About this title: Prendrick, a survivor of a shipwreck, is picked up by a schooner bound for Noble's Isle. On the island, Prendrick encounters the Beast People, roughly human but with animalistic traits. It turns out that Dr. Moreau, a scientist who came to the island years before, has been developing animals into humans with the help of his assistant Montgomery. When Moreau is killed, the Beast People revert and their world becomes utterly chaotic. Prendrick, while imagining himself to remain a cut above the Beast People, becomes somewhat bestial himself. He is rescued from the island, but cannot shake off ...
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Description: Good. 042503531X Good condition paperback book, some creases to spine, some edge/corner rubs, may have corner crease, small edge tear or spine slant, a good book for reading. Shop & Save With US. read more
Binding: Paperback
Publisher: Signet Classics
Date Published: 2005
ISBN-13:9780451529893ISBN:0451529898
Description: New. Slight shelf wear. GoodwillnyBooks is committed to providing each customer with the highest standard of customer service. You may return new items within 30 days of delivery for a full refund. read more
"This is the first time I've read any H.G. Wells, and i don't know what took me so long. I picked this book to start with because it was alluded to in Kings of Infinite Space, plus of course there are many references to Wells' classics in popular culture (I know there was a Simpsons Halloween episode based on this book...). I was pleasantly surprised to find it extremely well-written and a real page-turner, although considering it's a classic that's what I should have expected. Glad I finally discovered H. G. Wells--reading the Time Machine now."
"My first impression of this novel was that it seemed fairly straightforward. My initial suppositions on what sort of experiments the doctor was conducting were wrong, and I soon discovered the true premise of this novel, which is far more disturbing. There isn't a lot of direct terror in this novel, which is to say that the protagonist himself is never really in significant danger. Actually, he's pretty uninteresting as a whole. Wells could easily have doubled the length of this novel just by deepening the story and characterization, and honestly the book may have been the better for it. As it is, the barebones story really just serves as a vehicle for the most horrifying premise I think I've read. The repulsiveness of it is subtle and psychological, because ultimately what this book does is to threaten and pervert our very sense of humanity. It could have been a masterpiece had it been more well-rounded. As it is this story stands apart merely on the strength of its original and abominable concept, sprinkled with some interesting cultural and social commentary on science, religion and civilization."
"The novel opens with an introduction in which the protagonist feigns amnesia in order to escape responsibility for ambiguous episodes in the history. Prendick's account of events in the dinghy sounds unconvincing, self-justifying, or at least as if much has been left unsaid. At the very least, the tone is such as to suggest that Prendick is not as innocent as he pretends; one suspects that what is unsaid is more important than the words spoken.
The creatures that Prendick encounters are all bestial in one way or another, leading him to the erroneous conclusion that Moreau has vivisected men and made them bestial. Only later does Moreau explain that they were beasts that he has humanized. Moreau has an odd philosophical conversation in which he claims that pleasure and pain are bestial sensations. In a bizarre way, he argues not only that pain in needless but that it does not truly exist, that it is somehow phasing out of existence; to this point in the novel (p.116), this seems the most extreme sign of his monomania, his madness.
The book does raise questions about what characteristics distinguish the human from the non-human. Is it simply physical appearance? Is it language? Does Moreau's madness make him less human, more like animals? Or does it make him less animal-like, more outside the sphere of rationality and thus more animal-like, or what? Does it make him more "divine," which is what his actions and the religious rituals of the beast-men would suggest he was trying to accomplish? Who are the "pure" creatures in this story? Those most close to nature, ie, the uncorrupted and unchanged animals before Moreau has them in his hands and power? Curious and interesting questions, these.
Moreau claims to have become totally rational, for him the highest state, to have shed entirely all emotions and thus all ethics. Does this make him superhuman? less than human? more, or less animalistic? There is more than a touch of Frankenstein's story in this novel, and I wonder if it is more a commentary on what humanity is or has the potential for being, or a commentary on the extremes of hubris inherent in modern science and technology. How does all of this speak to the issues of cloning and genetic manipulation? Can Wells' story help inform the dilemmas of scientific and medical ethics?
In being "humanized," the beasts are lessened, declining from their pure and, shall we say, dignified central and original nature and becoming a mob, a human mob, the individuals of which show their very typical bestiality. Again, the line between beast and human is blurred, and Wells shows that the same characteristics are present in both, man not always appearing to any advantage. "An animal may be ferocious and cunning enough, but it takes a real man to tell a lie."
Ultimately, the experience makes Prendick utterly misanthropic, seeing nothing but beasts in humans, and he cannot abide humanity. The book is an altogether strange and effective parable, leaving the reader haunted and pondering."
"After Darwin's theories of evolution were published, Victorians had to come to terms with the fact that they were descended from apes rather than angels - could they take a step down the evolutionary ladder as easily as they stepped up? This idea of reversion is obvious in Dr Moreau.
Wells explores degeneration and reversion - devolution rather than evolution perhaps? He also seems to recognise man as animal only removed from the ape by evolution and moral training. How easy would it be for man to allow his bestial traits to conquer the rational?
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