The Island of Dr. Moreau

H. G. Wells

Sep 2005 · Sold by Penguin

About this ebook

A cautionary tale of the horrors that can ensue when man experiments with nature, from the father of science fiction, H. G. Wells.  

A lonely island in the Pacific. The sinister scientist who rules it. And the strange beings who dwell there....

This is the scenario for H. G. Wells’s haunting classic, one of his most intriguing and visionary novels. Living in the late nineteenth century and facing the impact of Darwin’s theory of evolution, Wells wrote this chilling masterpiece about the characteristics of beasts blurring as the animals turn into men. Dr. Moreau, a scientist expelled from his homeland for his cruel vivisection experiments, finds a deserted island that gives him the freedom to continue torturous transplantations and create hideous creatures with manlike intelligence. But as the brutally enforced order on Moreau’s island dissolves, the true consequences of his experiments emerge, and his creations revert to beasts more shocking than nature could devise.

A genius of his time, H. G. Wells foresaw the use of what he called the “atom bomb,” the practice of gene-splicing, and men landing on the moon. Now, when these have become part of everyday life, his dark fable serves as a compelling reminder of the horrors that reckless experiments with nature can produce.
 
With an Introduction by Nita A. Farahany
and an Afterword by Dr. John L. Flynn

Ratings and reviews

What! Really! Did we really need a NEW introduction For THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU? Did we really need a lesson in bioethics before we read this book. Did we really need to know Nita Farahaney’s thoughts on transplanting an animal brain into a human being or her thoughts about a group of unethical scientists performing experiments on Guatemalan patients 70 years ago or her thoughts about giving ADHD drugs to enhance students concentration before taking the SAT for college placement or her thoughts about Lance Armstrong, Alex Rodriguez, and Roger Clemens use of performance enhancing drugs before we read THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU? The answer is a resounding no! I am surprised that anyone would continue reading this book after making the attempt to traverse this NEW introduction. What did you need a new introduction for anyway? The original introduction was just fine and it was all that was needed. I recommend this book for three different types of people: 1) Children 2) An adult with limited knowledge about tissue matching and blood typing and biologically possible feats 3) An adult who does understand about the above issues and is unconcerned at this time in his life about scientific reality or bioethical matters. All he wants is a good read! My guess is that the VAST majority of readers fall into this third category. I don’t think that anyone who is deeply concerned about reality is going to read any science fiction books, and no one who is concerned about ethics will be buying this book. The action is fast and fun to follow. That is what H. G. Wells had in mind when he wrote the book. He was not trying to give us lessons on ethics. He wrote many science based books and I don’t think he was trying to teach us lessons in any of them. He just wanted us to have fun, to have a good read and he was successful in THE ISLAND OF DR. MOREAU.

I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THE MOVIE WITH BRANDO AND KILMER, SO HAD TO READ THE BOOK, THE MOVIE EXCELLENT"I WALKED IN WHEN MY PARENTS WERE WATCHING IT,LOL"THEY ARE BOTH WONDERFUL, OF COURSE THE MOVIE IS MORE"OUR TIME~=^•^=~JUST FREAKING FABULOUS AND I SO APPRECIATE THE BOOK EVEN MORE NOW THAT I'M OLDER..A TREASURE INDEED!!!!

Save your money and get this public domain book from an organization like Project Gutenberg. This is an excellent book but there is no good reason anyone should be charging money for this.

About the author

Herbert George Wells (1866–1946) left school at thirteen to become a draper’s apprentice (a life he detested); he later won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science in London, where he studied with the famous T. H. Huxley. He began to sell articles and short stories regularly in 1893. His immediately successful novel The Time Machine (1895) rescued him from poverty. His other “scientific romances”—The Island of Dr. Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897), The War of the Worlds (1898), and The First Men in the Moon (1901)—made him the father of science fiction.

Dr. Nita A. Farahany is a Professor of Law and Philosophy and the Director of the Science and Society Initiative at Duke University. In 2010, she was appointed by President Obama to the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues. She is a widely published scholar on the ethical, legal, and social implications of the biosciences and emerging technologies, and a frequent commentator for national media and radio shows. Farahany is an elected member of the American Law Insitute, a Board member of the International Neuroethics Society, a coeditor and chief founder of the Journal of Law and the Biosciences, and recipient of the 2013 Paul M. Bator Award given annually to the outstanding legal academic under forty. She holds an AB (Genetics) from Dartmouth College, a JD, MA, and PhD (Philosophy) from Duke University, and an ALM (Biology) from Harvard University.

Dr. John L. Flynn is a three-time Hugo-nominated author and longtime science fiction fan and critic who has written ten books, numerous short stories, articles, reviews, and a screenplay. A professor at Towson University in Towson, Maryland, he teaches both graduate and undergraduate writing courses, including a course on Writing Science Fiction. He holds two PhDs, in literature and psychology.