shyamalan's Signs even more than I already did. When an author in 1898 can conclude an alien invasion story in a more scientifically sound manner than a screenwriter in 2002 can, maybe it's a sign that the screenwriter is headed for a terrible, terrible career.