Herbert George Wells was the son of a shopkeeper and first worked as a draper's asistant. He later qualified as a teacher, studied hard at night school and took a degree in science. He settled in London and in 1891 he married his cousin Isabel and continued his career as a teacher in a correspondence college. In 1895 Wells left Isabel for one of his brightest students, Amy Catherine, whom he married in 1895. Wells lived through World War II in his house on Regent's Park, refusing to let the blitz drive him out of London. In 1945, his last book expressed real pessimism about mankind's future prospects. Wells died in London on August 13. 1946.

THE TIME MACHINE
Science-fiction
As a novelist Wells made his debut with this famous classic science novel which presents a parody of English class division. The narrator is Hillyer, who discusses with his friends about theories of time travel. A week later their host the Time Traveler has an incredible story to tell. He had found two people: the Eloi, weak and little, who live above ground in a seemingly Edenic paradise, and the Morlocks, bestial creatures that live below ground, who eat the Eloi. The Traveler's beautiful friend Weena is killed, he flees into the far future, where he encounters "crab-like creatures" and things "like a huge white butterfly", that have taken over the planet. In the year 30,000,000 he finds lichens, blood-red sea and a creature with tentacles. He returns horrified back to the present. Much of the realistic atmosphere of the story was achieved by carefully studied technical details. The basic principles of the machine contained materials regarding time as the fourth dimension - years later Albert Einstein published his theory of the four dimensional continuum of space-time.

THE WAR OF THE WORLDS
Science-fiction
This famous novel is about an invasion of Martians. The story appeared at a time when the discovery of Martian "canals" arose speculations that there could be life on the Red Planet. The narrator in this book is an unnamed "philosophical writer" who tells about events that happened six years earlier. Martian cylinders land on earth outside London and the invaders, who have a "roundish bulk with tentacles" start to vaporize humans. The Martians build walking tripods which ruin towns. Panic spreads, London is evacuated. Martians release poisonous black smoke. Orson Welles' Mercury Theater radio broadcast, based on The War of the Worlds, caused a panic in the Eastern United States on October 30, 1938. In Newark, New Jersey, all the occupants of a block of flats left their homes with wet towels round their heads and in Harlem a congregation fell to its knees. Welles, who first considered the show silly, was shaken by the panic he had unleashed and promised that he would never do anything like it again.

THE ISLAND OF DOCTOR MOREAU
Science-fiction
The text of the novel is the narration of Edward Prendick, a shipwrecked man rescued by a passing boat who is left on the island home of Doctor Moreau, a mad scientist who creates human-like hybrid beings from animals via vivisection. The novel deals with a number of philosophical themes, including pain and cruelty, moral responsibility, human identity, and human interference with nature. "The Island of Doctor Moreau" is a classic of early science fiction and remains one of Wells's best-known books.