 And, actually, it does not really matter whether these devices are derived from science (e.g. a time machine) or superstition (a ghost, say). What matters is whether they allow a writer’s imagination to soar, extrapolate and create. Let us never forget that a certain William Shakespeare had no qualms about making use of ghosts and fairies, spirits and sprites, when it seemed expedient to do so.
Reviewed by P.P.O. Kane
The Man Who Could Work Miracles
By H.G. Wells
With an Introduction by Brian Stableford
Tartarus Press
1 December 2006, ISBN-13: 978-1905784004, Hardcover
This volume collects together some 31 of H.G. Wells’ supernatural and fantastic tales, with most dating from the decade before and after 1900. We are inclined to associate Wells with science fiction only, and it is certain that he did not believe in the supernatural or even Christianity (as is clear, for example, from ‘A Vision of Judgement’, a tale included here), so it might be supposed that he would have a certain difficulty in conveying darkness and dread. Yet Wells the level-headed rationalist was also a visionary artist, as well as being the author of that strange text, Mind at the End of Its Tether; and he undoubtedly had his own terrors and fears to contend with.
In a considered and substantial introduction, Brian Stableford, clearly an admirer, traces Wells’ career and provides some discussion of each tale. Crucially, he makes the point that Wells knew that ‘all imaginative fiction relied on facilitating devices of dubious rational plausibility’. And, actually, it does not really matter whether these devices are derived from science (e.g. a time machine) or superstition (a ghost, say). What matters is whether they allow a writer’s imagination to soar, extrapolate and create. Let us never forget that a certain William Shakespeare had no qualms about making use of ghosts and fairies, spirits and sprites, when it seemed expedient to do so.
‘The Story of the Late Mr. Elvesham’ is one of the best and it is concerned with transmigration. An old man nearing the end of his life attempts to transfer his consciousness - or his soul, if you will - to a younger man, a healthier vessel. We are given to understand that this is a procedure that has occurred before. It is an intriguing notion, one with distinct Platonic/homosexual overtones, and is superbly executed, primarily because it is told (mainly) from the perspective of the victim. What is apparent, from this tale and others too, is that one of Well’s great strengths is his vivid depiction of strange experiences and queer states of being. Here, for example, there is a moment when one consciousness almost, but not quite, eclipses another. It is described in part thus: ‘a ghostly set of new sensations was struggling with those of my ordinary self.’
Perhaps the outstanding story is ‘The Door in the Wall’. A rich fantasy capable of myriad interpretations, it is the tale one would urge others to read first. Lionel Wallace, when a child, comes upon a green door in a white wall and, despite his fear and a strong sense of transgression, he goes through it. There, amid other experiences, he is shown a strange book:
The pages fell open… and I looked, marvelling, for in the living pages of that book I saw myself; it was a story about myself, and in it were all the things that had happened to me since ever I was born… It was wonderful to me, because the pages of that book were not pictures, you understand, but realities. (299)
At certain key moments later in life, Wallace comes across the green door again but he declines to explore it further: the onrush of the world is simply too strong. Gradually, though, the search for the door becomes the overriding obsession of his life.
Like Kafka’s ‘Before the Law’ (a rather different fantasy which also involves a door/gate), Wells’ tale resists any single interpretation. It could be about childhood nostalgia or forbidden knowledge or expulsion from a lost Eden (which would be ironic, considering Wells’ antagonism to religion). Yet the door could also represent weakness and a desire to escape from responsibility. Taking a more sinister tack, it could also represent an active evil, a temptation that sidetracks men from achieving good in the world. For Lionel Wallace, a Cabinet Minister, was apparently on the cusp of greatness. All these possibilities are left open.
A more mundane point: we are probably in a better position to appreciate Wells’ feat of imagination in conceiving of this strange book, what with our experiences of virtual reality, gaming and TV, than his first readers. For the record, ‘The Door in the Wall’ was first published in 1906.
A few tales adopt a satiric stance towards Christianity, ‘Answer to Prayer’ being one example. Wells’ point here is that the existence of God would be a real inconvenience, if not a source of great stress, for the Catholic Church. Incidentally, another of Wells’ strengths is that all these tales end well. There is always some payoff, whether it be satiric, didactic, elegiac or ironic. Wells was a consummate craftsman and these fictions are complete, fully formed creatures.
In conclusion, one can question whether there is really any great disconnection between the supernatural tales collected here and the rest of Wells’ work. The same extraordinary visionary imagination is actively present and (as a ‘for example’) the description of the universe given in ‘Under the Knife’ would not be out of place in a work of science fiction. There are also clues in this tale as to what Wells feared: the infinite nature of the universe was a source of dread as well as wonder to him; its loneliness, the lack of a human scale. Elsewhere, it is clear that he feared the prodigiousness of nature, her great diversity and capacity for perversity. And what do these two fears tell us? Perhaps that Wells had an underlying sense that human beings were somehow redundant as far as the world and the universe was concerned; that without us, creation’s clock could tick happily on… trees would fall in a forest, even without a human eye to witness it.
The Man Who Could Work Miracles: The Supernatural Tales of H.G. Wells is an extremely worthwhile collection and, like all Tartarus Press books, it is produced to an extremely high standard indeed.
NB: in the US, the title is A Dream of Armageddon, and the 'steampunk' paperback can be found here.
About the reviewer: P.P.O. Kane lives and works in Manchester, England. He welcomes responses to his reviews and you can reach him at ludic@europe.com
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