One might try to imagine the shape of the modern world had Mr. Coolidge been successful in his position of isolationism. Watching the movie "Things to Come" and the trench warfare continuing up into the 1960s makes you think - even if that was set in the 1930s.

 

One might try to imagine the shape of the modern world had Mr. Coolidge been successful in his position of isolationism. Watching the movie "Things to Come" and the trench warfare continuing up into the 1960s makes you think - even if that was set in the 1930s.

Better than watching the film, read the book: The Shape of Things to Come by H.G Wells. It is a bit heavy going but it is very interesting to see how Wells visualises future events. Considering it was written (published) in 1933 he makes some rather interesting predictions, one of which is the second world war which he claims starts in 1940. Some might argue that in 1933, the probability of war was high that such a prediction was pretty obvious.

Dave

 

I'm almost certain I have, but memories of Raymond Massey, the Art Decco rifles and the sheer absurdity of the long reindustrialization being a process for a better wall board have quite erased any memories.

Speaking of strange things - did you ever encounter phillip Jose Farmer? Not quite as wierd as Phillip K. Dick. He wrote a novel in character as Adolph Hitler after the failure of his political ambitions. It's a violent and racist (no surprize) thing called "The Iron Fist", where the big racist runs with a bunch of german bikers (teddy boys?) trying to purify Europe.

 

No, I haven't heard of wither of these authors. I do recall "The Iron Fist" as something to do with Star Wars!!

Before we move on from H.G Wells, I found his books very perceptive, if a little to focused on utopia (The Time Machine would be the classic example here) - his quite strong left-wing views are sometimes to 'longing' rather than convincing, and although I like his style (particularly his view of technologies that didn't even exist when he wrote the books) I don't buy into his vision.

Wasn't the inspiration for the A-bomb after a H.G Wells novel which depicts the concept of WMD?

Dave

 

Richard Rhodes, in "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" credits Wells with a very bleak vision of war with atomic weapons. But, as the development came in time of a world war, I think national survival was a greater inspiration. For a period of time, it looked as if the Germans might make one first. Luckily, Hitler chose to place his limited resources into more convertional weaponry.

Wells tends to be a bit bleak. Remenber that the Elloi (sic) lived in a sort of eden, but were preyed upon by the Morlocks. The martians were completely irresistible by modern weapons. I'll have to do some rereading - your points about "The Shape of Things to Come" are interesting. Movies tend to leave quite a lot out.

 

Richard Rhodes, in "The Making of the Atomic Bomb" credits Wells with a very bleak vision of war with atomic weapons.

What is an interesting thing about Wells was that, being a staunch left-winger, he was in principle opposed to any form of WMD or weaponry in general. However, his fantastic imagination meant that he was able to dream concepts and ideas that were decades ahead of their time - providing contemplative inspiration, if not technical inspiration (read his technical description of any of his WMD and they are nonsense! - still interesting non-the-less).

Dave