The Time Machine, Chapters Eight and Nine

In which our hero explores a museum and find some useful tools, attempts to return to the Sphinx, is waylaid by some Morlocks, and ends up just watching the world burn; and in which our narrator once again wonders at how smart our genius inventor is, but supposes allowances can be made for panic and lack of sleep, I GUESS.



Oh, poor Weena. She was a good little pet humanoid.

Covers! Two more covers tonight:

Haha, oh, this one. It's from 1968, in case you couldn't guess, printed by Berkeley. The blurb at the top reads "The famous novel of one man's defiant gamble with the unknown. The science-fiction masterpiece that heralded the coming of the flower children!" The Eloi on the cover are, of course, wearing mini-skirt-length dresses and are bedecking each other with flowers, while the Time Traveler bursts in on what could very well be a motorcycle through a psychedelic portal between them and the Morlocks below (bearing one of them off). It's, like, a trip, man. I'm not sure if the blurb-writer was trying to make a point of comparing hippies to the childlike, barely sapient Eloi, or if they didn't really look into it that deeply and just wanted to cash in on the latest trend.

Another cover and notes after the jump!

The Time Machine, Chapter Six and Seven

In which our hero descends into the underground with no reliable light source like a CHUMP and gets the Morlocks all stirred up, sets off with Weena towards a distant and mysterious building, and makes a disturbing deduction about the Morlocks; and in which we are suddenly yet briefly thrust back into the framing narrative.



...and now it is made quite clear that the Morlocks are the Bad Guys, if there was any doubt. This was again perhaps a socialist cautionary tale: treat the workers well and make the classes more equitable, or you'll get eaten. Nom. (Oh, hello "dismemberment" tag, I've missed you!)

We've got two covers for you today, because I've found more fun covers than there are installments left in the book. Both for today are from pulp magazines that reprinted the story in the 1950s, because sweet Oz do I love me some pulp covers.

This first one is from volume 11, no. 6 of Famous Fantastic Mysteries, with a cover painting by Norman "Mars Attacks" Saunders. Since this is the pulps, we've got our Time Traveler — who specifically describes himself as "not a young man," but whose appearance is otherwise up to the imagination, so why not — as a rugged young man, and the tiny, childlike Weena as a tall, voluptuous blonde, perfectly coiffed and given a nice little nothing to almost wear. Other than that, it's actually a reasonable depiction of the book, more or less. At least, one could identify it as actually BEING from this story, though sexier and more actiony. Oh, and I also like the numbers randomly flying through the sky.

Another cover and notes after the jump!

The Time Machine, Chapter FIve

In which the Time Machine most mysteriously goes missing, presumed inside the sphinx; the Time Traveler makes a little friend; and discovers new structures an inhabitants that lead him to revise his politico-evolutionary hypothesis.



Enter the Morlocks! They naturally will play a most important part to come, and as the Time Traveler has already mentioned he has not quite gotten the whole picture yet.

Today's cover is from a 1927 edition by Heinemann. And... nope, I have no idea what's going on here. I mean, I may have forgotten some scene after we rejoin the framing narrative wherein someone at the dinner party starts having some sort of convulsions, but I don't think so. And even if there is, or were, that's the scene you put on the cover? Nothing science-fictiony at all? No future world, no strange creatures, no Time Machine, nothing even vaguely time-related, like a clock or the sun? You want it to look like a murder-mystery? Suit yourself, artist whose work was not scanned in hi-res enough for me to make out the signature, and whose cover I can't find anywhere other than here.

And now useful notes, after the jump! Mostly definitions, but also some talk of sewers. Yay!

The Time Machine, Chapters Three to Four

In which the Time Traveler tells his tale of traveling in time, ending in the year 802,701 where he finds that humanity has become largely useless and expostulates incorrect hypotheses as to how this came about.



And now we start the tale proper, and we see what appears to be the remnants of humanity, grown weak and careless from all challenges in the world being conquered. A valid evolutionary theory? Probably not! Heck, even the Time Traveler admits he's wrong, though that is in hindsight to some as-yet-undisclosed evidence....

Our cover art this time around comes from Classics Illustrated #133 from 1956, painted by Lou Cameron. There's a lot to really love about this cover, with little details like the fading sun and the phases of the moon.I'm also rather fond of his depiction of the Time Machine itself, incorporating some of the few details Wells included, like the dual lever control and the saddle (though at the time, "saddle" could also mean a bicycle seat, and as Wells was a bicycling enthusiast many think that's what he meant), while making look cleverly like a gyroscope. Many other artists would rip off this design in years to come.

