Chapter 6 - The Heat Ray in the Chobham Road
You know how in some internet videos of an event happening, they re-play the content of the video in slow motion? That’s basically this chapter.
I know it’s still pretty early but I’m feeling kinda mixed about this book so far. There’s a chance that it’ll have a really cool ending the way The Time Machine did, or that its narrative will change, but as is the strange nature of this narration and the relatively detached voice with which these events are regarded seems to work to the detriment of the piece. Say what you will about The Time Machine, at least I could kind of tell the personality of The Time Traveler by his interactions with his guests and the Eloi. This narrator though (I’m gonna just start calling them Hershel for now) seems not only detached, but strangely like Wells wanted to do a third-person omniscient role or third-person limited focused on a specific character but didn’t. As is, the first person narration makes these strange moments where Hershel is able to tell how other people perceived a particular event as it unfolds strikes me as really strange.
We get some details on the heat-ray in this chapter. It can melt through things, it is invisible, and it killed around 40 people on the night of the initial attack. Other than that, however, this chapter is spent with the narrator mentioning the people in the nearby towns did not know what was going on at the time. I suppose there’s something to be said for the relative lack of communication between the places, but it seems that any point that could be made about it is fairly beside the focus of the narrative. I feel like maybe I’m missing something to these chapters, could anyone fill me in on why these are presented here?
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