I like writing book reviews, make suggestions, read articles, and exchange ideas about any book. Instead of just talking about the books that I like, some kind of talks like “ I did not like … because of …” or “It would have been better if this… part was not like this…” can change my perspective and that’s the most important thing to me.
Based on the reasons I wrote above, I would like to give you some information about the author of our book, Herbert George Wells (H. G. Wells / 1866-1946). Born in England, H. G. Wells’s family situation was not very good, and he even worked as an apprentice with a draper (some claim that he addressed to that period in this book because he hated this work). He started with a scholarship to the Normal School of Science, where it was perhaps the basis of him being the father to science fiction ( he took lessons from Thomas Henry Huxley ,a biologist called Darwin’s advocate), and graudated ranking first in class. Our author has written many kinds of works. We cannot ignore the fact that Wells, who has found voice in any environment without any hesitation about being a socialist, criticizes society and politics in many of his works that we can call “political dystopias (distopias)”. But above all, he is remembered as one of the creators of science fiction with his books such as “The War of The Worlds”, “The Invisible Man”, “The Sleeper Awakes”, “The Time Machine” and “The Island of Dr. Moreau”. [1,2,3].
One of the things that interest me most about H. G. Wells is the fact that he was one of the writers that Mustafa Kemal Atatürk had read his socialist opinions in the Outline of History (It is ranked third among the best-selling works) took place in Nutuk (The Great Speech). I would like to share with you;
“I also reminded to the nation that, the unbearable thought of thinking ourselves to dominate the World, should not continue. Our real position, the state of the world to recognize the state of disarray, with obeying our nation to follow the ruins are grown. We cannot let this painful state continue. Gentlemen, an English historian, Wells, wrote a history, published two years ago. Last pages of his work contain thoughts under the title of “future phase of world history”. The main subject in these thoughts is “federal world state”. In this chapter, Wells raises his thoughts on how a unified world state can be established and what are the important distinctive qualities of such a state, and tries to revive the situation our world will take under the rule of justice and a single law. “If all sovereignties are not dissolved in one sovereignty, the world will be destroyed” he says and adds “A real state cannot be anything other than the united states of the World that contemporary life conditions made it an obligation”, “There is no doubt that if people do not want to be crushed under the things they reveal, they will have to unite sooner or later.”
I came across something that you might want to look at the place where I find this information, I’m dropping here 🙂 [4].
Instead of writing the subject of our book at length, I want to pass a brief summary. The book, which was told through the eyes of Edward Prendick, continued with the help of Montgomery (the assistant of Dr Moreau), who helped our protagonist to save him from the shipwreck he was going through, and arrive on a volcanic island on the Pacific, where he was not actually wanted but was accepted as a remedy. There is no limit to the quirks on this island, and Prendick will misinterpret these things at first. The island’s all Dr. Moreau’s and his experimental animals’. The doctor is a scientist who is excluded from the society due to the brutality of his experiments but can be called a bit of a wacky aiming to reach perfection. For example, the strange servant of Montgomery, M’ling is the work of him. Prendick, the guest of Moreau, escapes into the woods of the island for fear of his own life, where he faces the most crucial points, including strange human beings, rituals rules that animal-people call the law, and must obey.
This is a book where known and unknown intertwine, which tells the basis of the community, the leadership struggle given on the basis of the individual, similar and different aspects of human and animal nature, borders, rules, punishments. At the beginning of this book I received from İthaki publications, the closing writings of the Introduction and Moreau’s Shackles were very nice (I do not know if it was printed in other publishing houses). It allows you to look at the book in a different way and it proves that it is not an ordinary science fiction book.
The book has two screenplays;
- The Island of Dr. Moreau- Don Taylor (ABD, 1977)[5]
- The Island of Dr. Moreau- John Frankenheimer (ABD, 1996)[6]
(Note: Marlon Brando, Val Kilmer, David Thewlis played the most important characters in second one but critics about the movies were not satisfactory so couldn’t watch them 🙂 )
If you have any suggestions or ideas you want to share, please come to the comments
With love.
[1] H.G. Wells Biography ”https://www.biography.com/people/hg-wells-39224”
[2] Thomas Henry Huxley ”http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/huxley_thomas_henry.shtml”
[5] The Island of Dr. Moreau- Don Taylor (ABD, 1977) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076210/
[6] The Island of Dr. Moreau- John Frankenheimer (ABD, 1996) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116654/
♥thanks to my lil dragon♥
Little Hope 4 Us 