The Time Machine Deleted Text: "The Grey Man"

In which the author gives in to editorial demands and then fixes it when publishing it on his own, and where we see "the ultimate degeneracy of man."



And here is the promised "bonus feature" for The Time Machine. Wells wrote this at his editor's request but took it back out first chance he got, and it really was rather the right choice, in my opinion. It makes for a weird flow to the chapter to have the Time Traveler's escape take him to the far distant future, and then the even farther distant future. But, I like letting you have the option. To listen properly, stop the main recording at about 9:30, then pick it back up after you're done with "The Grey Man" here at 12:05, and continue on from there.

No notes on this one, but a couple of bonus covers for you, from non-English language editions

This first one hails from Germany in 1951, and is interesting to me as it appears to depict the giant centipede-like creature that appears in "The Grey Man," but not in the main text. I wonder if translated version tend to include that more than English-language versions? Or maybe it's not in this text either, and it's just another confusing choice on the part of the artist.

Like this one here, from a 1983 Turkish edition. The Morlocks are carrying off an unconscious Time Traveler, who appears to be wearing a futurey jumpsuit of some sort. Looks pretty cool! But wasn't in the novel.

All right, that's it for our bonus feature! Next up: a new short story.


If you would like to read along, the text can be found at Wikisource. No reading ahead, though!

The Time Machine, Chapters Ten to Twelve and Epilogue

In which our hero swaggers right into an obvious trap, is nearly foiled due to strike-on-box matches, escapes due to time travel, sees the even farther distant future, and returns home; and in which we learn in a wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey way that our framing story narrator's name is "Hillyer.



And that wraps it up for The Time Machine! As mentioned in the recording, there was a deleted scene called "The Grey Man" (deleted by Wells himself) that I have recorded and will be posting separately.

I've got a few covers for you this time, mostly seeming to go with the design philosophy of "eh, good enough."

This first one here on the right is by Everyman's Library from 1978. Now, this is not really "eh, good enough," as obviously someone put a lot of work and thought into this 'cause there's a LOT GOIng on here. We've got Evel Knieval as the Time Traveler, wearing a sweet checked shirt under a... fishing vest? They've got the multiple-exposure thing to represent time travel we saw before, though here they at least added different poses. We've also got the flying numbers, though less subtle here. Oh, and our guy falls down through a vortex, over some geometric planes, some ruler markings or something, and the odd impression that the year 1970 will be important somehow.

More covers and note after the jump!

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.