Artist
(Kent Joseph E. Palua)
Discussion
Director (Vinze Julius Gadugdug)
The refers not only literally to the Martians
taking over the world and reducing men to breeding purposes, but also in a
symbolic way to men to machines, as was feared during industrialization. A
number of other vices, such as drinking, were problems, especially among the working
class. The horrors of war, this includes not only the frequent scenes of
dead bodies and buildings in ruins but also the mental toll. The artilleryman,
who had been a devoted soldier, becomes an impractical dreamer. The narrator
ends up attacking the curate. And in the mass migrations, people turn on each
other in their fight for survival.
Artist
(Kent Joseph E. Palua)
The refers not only literally to the Martians
taking over the world and reducing men to breeding purposes, but also in a
symbolic way to men to machines, as was feared during industrialization. A
number of other vices, such as drinking, were problems, especially among the working
class. The horrors of war, this includes not only the frequent scenes of
dead bodies and buildings in ruins but also the mental toll. The artilleryman,
who had been a devoted soldier, becomes an impractical dreamer. The narrator
ends up attacking the curate. And in the mass migrations, people turn on each
other in their fight for survival.
Literary
Luminary (Kent Joseph E. Palua)
1. “No one would have
believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being
watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man’s and yet as
mortal as his own; that as men busied themselves about their various concerns they
were scrutinised and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a
microscope might scrutinise the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in
a drop of water.” (p.1)
2. “He compared it to a colossal puff of flame suddenly and violently
squirted out of the planet, ‘as flaming gases rushed out of a gun.” (p.
6)
3. “By eight o’clock a number of boys and unemployed men had already started
for the common to see the ‘dead men from Mars.’” (p. 14)
Though it says something
critical about human nature that people are drawn to the scene of what they
believe to be an accident, it also is an image that will be paralleled in the
end, when the Martians will be dead in a pit with men looking down on them in
excitement.
4. “It was the head of
the shopman who had fallen in, but showing as a little black object against the
hot western sky.” (p. 22)
5. “One of our
chimneys cracked as if a shot had hit it, flew, and a piece of it came
clattering down the tiles and made a heap of broken red fragments upon the
flower bed by my study window.” (p. 44)
Connector (Marc Joshua Gorospe)
1. In The War of the Worlds, who was the first to discover the Martian
spacecraft?
The first person to come across the fallen Martian
spacecraft is the astronomer Ogilvy. He had been observing Mars at the
moment there was an apparent explosion or expulsion of something, and so when
something falls to Earth in his locale, he goes off to investigate. When
he sees the cylinder that is the spacecraft laying in a crater in a field, he
immediately connects it with the phenomenon he'd witnessed on Mars, and quickly
reaches the (correct) conclusion that it is a Martian object.
2. In The War of the Worlds, how does Wells draw parallels between
the Martians' treatment of Earth and Britain's treatment of its colonies?
Wells makes the parallels between the Martians and human
colonists quite explicit at the very start of the novel, when in the middle of
a cool scientific exposition on the Martians he inserts the following scathing
observation: And before we judge of them too harshly we must remember
what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought, not only upon
animals, such as the vanished bison and the dodo, but upon its inferior races.
The Tasmanians, in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of
existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the space
of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians
warred in the same spirit?
3. In The War of the Worlds, why was the day the Martians landed
the "last great day?"
While the day of the Martian arrival cannot be thought of
as a "great" (positive) day, it can be thought of as the last day
that Humanity was alone and living in relative peace. In that sense, the day
was great because it preceded the War and the deaths of so many people; it was
also objectively "great" (extraordinary) because it was the first
contact between humans and aliens. In the context of the novel, the day was
"great" but not "good," and so his reference is poetic and
not literal.
4. What is the message of The War of the Worlds?
Most contemporary analyses of The War of the Worlds
compare it to European Imperialism and expansion; with their superior
technology, the Martians (Europeans) invade the weaker nation of England
(Africa, Asia, etc.) and dominate the "inferior" people with their
military might. Wells showed how Humankind, believing themselves to be superior
to all other creatures, can be reduced to animalistic survival instincts; in
the same manner, European expansionists thought of other races as inferior, and
considered their actions in those regions moral. If the Martians had no reason
to consider Humanity as anything but inferior animals, they had no reason to
spare them; using humans as cattle and food is similar to the enslavement of
humans by other humans practiced around the world during past eras.
5. How does the crowd at the Common react to the heat ray in The War
of the Worlds?
