H. G. WELLS AND THE SHORT STORY

Also by J. R. Hammond

AN H. G. WELLS COMPANION H. G. WELLS AND REBECCA WEST AN EDGAR ALLAN POE COMPANION A GEORGE ORWELL COMPANION A ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON COMPANION H. G. WELLS: AN ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY OF HIS

WORKS H. G. WELLS AND THE MODERN NOVEL

H. G. Wells and the Short Story

J. R. Hammond

M St. Martin's Press

© J. R. Hammond 1992

Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1992 978-0-333-51327-9

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First published in Great Britain 1992 by THE MACMILLAN PRESS LTD

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Companies and representatives throughout the world

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

First published in the United States of America 1992 by Scholarly and Reference Division,

ST. MARTIN'S PRESS, INC., 175 Fifth A venue,

New York, N.Y. 10010

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Hammond, J. R. (John R.), ] 933-

H. G. Wells and the short story I J. R. Hammond. p. em.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

1. Wells, H. G. (Herbert George), 1866-1946-(:riticism and interpretation. 2. Short story. I. Title. PR5777.H294 1992 823'.912-dc20 91-38862

CIP

ISBN 978-1-349-38922-3 ISBN 978-0-230-37667-0 (eBook)DOI 10.1057/9780230376670

ISBN 978-0-312-07582-8ISBN 978-0-312-07582-8

ISBN 978-0-312-07582-8

For H. G., in homage

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Contents

Preface ix

Acknowledgements xi

PART ONE: OVERVIEW 1

1 Wells and the Short Story 3

2 The Frontiers of Art 19

3 A Checklist of Wells's Short Stories 29

PART TWO: CASE STUDIES 41

4 Suburban Gardens 43 'Through a Window' 44 'The Purple Pileus' 48 'A Catastrophe' 52 'Miss Winchelsea' s Heart' 55

5 Mysterious Worlds 59 'Aepyornis Island' 60 'The Sea Raiders' 63 'The Crystal Egg' 66 'Under the Knife' 70

6 A Hideous Grimace 75 'The Flowering of the Strange Orchid' 76 'The Red Room' 79 The Cone' 82 'The Wild Asses of the Devil' 86

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viii Contents

7 The Magic Crystal 89 'The Remarkable Case of Davidson's Eyes' 90 'The Plattner Story' 93 'The Story of the Late Mr Elvesham' 96 'The Stolen Body' 100

8 The Man Alone 103 'A Slip under the Microscope' 104 'The Presence by the Fire' 107 'Wayde's Essence' 109 'The Valley of Spiders' 110

9 Lost Orientations 115 'Mr Skelmersdale in Fairyland' 116 'The Country of the Blind' 121 'The Door in the Wall' 125

10 First and Last Things 133 'The Apple' 134 'The Story of the Last Trump' 136 'Answer to Prayer' 139 'A Dream of Armageddon' 141

Appendices 149

1 Two Unreprinted Short Stories 149 2 Introduction to The Country of the Blind 162

Notes 167

Bibliography 171

Index 173

Preface

It is now thirty years since the publication of Bernard Bergonzi's pioneering work The Early H. G. Wells, the first study to subject Wells's short stories to detailed academic scrutiny. The intervening three decades have seen a significant growth in the field of Wells studies and the publication of a number of important biographical and critical works pertaining to his life and writings. As a result we now know far more about his methods of work than was understood during his lifetime and have a deeper understanding of his artistic concerns and the forces that shaped his temperament and attitude of mind.

The present study is best seen as a companion volume to my H. G. Wells and the Modern Novel, published in 1988. In that book I ques­tioned the received view that Wells was a novelist in the realist tradition and concluded that he can properly be regarded as a trans­itional figure between realism and modernism. This study stems from my conviction that his short stories merit far closer critical attention than they have yet received and possess considerable psy­chological and symbolic insight.

Justly famous as a writer of short stories, for too long Wells's contributions in this field have earned him a reputation as a second Poe or a second Stevenson. The present study argues that in his short stories Wells was not simply emulating the styles and themes of his predecessors but making a distinctive contribution to the genre grounded firmly in his approach to fiction. Rejecting any attempts to circumscribe the short story within narrow definitions he proclaimed in the introduction to the Country of the Blind that 'insistence upon rigid forms and austere unities' was 'the instinctive reaction of the sterile against the fecund'. Through his deliberately fluid approach to the genre and willingness to experiment with a diversity of styles and themes, he produced some of the most memorable short tales in the English language.

He was moreover giving fictional expression to drives and longings implicit in his own makeup. Throughout his life Wells sought unsuc­cessfully to reconcile the conflicting drives within his personality towards, on the one hand, a love of order and security and, on the

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other, a craving for passion and adventure. This tension between classical and romantic elements fractured much of his work yet, paradoxically, proved to be one of his greatest strengths. Wells was a man who was haunted by an oppressive sense of man's animality and propensity towards evil yet was continually beckoned by vi­sions of beauty and desire. The expression of these diverse tensions in his shorter fiction forms a fascinating study.

An introductory chapter gives an overview of Wells's contribu­tions to the genre and places them in their literary and biographiCal context. This is followed by a chapter examining his distinctive approach to the art of the short story, and a checklist of his short fiction. This introductory section is followed by seven chapters of 'case studies' focusing on a representative selection of the short stories and examining their language and imagery in closer detail. An appendix includes the text of two short stories now reprinted for the first time since their original publication.

I would like to express my warm thanks to Gene K. Rinke!, Cura­tor of Special Collections at the University of Illinois at Urbana­Champaign, who has been unfailingly kind and helpful in respond­ing to many tedious requests for information and for xerox copies of manuscripts. I also wish to place on record my thanks to the staff of the National Newspaper Library, Colindale, and the Local Studies Library, Bromley, for their courtesy and assistance over a long period. My final thanks must be to the members and officers of the H. G. Wells Society, not only for the great honour they have ren­dered me in electing me as their President but for their constant encouragement and interest.

J. R. HAMMOND

Acknowledgements

The extracts from the works of H. G. Wells are reproduced by per­mission of the literary executors of the estate of H. G. Wells and the following copyright-holders:

Faber & Faber Ltd and Little, Brown & Co., for the extracts from Experiment in Autobiography and H. G. Wells in Love.

A. P. Watt Ltd, for the extracts from all other works by H. G. Wells.

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