The New Machiavelli

By H.G. Wells

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"The New Machiavelli" by H.G. Wells is a classic novel that was set during World War I in England. The novel gives insight into Well's political and social views. It centers around Richard Remington who seems to have it all: he is a successful author, Liberal and appears to have a loving wife but in reality, he is unhappy with his marriage and his party's political view. He then meets the beautiful, Isabel Rivers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trajectory, Inc.
• Release date: Oct 1, 2014
• ISBN: 9781632094056

H.G. Wells

H.G. Wells is considered by many to be the father of science fiction. He was the author of numerous classics such as The Invisible Man, The Time Machine, The Island of Dr. Moreau, The War of the Worlds, and many more. 

Reviews for The New Machiavelli

[yooperprof · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I bought my copy of "The New Machiavelli" all the way back in 1991; it sat unopened on my bookshelf for 18 years. There was a good reason for that! Wells' confessional novel is quite tedious: it's perhaps the most egotistical autobiographical novel I've ever read. The book starts out well, with a pleasant description of the sleepy suburban town where "Remington" (Wells) passes his adoloscence. But soon the novel is encumbered by a number of incidents that only exist to settle personal scores, and when politics of early twentieth century Britain become the main subject of the book, interest further dwindles. It's actually a little startling to see how much Wells bought into the Edwardian fad for eugenics! The final section, which deals gushingly with Remington's love life, contains some of the most embarrassingly bad prose I've encountered in recent years. The second star I've provided is only an expression of the novel's historical interest. As a work of literature, I would give it just one star.

[baswood · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

If he had dared H G Wells might have titled his novel “Sex and Politics”, but he had enough trouble getting this novel published without any additional provocation. As he was very interested in both sex and politics it is surprising that he waited until his nineteenth novel to write passionately about both, but when he finally did he produced an outstanding book that ranks among his best. Published in 1911 the centre-piece political event is the Liberal Party’s 1909 “budget for the people”, where the Commons challenged the power of the House of Lords and so today “The New Machiavelli” reads a bit like an historical novel, but in 1911 it would have been extremely topical especially as Wells’ scathing pen portraits of political figures would have been easily recognisable. The novel is written in the first person: Richard Remington is writing his memoirs reflecting on his short but eventful political career, which had been wrecked by scandal. The reader therefore knows the end of the story and so the interest is in how it all happened and this gives Wells the opportunity to delve deeply into political, social and philosophical issues without having to maintain a tension in the story. Remington is in fact writing his autobiography and he starts with his childhood and upbringing and this has led some readers to conclude that this is Wells’ most autobiographical novel. While there is certainly plenty of Wells in Remington and he uses Remington to put forward some of his own views on society and politics it is dangerous to assume that this is in any way autobiographical: for example Remington went to a public school and on to Cambridge, then was elected to Parliament as a liberal MP. Wells did none of these things but did stand for parliament as a Labour MP later in life. Remington was initially supported by the influential Baileys; the husband and wife team based on Sidney and Beatrice Webb, but once inside the Commons he fell out of step with the Liberal party. He married a wealthy heiress which gave him the independent means to follow his own path, he wrote pamphlets he organised groups, but increasingly saw the Liberals as a party made of individuals too concerned with their own position and influence to make any lasting changes. He looked across the floor of the House to the Tory benches and saw a beleaguered party who he thought might give him a better platform for the changes he wanted to make. He resigned from the Liberal Party and stood as a Tory at the next election and was successful again. He gathered around himself a group of young intellectuals and edited a weekly pamphlet that put forward their view point; he was creating a party for change within the Tory party. It all came crashing around his ears however when his love affair with his closest party worker Isabel Rivers became public and he was hounded out of the country.Remington went into politics because he believed that he could make a difference. Very much like Wells he is appalled at the muddle-headedness that he saw all around him and believed that better education would be a basis for change and he sets out his arguments in some detail. Later in the novel he embraced eugenics which might make modern day readers shudder, but we would be much more inclined to support his views on women's suffrage. These are clearly Wells’ views and so he is able to indulge himself through Remington, but his indulgences are part and parcel of the political novel he is writing, he has Remington say:“My political conceptions were perfectly plain and honest. I had one constant desire ruling my thoughts. I meant to leave England and the Empire better ordered than I found it, to organise and discipline to build up a constructive and controlling State out of my worlds confusions. We had I saw to suffuse education with public intention, to develop a new better living generation with a collectivist habit of thought, to link now chaotic activities in every human affair, and particularly to catch that escaped, world-making, world-ruining, dangerous thing, industrial and financial enterprise and bring it back to the service of the general good.” There are fascinating sections on the Baileys influential groupings and on the groups within the political party’s. The glittering dinners, the weekends in the country, the importance of friends and contacts create a viable and credible scenario of the politics of the time. Perhaps the most interesting development is Remington’s attempt to create his own party within the Tory party which anticipates the Militant Tendency’s attempts to influence the Labour party in England in the 1980’s.It is a sex scandal that finally brings Remington down and we know this from the very start of the novel and so Wells is keen to show his hero as a man with normal passionate desires. We learn of his initiation into the adult world of sex and how difficult it was for a young man at that time to find out anything at all about sex. Wells/Remington says:“Humanity is begotten by desire, lives by desire” but Victorian/ Edwardian society does its best to hush it all up. He goes further to claim that society/politics “penalises abandonment to love so heavily, that power, influence and control fall largely to unencumbered people and sterile people and people who have married for passionless purposes, people beauty-blind, who don’t understand what it is to fall in love, what it is to desire children or have them, what it is to feel in their blood and bodies the supreme claim of good births………people almost of necessity averse from this most fundamental aspect of existence.” The final part of the book describes Remington’s passionate affair with Isabel Rivers. He confesses to his wife Margaret and she is willing to forgive him and even to manage their marriage while the affair continues, but this would be unacceptable in public life and Remington rails against the hypocrisy of it all. He must in the end choose between the two women, knowing that if he continues his love affair with Isabel his career is finished.This final part of the novel sounds like a cri de coeur from Wells whose own affair with Amber Reeves was causing him to make choices imposed on him by society, choices that are difficult to make in the heat of a passionate love affair. The affair and its ramifications are beautifully written with an intensity that impressed D H Lawrence and will keep the reader gripped until the end.I have no doubt that The New Machiavelli is a fine achievement: it gives us a believable character struggling to do great things in a society that will not allow him to stray from the narrow path of its own hide bound sexuality. Along the way Wells gets to satirise leading political figures and air his own views on politics and society. London is beautifully described as are the horrors of the industrial Midlands. It all works magnificently and a five star read.

[danielstj · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This was a mixture between a coming of age novel (at the beginning), then a political one, and finally imbued with a sense of romance. Overall, I thought it was decently contemplated and I felt invested in the characters, the story, and the final turnout. I recommend it to those who are interested in Wells, as this is quite an original piece of work by him.3 stars.