Read the short story "Twilight" by John W. Campbell from The Science Fiction Hall of Fame, Volume One, 1929-1964 and respond to the discussion question on the class bulletin board: Compare or contrast John W. Campbell’s view of the end of mankind in “Twilight” with H.G. Wells’ view in The Time Machine.

-- Anonymous, February 23, 2005

Answers

Well what interested me was that both see a man kind still existing in the near future where as I'm told that it won't be long till the sun blows up or what not. I think that the view of the oldest age of men as children almost. Here they are in this world which they don't understand and they don't want to understand, they just live, everything just IS. They don't do anything except live. Like the machines, the Morlocks and the Men of the future in Twilight both know the machines are there but don't do anything to find out what they do or why they need them, they just tend to these machines of their ancestors.

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BAM! I'd like to bring attention to that fact that it's 4:20 on Wednesday and here I am ... POSTING FIRST!

-- Anonymous, February 23, 2005

I think both Wells and Cambell are imagining worlds after man has lost all competition. The Eloi and Campell's humans have lost their intelligence becuase they no longer need it to survive. In Twilight the only life forms left on Earth are non-threatening, and machines are available to preform any task you wish. In the Time Travleler's future, the Eloi had become like pets because the underclass had evolved to do all their work for them. Both forms of man kind deevolved from there because their intellect was no longer challenged to force them to find ways to survive. In the Darwinian sense, they had eliminated all less fit life forms, and they kind of have no more purpose in life.

-- Anonymous, February 23, 2005

Wells and Campbell seemed to both have very different ideas of where mankind was headed. While both had the entire race in a decline in the future, the type of decline was very different. In Wells' world, Man had eventually had nothing better to do, but had devolved into almost childish creatures who were human in their emotions, but not in their intellectual capacity. In Campbell's world, humans had evolved to its very height, and in its decline, it still had all its mental abilities, but no emotions to put them to use.

-- Anonymous, February 24, 2005

I think the most interesting comparison between the two stories is the authors' treatment of emotion. In the Time Machine, Wells depicted his Eloi as having existing in a generally stunted state of emotional infantility - they even make love in a "half-playful" manner, indicating that in all facets of their life, the passions of living - hatred, love, greed, curiosity, etc - have been bred out of them. The Eloi are left only with a vague general sense of fear that they are unable to act upon. The Men of the Twilight, however, are left with nothing but an incredible sadness - imagine those songs! The Eloi are mere cattle, knowing nothing of their history. The Men of the Twilight, however, know they have lost something mournful - but they do not know what. This makes them far more worthy of sympathy than Wells' Eloi.

-- Anonymous, February 24, 2005

I see two similar but different endings for humanity in these stories. In twilight there is man who has lost the spark of humanity, their souls. These men are not men, but mere organic calculating wraiths. This is unlike The Time machine because the Eloi and the Morlocks are still human, only greatly atrophied.

-- Anonymous, February 24, 2005

I think the most easily made comparison is really that of the apparently inevitable decline of man. The difference, it seems, is that Wells perceives men to split into two factions in the future: the animalistic and, for lack of better term, the intellectual. Campbell, however, just allows for the degeneration of men into a race reliant on machines and incapable of working for itself. This weakness that men apparently fall into shows potently the bleak outlook most sci-fi writers apparently have towards the nature of men.

-- Anonymous, February 24, 2005

The Eloi and the humans in "Twilight" are both declining, but the stories adress different methods of decline. I find it interesting that Wells pictures the Eloi as humans without initiative, who will not act. "Twilight" depicts a humanity who have lost their curiosity. However, both of these depictions result from the idea that once man loses his competition and has turne the Earth into a perfect and wonderful world without danger, he begins to decline.

-- Anonymous, February 25, 2005

Campbell is much more pessimistic than Wells in his view of the end of mankind. There is obsolutley no hope in on Earth in "Twilight." Wells still has evolutionary forces in his version of the future; the Eloi still have to struggle. However, Campbell's future is "lonely." There is nothing left for them to do but take up space until they die. The two authors do portray future generations as miniaturized and weak. Truth be told, "Twilight" creeped me out.

-- Anonymous, February 25, 2005

I find it interesting that in both The Time Machine and Twilight, humanity has forgotten how to use the things they've created through lack of need. In both cases, after humanity reaches its peak, they have eliminated the problems which used to make it necessary for people to think. Use it or lose it I guess.

-- Anonymous, February 25, 2005

I realized that in both tales, the Time Traveler (whether it be the 3059 one or not) leaves forever, taking all proof to the future. This is just plain annoying for the teller of the story, for no one seems to believe him. Another example of this is in 'The Martian Odyssey' with Tweel. It's a common occurance in Science Fiction, I see.

-- Anonymous, February 25, 2005