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Wells,
H. G. (Herbert
George Wells), 1866–1946
 English
author. Although he is probably best remembered for his works
of science fiction, he was also an imaginative social thinker,
working assiduously to remove all vestiges of Victorian
social, moral, and religious attitudes from 20th-century life.
He was apprenticed to a draper at 14 and was later able
through grants and scholarships to attend the Univ. of London
(grad. 1888).
Wells taught biology until 1893, when he began his career as a
novelist. His early books, full of fantasy and fascinating
pseudoscientific speculations, exemplify the political and
social beliefs of his time. They include The Time Machine
(1895), The Wonderful Visit (1895), The Invisible
Man (1897), and The War of the Worlds (1898).
In the novels of
his middle period Wells turned from the fantastic to the
realistic, delineating with great energy and color the world
he lived in. These books, considered his finest achievement,
include Kipps (1905), Tono-Bungay (1909), and The
History of Mr. Polly (1910). His later books are primarily
novels of ideas in which he sets forth his view of the plans
and concessions individuals must make in order to survive.
Included among these final works, which became increasingly
pessimistic as Wells aged, are The World of William
Clissold (1926), The Shape of Things to Come
(1933), World Brain (1938), and Mind at the End of
Its Tether (1945). His other works include the immensely
popular Outline of History (1920) and The Science of
Life (1929), which was written in collaboration with his
son G. P. Wells and Julian Huxley.
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