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The War of the Worlds | Introduction

H. G. Wells’s science fiction masterpiece The War of the Worlds was originally published in Pierson’s magazine in 1897 and was issued as a novel the following year. A century later, it has never been out of print. The story has become an integral part of our culture, frequently retold in graphic novels and films. In 1938, it became part of one of the greatest and most horrifying media events of all times. The Mercury Theatre on the Air, headed by twenty-three-year-old Orson Welles, broadcast over the radio an adaptation of the book that was so realistic that it caused widespread public panic, mob violence, and looting. Until the night of that broadcast, few people realized the power of broadcast media to make whole populations feel powerless when faced with breaking events.

Like the radio program, much of the novel takes its power from appearing to be real. Wells, who had an intense interest in science from an early age, created his Martian invaders with a strict sense of the laws of biology and physics. They are not super beings, but bodiless heads, barely able to move because the atmosphere of Earth is so much thicker than that of their own planet. Still, their advanced intelligence gives them the power to create powerful weapons, such as Heat-Ray guns that can level whole towns; tripods with hundred- foot legs, that give them mobility; and even flying machines, which, in 1898, were beyond human technology. Humanity has entered into space exploration since this novel was published, and many of the specific details are no longer of con- cern. But there will always be uneasiness about the unknown and curiosity about what might happen when people of Earth contact lives from other worlds.

The War of the Worlds Summary

Book 1, Chapter 1: The Eve of the War
The narrator of The War of the Worlds is never identified by name. He refers to a “great light” seen on the planet Mars in 1894, explaining that this was six years before the time when he is writing. Earth’s astronomers were perplexed about what to make of it, he says, but later realized that it was the invading forces, being shot toward Earth as if out of a gun.

Book 1, Chapter 2: The Falling Star
People think that the first Martian ship is a falling star, then a meteor. An astronomer hears something within the metal tube that landed.

Book 1, Chapter 3: On Horsell Common
The narrator goes to investigate the crash site, where a crowd of spectators has gathered. Also there are several astronomers gathered.

Book 1, Chapter 4: The Cylinder Opens
The top of the cylinder opens, and the crowd scatters. A Martian, with huge eyes and flailing antennae, jumps out, and another looks out the top. One man who slipped into the crater that the cylinder made tries to crawl out of the hole, but the Martian grabs him and pulls him back.

Book 1, Chapter 5: The Heat-Ray
Because the Martians do not seem able to climb out of the pit their ship is in, people crowd around again. A group of men approach the Martians with a white flag, signaling that they come in peace, but they are incinerated by a Heat-Ray that is fired at them.

Book 1, Chapter 6: The Heat-Ray in the Chobham Road
Word of the Heat-Ray spreads to the nearby towns of Cobham, Woking, and Ottershaw. Hundreds of people come to observe what is coming on. When the ray is turned on the crowd, it is unable to kill everyone because it is being fired from down in the pit, but two women and a little boy are trampled in the rush to get away from the Martians.

Book 1, Chapter 7: How I Reached Home
The narrator returns to his home, on the way hearing people talk about the Martian ship. His wife has dinner on the table. She has not heard anything about all of this until he tells her what he saw. The morning newspapers report on the Martians, but they say that they would never be able to threaten the planet because the Earth’s gravity, much stronger than the gravity of Mars, would weigh them down.

Book 1, Chapter 8: Friday Night
While they can hear hammering sounds from within the pit where the Martians have landed, the army sends soldiers to surround the cylinder. A second cylinder from Mars arrives on Earth, landing not too far from the first.

Book 1, Chapter 9: The Fighting Begins
The day is like an ordinary Saturday, except that everyone is talking about the Martians. The Martians release the Heat-Ray across the countryside, and it reaches for miles around. The narrator rents a dog cart from his landlord to take his wife away from their home, which is too close to the invaders, to live with his cousin in Leatherhead, twelve miles away.

Book 1, Chapter 10: In the Storm
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