The Time Machine Essays (1505 words) - The Time Machine, Morlock

The Time Machine Time traveling, a concept known to modern man as inconceivable, but in The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells, this fathom of human fantasy has come to life. Wells entangles a unique blend of contrasting characters, conflicts of capitalist verses laborer divisions, and foreshadowing of the destruction of humanity to seem together this novel of visionary proportions. The Time Machine is a bleak and sober vision of mans place in the Universe.(McConnell Pg.1581) Wells use of characters in The Time Machine brings a heavy sense of contrast and diversity into the story. There are five main characters around which the story revolves. Beginning with the Eloi and the Morlocks, which are the two branches of humanity in the year 802,701. The Eloi, who are our capitalist force, and whom resemble modern humans the most, live above ground and feed on the vast vegetation that has engulfed the Earth. The Eloi are lazy and mind spans to that of a five-year-old. The Eloi never fully mature for the cannibalistic Morlocks harvest them at a certain age as food. The Eloi are described as fair of skin and hair and are considered childlike and frail. Fragile little creatures perhaps four feet tall, they pass their time in playing gently, in bathing in the river, in making love in a half-playful fashion, in eating fruit and sleeping. Human vigor and energy have passed into languor and decay.(McConnell Pg.3865) The Eloi live in splendid castles, but these beautifu l porcelain castles are crumbling because of a lack of maintenance due to inferiority and lack of concern from the Eloi. But a second look reveals that is only a ruined splendor. All human artifacts are slowly crumbling. Some of the buildings are already gone, and even the many still-standing buildings, in which the surface people live, are decaying.(McConnell Pg.3865) The second branch is the race known as the Morlocks. The Morlocks, on the other hand from the Eloi, are the laborer and harsher branch of humanity. The Morlocks are hairy and monstrous creatures with red glowing eyes and razor sharp teeth. He is supprised to learn of another people, the Morlocks, ugly, fearsome, and subterranean.(Molson Pg.600) The Morlocks live under ground in a subterranean environment running machines and underground factories. Due to their adaptations to their underground living environment, the Morlocks only come to the upper world in the dark, for they cannot stand the glare of sunlight. They are strange little beings whose pallid bodies are just the half-bleached color of the worms and things one sees preserved in spirit in a zoological museum. They are chinless, and in their faces are set great lidless, pinkish grey eyes that glow of red. At night they leave their subterranean world to hunt down Eloi for food.(McConnell Pg.3865) The next character is the Time Traveler himself, who remains nameless throughout the whole novel. He is an inventor with an infatuation of the future and Darwins theory of the fourth dimension. The Time Traveler is middle class citizen, just as Wells was in his day. The traveler is highly concerned with the world to come and has spent years perfecting his spectacular machine. It took two years to make, retorted the Time Traveler.(Wells Pg.14) The next character is Weena. Weena is one of the Eloi who befriends the Time Traveler after he saves her from drowning in a nearby stream. Even though, in the beginning, the Time Traveler states that no gender can be determined of these creatures, he seems to be sure that Weena is female. The way Weena acts around the Time Traveler is like that of a pet or small child. She cannot perform any humane actions, talking, logically thinking, Etc. It is also no accident that language itself has declined to a very simple level, for language is what marks the human intellectual capacity to question, evaluate, and explore. Weena can do none of these things.(Magill Pg.867) Lastly there is the narrator of the story, Mr. Hillyer. Mr. Hillyer doesnt really play a main image in the story line, he is merely there to relay the story. Mr. Hillyer is a guest of the Time Traveler, who has been invited to dinner. Mr. Hillyers curiosity gets the