Re: Time Machine revised?

On 4 May, 09:36, Girish <girishbhat6...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On May 4, 12:09 pm, ncwa...@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

On 4 May, 07:43, Girish <girishbhat6...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Not quite how I read it. AFAIR At one point Wells has the time
traveller speculate that the Morlocks must have retained some
intelligence and adapatability in order to keep their industry going.
OTOH, the Eloi have become a sub-species of air-heads who are now
being kept as food animals.

True, but the Morlocks are STILL mental pygmies. :-)
And let us not forget how the romance with Weena is used by Wells to
soften and humanize his vision of the future. And what do you make of
the epilogue? To quote:

"And I have by me, for
my comfort, two strange white flowers--shrivelled now, and brown and
flat and brittle--to witness that even when mind and strength had
gone, gratitude and a mutual tenderness still lived on in the heart
of man."

Wells is being quite subtle here, IMHO. What he is saying is that the
Morlocks need the intellectual stimulus of the culture hoarded by the
upper classes as badly as anyone else. And such culture IS valuable,
not to be lightly destroyed in a workers' revolution.


Err ... the culture "hoarded by the upper classes" is being left to
rot in museums in places where only the Morlocks go. The Morlocks
might receive some stimulation from this, but it is not coming from
the Eloi and the Eloi are simply ignoring it.

place. Instead, a more evolutionary process seems to take place in
which the downtrodden workers become the Morlocks (who are the real

I think he is quite clear that the morlocks too have devolved - due
to the nature of their wretched existence and lack of culture. :-)


Correct - both of sub-species are viewed as having devolved. While
the Morlocks have devolved in terms of appearance and maybe overall
culture [1], the Eloi have devolved more intellectually and
physically.

Cheers,
Nigel.

[1] But note that the Morlocks are supposed to be the descendants of
workers forced to live and work underground. They would not be viewed
as having a high culture to begin with.


.

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