After the first Martian exits its
cylinder, the crowd pulls back to the hedges and watches from a distance.
People who were very curious are now scared, but the Royal Astronomer, Stent,
puts together a Deputation of people to try and make contact. They approach the
cylinder with a white flag, trying to show their intentions as peaceful:
Forthwith flashes of actual flame, a
bright glare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of
men. It was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them and flashed into white
flame. It was as if each man were suddenly and momentarily turned to fire. Then, by the light of their own
destruction, I saw them staggering and falling, and their supporters turning to run.
Literary
Luminary (Kent Joseph E. Palua)
2. “He compared it to a colossal puff of flame suddenly and violently squirted out of the planet, ‘as flaming gases rushed out of a gun.” (p. 6)
3. “By eight o’clock a number of boys and unemployed men had already started for the common to see the ‘dead men from Mars.’” (p. 14)
Connector (Marc Joshua Gorospe)
1. In The War of the Worlds, who was the first to discover the Martian
spacecraft?
The first person to come across the fallen Martian
spacecraft is the astronomer Ogilvy. He had been observing Mars at the
moment there was an apparent explosion or expulsion of something, and so when
something falls to Earth in his locale, he goes off to investigate. When
he sees the cylinder that is the spacecraft laying in a crater in a field, he
immediately connects it with the phenomenon he'd witnessed on Mars, and quickly
reaches the (correct) conclusion that it is a Martian object.
2. In The War of the Worlds, how does Wells draw parallels between
the Martians' treatment of Earth and Britain's treatment of its colonies?
Wells makes the parallels between the Martians and human
colonists quite explicit at the very start of the novel, when in the middle of
a cool scientific exposition on the Martians he inserts the following scathing
observation: And before we judge of them too harshly we must remember
what ruthless and utter destruction our own species has wrought, not only upon
animals, such as the vanished bison and the dodo, but upon its inferior races.
The Tasmanians, in spite of their human likeness, were entirely swept out of
existence in a war of extermination waged by European immigrants, in the space
of fifty years. Are we such apostles of mercy as to complain if the Martians
warred in the same spirit?
3. In The War of the Worlds, why was the day the Martians landed
the "last great day?"
While the day of the Martian arrival cannot be thought of
as a "great" (positive) day, it can be thought of as the last day
that Humanity was alone and living in relative peace. In that sense, the day
was great because it preceded the War and the deaths of so many people; it was
also objectively "great" (extraordinary) because it was the first
contact between humans and aliens. In the context of the novel, the day was
"great" but not "good," and so his reference is poetic and
not literal.
4. What is the message of The War of the Worlds?
Most contemporary analyses of The War of the Worlds
compare it to European Imperialism and expansion; with their superior
technology, the Martians (Europeans) invade the weaker nation of England
(Africa, Asia, etc.) and dominate the "inferior" people with their
military might. Wells showed how Humankind, believing themselves to be superior
to all other creatures, can be reduced to animalistic survival instincts; in
the same manner, European expansionists thought of other races as inferior, and
considered their actions in those regions moral. If the Martians had no reason
to consider Humanity as anything but inferior animals, they had no reason to
spare them; using humans as cattle and food is similar to the enslavement of
humans by other humans practiced around the world during past eras.
5. How does the crowd at the Common react to the heat ray in The War
of the Worlds?
After the first Martian exits its
cylinder, the crowd pulls back to the hedges and watches from a distance.
People who were very curious are now scared, but the Royal Astronomer, Stent,
puts together a Deputation of people to try and make contact. They approach the
cylinder with a white flag, trying to show their intentions as peaceful:
Forthwith flashes of actual flame, a
bright glare leaping from one to another, sprang from the scattered group of
men. It was as if some invisible jet impinged upon them and flashed into white
flame. It was as if each man were suddenly and momentarily turned to fire. Then, by the light of their own
destruction, I saw them staggering and falling, and their supporters turning to run.
Vocabulary Enricher (Juver Blaqeura)
1. Curate
-a member of the clergy engaged as assistant to a vicar,
rector, or parish priest.
Character
Captain (Lorenz Gerard Capisin)
Narrator (main character) – He is a
philosopher doing some literary works but was interrupted when the Martians
came. He is quite a lucky man considering that he encountered death so many
times, he has a determination to survive and live to see his wife again. Unlike
the other persons who encountered the Martians and survived, he did not become
insane nor had a trauma, he remained sane and composed.
pp. 79
