A man falls asleep, outlives all his annoying neighbors in the process and wakes up in a future filled with amazing technology where life is blissfully easy. Oh, and now he owns the whole world. How is this book not titled "The Best Day Ever"?As it turns out, Wells had other concerns on his mind. The basic idea here isn't that far removed from the old tale of Rip Van Winkle, where a man displaced in time lets his experiences be extended into metaphor for the differences between those different times, letting the native culture shock drive the plot and turning the novel into part travelogue and part commentary. It's a useful device that taps into those unconscious curious longings we all have . . . who wouldn't want a chance to see how the far future turns out? Nowadays we have literary devices like time travel machines and suspended animation but in these days with SF in its infancy you didn't have all the cliches of the genre to just pick up and use when the need arose. You had to invent them. Having done a bit about a time machine already, he decided to take a different tactic and go with the magical realism route. Thus, Graham simply gets very tired and falls asleep for a very long time.That's when the fun begins. Feeling extraordinarily rested, Graham learns that not only has he become a sort of legendary figure to the masses for his amazing ability to . . . sleep (Tilda Swinton and your performance art exhibit, eat your heart out!) but thanks to the magic of compound interest and the fact that no one ever thought he would wake up, he basically owns ninety percent of everything in the whole world, making him a true master of the Earth. Very quickly, he watches as the current Council gets overthrown and replaced and thinks that finally everything will be really swell. Except . . . maybe it isn't.People looking for a strict measure of science may have to go look elsewhere for their daily dose of their evidence based writing, the device to get Graham to the future is clearly a device and there's little time spent on the way or the how of it working. Everyone seems equally mystified and in that light the novel isn't that much different from the methods of Twain's "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court". But as I said, Wells' interest doesn't quite lie there as he sidesteps the whole issue and instead focuses on what matters here: the future. And what a future. Given a chance to depict how the world might look two hundred years from now, Wells manages to be off by a hundred years and creates a world that doesn't feel much different than ours, except in the small details. The clustering of architecture, swooping and soaring and confining, the moving sidewalks, video screens and perhaps most interesting of all, flying machines . . . even as Graham experiences the constant shock of the new, there's quite a bit here that would look familiar to us. Even touches like the language fracturing slightly into newer dialects feels right. Detached from history, everything feels new and we get some of Graham's curious delight but at the same time the ring of familiarity is so distinct that it's a grounded sense of wonder. We see through new eyes what we've been seeing already, but we aren't dazzled, we're reassured. And maybe . . . hopeful, that somehow this future will turn out right.Not quite. Wells isn't interested in writing a dippy utopia where everyone holds hands and praises the sunshine. What impresses here is the urgency that creeps into the text, an intensity missing from some of his other novels. Wells apparently wasn't completely happy with the end result, feeling it was written too quickly, but that speed often makes the writing feel feverish in parts, his Victorian poise pulling back slightly and replaced by a need to get this down as purely as he can before he loses it, before it's too late. That calm tone that makes everything believable is still apparent and adds much to making this all go down easily, but it all seems taken up a notch, your favorite record set to the wrong speed. Perry Como putting on punk clothes and telling you that now he's getting real. While entertaining novels like "The First Men on the Moon" came down to romping around with funny moon people, stripping the novel of outer space aliens entirely turns the future into one big alien force. Graham has to navigate a maze without walls, where all the rules have changed and learns quickly that you can be Master of the world and still not in control.For the most part, Wells' future is even handed, possessed of marvels and horrors in equal measure, although Wells is clearly in commentary mode as he gives us scene after scene of the lives of the working class in London, laboring under giant dirty machines and scrabbling about for whatever tainted glimmers they can find before sweet and welcome oblivion claims them. For these people, any change is akin to "meet the old boss, same as the new boss" and Wells' point seems to be that just because we get fancier stuff, it doesn't mean that life gets better. Not for everyone and when the realization hits the plot kicks back into gear. This may indeed have the most action of any Wells novel I've read, with plenty of fists being thrown and battles being fought, along with perhaps the best depiction of dogfighting you'll ever read before airplanes were invented. And the ending itself is heartstopping, so abrupt you're wondering if you're missing a page but perfect in its way, realizing when you've told enough, you don't need to go any further.It's not perfect, of course. It does betray some of its hasty writing in the middle portions, where the plot sags slightly as the book becomes more interested in showing us all the details of this new world. Once the plot ramps up again, all in forgiven but if you're not that interested in the scenery it could be slow going. It's also definitely a product of its time, showing an attitude toward "Negros" that would seem bizarre to us today and even stranger considering it takes place in the future (basically the whole race is treated as members of a brutish police force and it's implied its all they're cut out for). But as SF adventure, as dire warning, as a advertisement for the benefits of a great nap it ranks up with books that are being produced today. Considering how many of its ideas were later poached for works that are varying degrees of SF (Woody Allen's "Sleeper" comes to mind immediately), its central ideas still resonate and the best way to treat it is not as a historical artifact of a long-ago time but a full-blooded novel in its own right, still vital even now.
