The Artilleryman Rant, Part 1

[Idem]

'Well, those who mean to escape their catching must get ready.  I'm getting ready.  Mind you, it isn't all of us that are made for wild beasts; and that's what it's got to be.  That's why I watched you.  I had my doubts.  You're slender.  I didn't know that it was you, see, or just how you'd been buried.  All these - the sort of people that lived in these houses, and all those damn little clerks that used to live down that way - they'd be no good.  They haven't any spirit in them - no proud dreams and no proud lusts; and a man who hasn't one or the other - Lord!  what is he but funk and precautions?  They used to skedaddle off to work - I've seen hundreds of 'em, bit of breakfast in hand, running wild and shining to catch their season-ticket train, for fear they'd get dismissed if they didn't; working at businesses they were afraid to take the trouble to undertand; skedaddling back for fear they wouldn't be in time for dinner; keeping indoors after dinner foe fear of the back streets, and sleeping with wives they married, not because they wanted them, but because they had a bit of money that would make for safety in their one miserable skedaddle through the world.

Lives insured and a bit invested for fear of accidents.  And on Sundays - fear of the hereafter.  As if hell was built of rabbits!  Well, the Martians will be a godsend to these.  Nice roomy cages, fattening food, careful breeding, no worry.  After a week or so chasing about the fields and lands on empty stomachs, they'll come in and be caught cheerful.  They'll be quite glad after a bit.  They'll wonder what people did before there were Martians to take care of them.  And the bar-loafers, and marshers, and singers - I can imagine them.

There'll ne any amount of sentiment and religion loose among them.  There's hundreds of things I saw with my eyes that I've only begun to see clearly these last few days.  There's lots will take things as they are - fat and stupid; and lots will be worried by a sort of feeling that it's all wrong, and that they ought to be doing something.  Now whenever things are so that a lot of people feel they ought to be doing something, the weak, and those who go weak with a lot of complicated thinking, always make for a sort of do-nothing religion, very pious and superior, and submit to persecution and the will of the Lord.  Very likely you've see the same thing.  It's energy in a gale of funk, and turned clean inside out.  These cages will be full of psalms and hymns and piety.  And those of a less simple sort will work in a bit of - what is it? - eroticism.'

- from H.G. Wells The War of the Worlds




I just finished reading this book, and wanted to share, even though you are probably already familiar with it.

[Idem]

No replies?  Srsly?

...

[Random Probability]

Yes, yes.....

I read that when I was about nine, methinks.  These truths we hold self evident.  Not much to comment on since you didn't really add anything or try to make a point.

Or was this some kind of revelation to you?

Please, elucidate.

..or I can just kill you.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Bump.

[Adios]

Bored?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Bored?

No, I rather liked this, and I missed it the first time around.

[Don Coyote]

Fuck I don't even remember that part in the War of the Worlds.

[The Johnny]

And here i was thinking that book was only crappy fiction

[The Good Reverend Roger]

And here i was thinking that book was only crappy fiction

Did you just slap H.G. Wells?

What's next, Jules Verne?  Or the mother of science fiction herself, Mary Shelley?

[Adios]

And here i was thinking that book was only crappy fiction

Did you just slap H.G. Wells?

What's next, Jules Verne?  Or the mother of science fiction herself, Mary Shelley?

Why do they hate the visionaries?

[Phox]

And here i was thinking that book was only crappy fiction

Did you just slap H.G. Wells?

What's next, Jules Verne?  Or the mother of science fiction herself, Mary Shelley?

Why do they hate the visionaries?

Because those fuckers dared to dream! 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

And here i was thinking that book was only crappy fiction

Did you just slap H.G. Wells?

What's next, Jules Verne?  Or the mother of science fiction herself, Mary Shelley?

Why do they hate the visionaries?

Because those fuckers dared to dream! 

Verne had dreams.  Mary Shelley had horrible fucking nightmares.   The first science fiction story ever written is still billed as "horror" (Frankenstien), and The Last Man makes Greybeard look downright cheerful.

[Adios]

We need people like them. Where did the dreamers all go?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

We need people like them. Where did the dreamers all go?

Farmville.

[Adios]

We need people like them. Where did the dreamers all go?

Farmville.

You just made my brain roll over in my arse.