The Last Books of H.G. Wells: The Happy Turning: A Dream of Life & Mind at the End of its Tether

Thoughts At the End

Here is a handsome, worthwhile book, reasonably priced--however, the title requires qualification. These final two works of H. G. Wells (1866-1946) are essays, pamphlets really. THE HAPPY TURNING comes in at a robust thirty-two pages; MIND AT THE END OF ITS TETHER totals twenty-four, even with a brief preface. It demands mention that there are insightful, illuminating introductions by Colin Wilson and Rudy Rucker.
THE HAPPY TURNING is a whimsical account of dreams sent by his unconscious to relieve war obsession. Happy Turning Land is full of his suppressed desires and fantasies. Most notable are conversations with the modest ("I was not a bad carpenter") Jesus of Nazareth. To His mind the program He initiated just got out of hand: "NEVER have disciples." All in all, THE HAPPY TURNING is pleasant reading.
MIND AT THE END OF ITS TETHER is another matter, a work mentioned rightfully as the final profoundly pessimistic thoughts of Wells (and he died of liver cancer within months of its publication). The essay concludes with some Wellsian musings on biology, but the dark heart of it is the opening half. The author detects a strange metaphysical shift in the universe: a "cosmic movement of events is increasingly adverse," and "a frightful queerness has come into life." An emerging force labelled the "Antagonist" is inimical to mankind and the universe "is going clean out of existence." He expresses hope that humanity will not end "like drunken cowards in a daze or poisoned rats in a sack."
The dazed reader can certainly believe that this is the final eloquent outburst of an addled mind belonging to a formerly great writer and thinker now facing imminent death. But he or she will not have read anything like it.

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