This was one of the books that came pre-installed on my e-reader, so I decided to give it a go, as I'd quite enjoyed Wells' The Invisible Man.While the general premise - man falls into a deep sleep in Victorian times, wakes up 200 years later to discover he basically owns the world due to a vast increase in value of estates left to him - is interesting enough, and the book does have its own merits, I can't exactly recommend it.I'm generally a fan of dystopian novels, and this one has a lot in common with some of those that followed it, notably Huxley's Brave New World. The most interesting parts of the novel were perhaps the passages where Graham critiques aspects of the new world he's woken up in. His concerns about its soulless hedonism and exploitative Capitalist system are still just as relevant today as they were when the book was written.Still, a lot of the Victorian virtues which Graham is nostalgic for, particularly the ideal of chastity and the pious, self-sacrificial mother figure, are ideas that the modern reader will probably scoff at. Also, I couldn't get past the book's racism. While I know that we can't judge literature according to the standards of our own time, and that racism or misogyny in a work doesn't completely discredit its merits, I still don't think that we should excuse the portrayal of black people as brutal, trained servants. It's particularly jarring considering that in Well's imagined future, Japanese and Chinese have achieved equality with Europeans.This book may have set the stage for later, more accomplished works of dystopian fiction, but some aspects of it have become predictably cliche, for example the leader of the revolution who, upon ousting his competition, reveals himself to be just as corrupt as they were. The story lacks any real sense of surprise or suspense.I also feel I have to mention the fact that some passages of the book are rather dull. Long passages describing the scenery of the city and drawn-out action scenes are wordy and hard to make sense of. I found myself losing focus, and wasn't able to put together a clear image of what the modern city looked like or the action unfolding in a given scene.There are some interesting observations here, and Wells' concerns about the way his culture was headed are still applicable to our own society. But I'd say you're better off sticking to the author's more well known works, or picking up another dystopian novel. You'd have plenty of better options to choose from.
What do You think about When The Sleeper Wakes (2003)?
Apparently the third time is the charm, I have read two other works by H.G Wells (The Time Machine and War of the Worlds) and found both fell flat from the expectation society had placed on them. This one though had my favorite book plot... dystopian society. I love hearing about what people think the future will be like, especially when its messed up. It was great! Was going to give it 4 stars.Until the book took a SERIOUSLY racist turn... and the bad guys in the future are Black people!!! :(WHY PEOPLE!
—Jenn
Imagine falling asleep today and waking up 200 years later. Or, imaging being a soldier in the war of 1812, falling into a coma, and then waking up today. How much of the world would be completely foreign to you? Simple things that we take for granted in our daily routines would all be completely changed. How would you deal with that? In this book, H.G. Wells imagines what that would be like.For the most part, this is a well written book that draws you in to the story. Some issues, such as racial attitudes, are obviously dated, but do not really detract from the environment and story line that is being set up. You can even see parts of the evolution that H.G. Wells imagined happening in our own time, especially as it applies to the educational system.The only item I found to make little sense in this book is that someone did not kill the sleeper at some point before he awoke. We need look no further than cases like Terri Schiavo to see how this would play out in the real world. So, he is disconnected from life support yet still lives, and is not euthanized in a society where euthanasia is common (and actually the preferred form of death)? And, on top of that, no one just simply kills him for he power and money? Other than that nit, however, I thought the book told a compelling story.
—Ken Sodemann
This novel reads like a pulp sci-fi from the 1950s, very modern in feel as compared to the Victorian stuffiness of The Time Machine. That said it is still a reflection of the hopes and fears of the early 1900's and therefore full of racism and sexism. This work felt more plot based (rather than moral lesson based) than other early science fiction which was a nice change of pace. The gradual reveal of the society rather than a guided walk-through was much more realistic and leaves the reader with much to ponder about the parts of society that were not laid out. I also enjoy that Wells' novel occur in the same universe- the beginnings of the evolutionary path seen in The Time Machine are laid out in this work, plus there's a passing reference to the events of The War of the Worlds. Overall, a great piece of early science fiction that I would recommend to those who enjoy the genre.
—Kylie
