The Time Machine Essay, Research Paper



Book Review

The Time Machine

1. Relevance of the character Filiby (p.21 – 29)

Filiby is an argumentative person with red hair. He doesn t seem to accept anything without

reasonable ground for it. He doesn t have the intellectual level as the Time Traveller, but he tries

to contradict him or comments him to show that he also knows that. As he is totally inferior to

the Time Traveller in this discussion he became very fast pensive and didn t make any foolish

comments anymore. The idea of a time machine is absurd to him and he tells loudly that the

Time Traveller will never convince him. Filiby starts laughing at him as a token for his

amusement about the Time Traveller s theory. While the others were fancying about the

possibilities of a time machine, Filiby consists of seeing the experiment to reveal the Time

Traveller as a liar. Filiby compares him with a conjurer, but his anecdote collapsed when the

Time Traveller arrived with his little experiment as the others were too excited and didn t want

to miss anything. He couldn t believe it when the little thing disappeared.

2. Relevance of the social situation (p.67 – 70)

There are two different types of people in this world. The upperworld people called Eloi and

the underground people called Marlocks . The two species have resulted from the evolution.

The power of these two civilizations is not balanced, as the Marlocks dominate over the

Elois . As soon as it is getting dark the Elois gather together to hide and protect themselves

before the Marlocks . The Time Traveller has found out that the meat which he has seen was

from a human body and concludes that this specie must be cannibals. The Time Traveller

believes to see confirmation in his theory about the social differents between the Capitalists and

the Laborers which has caused this situation (p. 64 – 67). Before the shift of power the Elois

lived in a too perfect security world which had led them to a slow movement of degeneration,

to a general dwindling in size, strength, and intelligence. The Elois have grown weak and the

Marlocks strong. The Time Traveller mentioned a communal lifestyle of the Elois where

everybody is equal (p. 46).

3. Strength and weakness of the author (general)

Wells uses the idea of a time machine to transport the reader into the future. For the reader it

seems to be possible to do a time travel after the first two chapters. With the help of a group of

men who discuss the forth dimension Wells (the Time Traveller) explains his theories about

time traveling. This already shows that Wells has got a big imagination what you can also see

when he describes the creatures in the future in every detail.

The reader expects a futuristic world with a lot of high technology. Instead Wells writes about

people who have got the intellectual level of a five-year-old child (p.42). As the reader continues

to read, these characteristics of the people don t surprise him or her anymore, as Wells uses the

behavior and problems of our today s society and politics to concludes such a future. On the one

hand Wells tries to warn our society, but on the other hand the reader gets bored very fast in my

opinion, as he talks about these creatures and their behavior for several chapters.

4. Comparison of the book The Time Machine with the movie

The movie is quite different from the book. It starts with the scene when the gentlemen gather

together the second time and the Time Traveller has just come back from the future. The Time

Traveller (George) is much younger in the movie than in the book. George wants to travel into

the future, as he hopes to find a better life there. His friend Dave who is maybe the only one

who believed him (after the first meeting) tries to warn him and makes George to promise not to

leave the house. As George has already mentioned, you can only move through time and not

through space with the time machine… During the time travel he stops several time and he even

talked to a son s friend what he didn t do in the book. In the movie you can also see a shop-

window dummy that changes its clothes and shows how the fashion changed over the years.

The Elois in the movie also differ from the Elois in the book. They are not tiny and even talk

English. Before the Time Traveller leaves the future he causes a big fire in a wood -in the movie

the fire breaks out in the underworld of the Marlocks.

5. Relevance of the character the Time Traveller (p.21 -29)

The Time Traveller is an old, intelligent man. His earnestness about his ideas, although they

sound paradox, fascinate other people. He is not afraid of contradict laws of mathematics, as he

is able to give reasons for his theories. While he talks to the mayor you can see that he worked

on this problem for a longer time. He seems to be an ambitious man and later in the book he

states that he can work on a problem for years… (p.55). He knows that the whole world is wrong

in that point that you can t move in time. He tries to convince his guests with simple examples

before he gets more detailed. His discussions are always on a serious level and people who

don t want to accept other points of view and ignore unfoundedly the facts, doesn t care him. He

shows the people a minimization of his time machine and asks the Psychologist to do the

experiment for him in order to prove that there is no trick. The Time Traveller enjoys the silent

and other people s uncertainty shortly before he starts his experiment. The invention of a time

machine means a lot for the Time Traveller. The reader can see his seriousness about this

machine when he states that he was never more serious in his life.