B A U M A N R A R E B O O K S A U G U S T 2 0 2 3 38 "IT NEVER WAS A WAR, ANY MORE THAN THERE'S WAR BETWEEN MEN AND ANTS": SCARCE FIRST EDITION OF WELLS' WAR OF THE WORLDS 38. WELLS, H.G. The War of the Worlds. London: William Heinemann, 1898. Octavo, original gray cloth, uncut. Housed in a custom clamshell box. $5800 First edition of H.G. Wells' classic and influential "scientific romance." "Almost all of Wells' best science fiction has an evolutionary subtext… The British Empire, like all others before it, represented the successful predation of the weak by the strong, and that was the subject, in a metamorphosed form, of The War of the Worlds" (Disch, 62-63). "The novel is a tour de force whose innumerable fictional offspring include numerous adaptations and homages, by far the most effective of which was Orson Welles' Mercury Theater radio broadcast of 1938" (Anatomy of Wonder II-1234). First edition, first issue: "with no statement of printing on copyright page"; 32-page publisher's catalogue at rear with page one advertising Illuminations, Currey's Form B (Currey, 426). Without extremely rare dust jacket. Scattered light foxing to text, mild toning to cloth, with a bit of wear to spine. An extremely good copy.
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