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Michael Sherborne

Autor(a) de H. G. Wells: Another Kind of Life

4+ Works 104 Membros 3 Reviews

About the Author

Includes the name: Michael Sherborne

Obras de Michael Sherborne

Associated Works

A Short History of the World (1922) — Editor, algumas edições833 cópias

Etiquetado

Conhecimento Comum

Data de nascimento
1953
Sexo
male

Membros

Resenhas

Excellent, excellent biography: well-researched, thorough and appreciative of Wells's great talents (while thoughtfully confronting and deconstructing some of his great flaws). Approaches its subject with a sense of humor that The Great Man would have appreciated (when he was a a good mood ...)

My take-away, as I finished Michael Sherborne's excellent biography (and something that, I think, Sherborne hints at in his subtitle) is that Herbert George Wells' greatest creation was himself. As the son (and grandson, and great-grandson) of members of the servant class, he was earmarked by the rigid class system of the time to be a servant himself, and destined by poor health and a distinctly un-robust constitution to be lucky if he survived long enough to marry as unhappily as his parents, and produce a couple more additions to the servant class ...

And Wells said "no." Bucking the system at every turn, Wells broke free of the limitations that his birth, class, and education, as well as cultural tastes and contemporary morality, tried to impose upon him. (Even the limitations of his own body: a less likely "Sex God" it would be very hard to imagine, whether we are talking about the weedy youth or the stout, balding older Wells. But this is no Harvey Weinstein, and however icky the details of Wells's womanizing can be (and trust me, they can be pretty icky ...), the simple fact is that the ladies who canoodled with Wells adored him, before during and even (on the whole) after their liaisons. Even Rebecca West, whose relationship with him (and their son) turned quite toxic, admitted that she would have been a much happier person if she had married him --if she could have prised him away from his forgiving wife Jane -- because he was the best man she had ever known. And Margaret Sanger (yes, that Margaret Sanger, American birth control campaigner, he had a on-going dalliance with her ...) said that she admired the way Wells's presence combined jocularity, brilliance, flirtatiousness and profundity, and noted that, to be equal to his company, 'you must pull yourself up, keep alive every second.'

... author, prophet, futurist, historian, culture warrior and womanizer. And this is a volume that does justice to to a man whose life was his own greatest work of art.
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Marcado
maura853 | outras 2 resenhas | Jul 11, 2021 |
After browsing through a pretty complete list of the works of H.G. Wells, I was struck by how many, and how diverse, they were. Oh, I know Wells wrote science fiction, more “normal” novels, history, and other books about his opinions or predictions, but I never realized just how many. I didn’t know, for instance, that he wrote a diatribe against the Catholic Church during World War II. So, rather than try to read some subset of these books to get a sense of Wells, I decided it would be far easier to find a good biography that could give me an idea of just what was going on in his mind over his long life. Otherwise, when thinking of Well, I would just keep seeing him as Malcolm McDowell in Time after Time (which I suspect Wells would have enjoyed).

Sherborne’s book is superb in how well it covers both Well’s own story and the stories and other books he wrote. I didn’t realize how much Wells had done to educate himself and how he had rejected the life his parents, particularly his mother, had planned for him—as a draper’s assistant. (A draper was a person who sells cloth and dry goods, and there must have been a lot of them, because they seem to have required a lot of assistants. Wells’ older brother became a draper’s assistant, for instance.) H.G. Wells, however, appears to have deliberately sabotaged three apprenticeships and managed to find a way to become more educated and head down the path of being a teacher, while always whittling away at his writing. Of course, after some time, this made him quite wealthy, and he maintained several places of residence simultaneously, all the better for keeping track of his wife and sometimes more than on mistress. Because, yes, Mr. Wells’ love life is an integral part of this book. He left his first wife to take up with his second wife, Jane, who then had to contend with a series of long-time rivals, some of whom seem to have preferred making love outdoors (couldn’t resist mentioning that point). Nevertheless, Jane was Wells’ right hand when it came to typing his manuscripts and offering valuable advice and steering him away from bad decisions. She proves to be quite a remarkable person, and there are many incidents in the book to demonstrate it.

Wells, of course, rises above the status of a mere writer and becomes someone who can meet with, and offer opinions (rarely taken) to Presidents (both Roosevelts, for instance) and dictators (Lenin AND Stalin!). His belief in socialism, however, never dips so low as to really approve of the actual reality of communism.