Oh, and I also love how the Time Traveler looks like Ward Cleaver.

Notes after the jump! They're as numerous as last time, more or less, but somewhat less involved.

The Time Machine, Chapters One and Two

In which there is a gathering of unnamed satirical archetypes with much harrumphing and discussions on the nature of Time, and the Time Traveler claims to have traveled in time; and in which the narrator has already used up all of the voices that will be needed in this book.



Yay, new book! We haven't done a full-on science fiction book yet, so we'll start with one that invented or at least codified one of sci-fi's greatest tropes: TIME TRAVEL. As overly discussed in the intro, The Time Machine had kind of an odd publishing history, starting out as one short story in a college newspaper in 1888, then heavily rewritten to be serialized in another newspaper, never concluded, rewritten again to be serialized in another newspaper, and rewritten versions of both of those latter newspaper texts submitted and accepted by two different publishing companies, and published within three weeks of each other in 1895. Of the two book texts, the "Holt" or "American" version and the "Heinemann" or "British" version, named for their respective publishing companies and countries, the latter is by far the most reprinted. There's also the matter of deleted text, a section from a later chapter that Wells included in the serial due to editorial fiat but cut out once he had the chance. It was, however, inexplicably included in whatever cheap book-fair paperback I read back in elementary school, so it may or may not get read later on. We'll see how I feel.

Anyway, for the first time thus far I was unable to find any public domain illustrations for this book. I know, right? So, we'll just have to do what we did to fill in several chapters back in Green Gables, and show covers from various versions over the years. We'll start with the first edition covers:

Photo via the University of California, Riverside

The one on the left is the more well-known Heinemann version, showing the winged sphinx that will play a major part in the story. The Holt version on the right just has the Henry Holt & Co. logo, with an owl on a book. Not... entirely relevant to the story, but understandable, I suppose.

Luckily (?) there are plenty of notes after the jump to fill the void left by the illustrations! Especially in these here early chapters.

"The Little Mermaid," by Hans Christian Andersen

In which the young mermaid from under the sea wishes to be part of our world, makes a bargain with a sea witch, and attempts to win the love of a young prince in order to... get an immortal soul, a part of the story that our narrator had rather forgotten about.



Since "Snow White and Rose Red" was a bit on the short side, we're going to double up on our short story interlude by returning to Mr. Hans Christian Andersen. "The Little Mermaid," one of Andersen's popular "suffering is totally good for you" stories, was originally published in Denmark in 1836 as "Den lille havfrue," which literally translates as... "The Little Mermaid." As with "The Snow Queen" I had to pick a translation. Now, rather than just go with the one in the Andersen collection I own, because it inexplicably doesn't include "The Little Mermaid," which, what? I went with the original English translation from 1872, by H.P. Paull. As with Alice "Mrs. Edgar" Lucas," this is alternatively credited to H.B. Paull, Mrs. H.B. Paull, Mrs. H.H.B. Paull or various combinations thereof, when it seems her name is, in fact, Susannah Mary Paull.

Also, I, um, may have gone a bit overboard with the illustrations on this one. I found one rather extensive set of illustrations I really liked by Helen Stratton from 1899. Those are most of them, and all but one of the black-and-white illustrations. The full-color illustrations are by our friend Edmund Dulac, from the same 1911 edition that our "Snow Queen" illustrations came from. Then there are two others I threw in from Harry Clarke, 1916, and Hans Tegner, largely because I thought the others didn't include nearly enough pictures of the sea witch, who is awesome.

Oh, and it should be noted that whilst the Victorian era was one of rather notorious prudery, they were still kind of okay with breasts in art and illustrations. So... mermaid boobs ahead, if that kind of thing bothers you.

By the way, I apologize that this is late and that I didn't put in any timestamps for the images, but I need to stop pretending I can get these things done on time during tech week for a show I'm in. The theater people in the audience know what I'm sayin'. If I get a chance, I'll add the timestamps in.

The "F" from the opening line: "Far out in the ocean..." (Stratton)

More illustrations after the jump!

"Snow White and Rose Red," by the Brothers Grimm

In which the titular sisters encounter a very nice bear and a very ungrateful dwarf and between them find a happy-ever-after; and in which the narrator insists on demonstrating that he learned SOMETHING in four years of high school German.



