Illustration by Grahame Baker-Smith from The Folio Society edition of The World of The Worlds by H.G. Wells
The Folio Society’s edition of HG Wells’ classic The War Of The Worlds is available now and we have a couple of Grahame Baker-Smith’s incredible illustrations for you.
This new edition also includes a foreword by Iain Sinclair, and features six illustrations and a frontispiece. It is bound in buckram blocked with a design by the artist, and it is beautiful.
“Described by Brian Aldiss as ‘the Shakespeare of science fiction’, Wells was a prolific writer across many forms. Having lived in Woking, he took great delight in setting much of the invasion at the centre of this book there, remarking in a letter how he could ‘completely wreck and sack Woking – killing my neighbours in painful and eccentric ways’. In his introduction, writer Iain Sinclair describes The War Of The Worlds as a kind of ‘prophetic dream’ in which Wells, with his rivers choked with the alien ‘red weed’ and the deadly black smoke used by the Martians, seems to predict, among other things, chemical weapons and ecological disaster. Award-winning artist Grahame Baker-Smith has provided seven colour illustrations that embrace the sheer pulp joy of an alien invasion: Martian war-machines loom out of the night, surrounded by an unearthly glow, and the ornate gold-blocked binding design nods to the fantastical machines that have come to be associated with the author.”
“A peaceful night in Surrey is shattered when what is thought to be a meteor crashes into Horsell Common. Curious villagers approach the strange cylindrical object, only to be incinerated by a Martian heat-ray. Soon the invaders are sending out their terrible ‘tripods’, causing devastation throughout England as ‘intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic’ gradually seek to eradicate the human race. Spawning an infamous radio play that convinced listeners a real alien invasion was in progress, a musical, several films, a television series and countless literary spin-offs, The War Of The Worlds remains one of the most significant and influential works of science fiction.”
To find out more about the edition (and to order it, of course), head to The Folio Society’s website. Keep up with the latest genre news with the new issue of SciFiNow.
