Shadows of the Future

H.G. Wells - inventor of the concept of the time machine and the phrase the shape of things to come - described his life's work as one of critical anticipation. This book unravels the complex layers of meaning in The Time Machine, and shows how, throughout his life, he sought to exploit the potential of literary and cultural prophecy in new ways. Described by John Middleton Murry as the last prophet of bourgeois Europe, he was its first futurologist.