ed Fantasies of possibilities.[2] Wells also considered himself a philosophical writer and urged that some of his books be taken seriously. One of his great concerns was the fact that modern man had the capability of destroying civilization. Disturbed by the onset of the First World War, he hoped that at the end of the war, a better and safer world could be constructed. By 1933, he was convinced there would soon be another major conflict. For this reason he is also called a prophetic writer.[2]In fiction, Wells had tried to warn his contemporaries of the destructive impulses that were part of life. He felt that a novelist could express these ideas in fiction and readers might accept them if the ideas were presented as fantasy, and that the novel was the best form of fiction to influence posterity. A journalist or a writer who bases his stories on fact, and fact alone, is writing for the present. Wells felt he was writing for posterity, which is why he spent so much of his time on the fiction of prophecy.[2] During the half-century before 1914, formative for the young H.G. Wells, the British prided themselves on what they believed to be a reasonable system of government. They passed laws that recognized the legality of trade unions and provided elementary schooling for all children. Womens suffrage was also a major issue. Revolutionary ideas, which came to be known as Marxism, created some domestic turmoil, but Britain thought at first it was safe from the conflicts in continental Europe because it was made up of islands separated by the English Chnnel. It was a great shock when Britain was faced with a major conflict in the form of World War I. But even as a young man Wells felt that British isolationism was a myth. Britain was drawn into the war to help its ally France and by 1916, it was obvious that the war had extracted a fearful cost. In Russia, a revolution was taking place in amidst of the war, threatening the i...