Sherborne spends a good deal of the book defending Wells against modern critics who want to write him off as sexist, racist, anti-Semitic, or what have you, but as Sherborne shows, these critics are hand picking their evidence and ignoring many counter-facts. Wells certainly had his faults, both as a man and a writer, but they seem to have been outweighed by his good points. While he could hold a terrible grudge, he was also generous in providing help to friends (or survivors of friends) in need. His support for a utopian world government seems to have left democracy out of the equation, but nobody’s perfect. He can come across as egotistical at times, but in his personal writing he seems aware of many of his own faults. I’m not sure anyone could, or would want to, set out to emulate Wells in the 21st century, but those who were influenced by him in his own time are legion, such as George Orwell, and Wells should be remembered for his ideas and predictions as well as for his “scientific romances”. In the end, we have to admire Wells for engaging with the world—and not just a small part of it—as best he could. And there is a lot to be said for that.
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Marcado
datrappert | outras 2 resenhas | Apr 2, 2021 |
H G Wells was prolific: from 1895 when his first novel [The Time Machine] was published until his death in 1946, he published over 110 books. Many novels, even more political tracts, an outline history of the world, social commentary, biographies, autobiographies and text books. He collaborated on film scripts, attempted to write plays, wrote many articles as a journalist and fired off letters to anybody and everybody. He was politically active nearly all his life; sitting on committees, writing articles for the Fabians, for the Labour party, standing for Parliament, visiting world leaders; Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin and Lenin, in an attempt to get his ideas for a League of Nations off the ground. He became a celebrity and used his status as such to publicise his views on racism, contraception, socialism, human rights. Newspapers were always willing to give him a platform and what he had to say sounds progressive, largely fair minded and usually controversial for the times. His celebrity status made him a magnet for women and he indulged in many affairs of the heart, the most renowned of these often lasting for over a number of years, with many of his lovers still friendly with him when the passion had dissipated. He married twice and was on good terms with both his wife and his ex. He was a generous man looking after all his children both legitimate and illegitimate and was supportive of friends and colleagues, much of his wealth had been given away by the time he died.

Wells is a big subject for any biographer and Michael Sherborne gives a thoroughly readable account of his life and times. Sherborns says of Wells as a biographer:

"Like many biographers Wells adopted a slightly critical tone towards his subject" (Wells published a biography of Sanderson; the headmaster of Oundle school to raise money for the school), but Sherborne largely avoids this in his own biography of Wells. It is by no means a panegyric, but I got the feeling that Sherborne finds plenty to admire in Well's industry, courage, progressive views and artistry. He comments on most of Well's publications largely following the perceived opinion that most of Wells best fiction was published in his early career certainly up to [The New Machiavelli] in 1910, however where there is a return to form or a novel of interest during the later years then Sherborne highlights this for the reader. He has many good things to say about Wells' [The Outline of History] published in 1921 and Wells still had plenty to say that was relevant socially and politically after that. H G Wells long career as a writer straddled the Victorian novelists and the modernists, and he was genuinely friendly and admired by leading authors of both groups. His novels suffered in later years from too much message (or political ranting) and not enough character or plot development and so he started to become a bit of an anachronism, which was in stark contrast to his early years as the leading exponent of the new science fantasy genre. Sherborne provides enough analysis of Wells accomplishments as a writer to enable the reader to understand his place in the cannon and also to understand why he is now a writer "out of fashion".

In this well rounded portrait there is plenty of room for Sherborne to tell us about Well's love life. Christopher Priest says in an introduction that "Women were drawn to him - one said his body smelt irresistibly of honey" He seemed to have a fascination for and be fascinated by women of strong character particularly authors and I get the feeling that Wells liked to share, his talent and his artistry, he wanted to be stimulated mentally as well as physically. He also loved an audience.

Sherborne acknowledges his debt to previous biographers and has obviously read widely in these secondary sources, which are duly noted. I am not sure how much original research has been undertaken as there certainly does not seem to be any revelations. I think the book is all the better for this lack of sensationalism. What we have is an excellent biography of a man who lived much of his life in the limelight. but in addition there is much good stuff on his development as an artist and his place in literature and public life. A 4.5 star read for me.
… (mais)
½
3 vote
Marcado
baswood | outras 2 resenhas | Jun 14, 2013 |

Estatísticas

Obras
4
Also by
1
Membros
104
Popularidade
#184,481
Avaliação
3.9
Resenhas
3
ISBNs
10

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