And here's our first fairy tale by Grimm! As described at length in the recording, this Snow White is not the same as that of "...and the Seven Dwarves." The names are different in German: Sneewittchen for the more famous one, and Scnheeweißchen* for this one. They both translate literally to "Little Snow White," but the former is Low German and the latter is High German. There is a dwarf in this one, though!

Much like with Andersen and Verne, there are a multitude of translations of Grimm both in and out of the public domain. A translation by Margaret Hunt from the 1870s is considered the definitive English translation of the nineteenth century. It also, however, has not aged especially well. Instead, I'll be using the version used in the Barnes & Noble Classics edition I got for free a while back, which is an anonymous translation from 1869. Maybe not the best, but definitely usable.

I was, though, very pleased with the number of illustrations I was able to find for this somewhat lesser-known tale. I couldn't entirely decide between three sources, so I used them all! One batch is by Jennie Harbour, from a 1921 compilation edited by Edric Vredenburg called My Book of Fairy Tales. Another is by L. Leslie Brooke, from a 1909 book called The House in the Wood and Other Fairy Stories, and the third is by Alexander Zick from a German edition of Grimm's from sometime in the 1880s, probably. Most of the image files are courtesy of SurLaLune Fairy Tales.

2:37 - They were like the flowers which bloomed on two
rose-bushes which grew before the cottage. (Jennie Harbour)

See more illustrations after the jump!

Sense and Sensibility, Volume the Third, Chapters Thirteen and Fourteen

In which Elinor and Edward are happy, the conduct of Lucy and Robert is explained, the Ferrars are all reconciled, Marianne gives in to the inevitable and falls for Colonel Brandon, and all live happily ever after.



Sorry this is going up a day late! I had the recording ready to go yesterday and the post half-finished, but then I decided to go out to the movies all day with my wife, and I stand by that decision.

And, at last, we find our two heroines settled and happy, with Edward honorably released from his engagement to Lucy, and Marianne getting everyone to shut up about Colonel Brandon but just marrying him already (although, all right, they gave it a couple of years for her to actually fall for him.)

Two quick notes in this last installment, both while talking about Elinor and Edward's new house in Delaford: at 26:50, while talking about improvements they will be making, we hear that they plan on "invent[ing] a sweep," where a "sweep" is a long, winding driveway. Then, John Dashwood talks about how fine the timber is in Delaford Hanger (presumably with dollar signs -- pound signs? -- in his eyes.) A "hanger" here is a wooded area growing on the side of a steep hill or embankment (hanging on the side of it, you see.)

27:45 - "Everything in such respectable condition."

And, with a note about the extraordinariness of two sisters living so closely by without fighting or setting their husbands against one another, we conclude Sense and Sensibility. Thank you for listening, and stay tuned for the next short story interlude!


If you would like to read along, the text can be found at Project Gutenberg, and high-res copies of the Thompson illustrations can be found in the British Library's Flickr stream. No reading ahead, though!

Sense and Sensibility, Volume the Third, Chapters Eleven and Twelve

In which everyone insists that no, even with Willoughby's "vindication," there is no way Marianne would have been happy with him; it is revealed that Mr. Ferrars and Lucy Steele are now married, to the great agitation of everyone; and Edward comes to pay another most awkward visit.



Oh no! Mr. Ferrars is married! Well, I'm sure they will be very happy together. I must say, I love how wonderfully awkward pretty much every single scene with Edward is, and I don't identify with it at all.

Shut up.

9:37 - "I suppose you know, ma'am, that Mr. Ferrars is married."

Oh, hmm. Was Thomas supposed to be an older gentleman? Should I have, I don't know, baldened up his voice a little bit, or something? I should take a closer look at these illustrations maybe before recording. Ah, well.

17:43 - It was Edward.

Edward! Why you cut off your horse's tail like that? Don't you know that's their flyswatter? Not very nice. Elinor's better off without you, probably.

(All right, maybe I'm just looking for a way to use the "dismemberment" tag in this book. I suppose that's stretching it a bit, though. Seriously though, Jane, you couldn't have had anyone, like, lose a finger? Or something? Pssh.)


If you would like to read along, the text can be found at Project Gutenberg, and high-res copies of the Thompson illustrations can be found in the British Library's Flickr stream. No reading ahead, though!