A Study Guide for H. G. Wells's "Country of the Blind"

By Gale and Cengage

A Study Guide for H. G. Wells's "Country of the Blind," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Short Stories for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Short Stories for Students for all of your research needs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cengage Learning - Gale
• Release date: Jul 27, 2016
• ISBN: 9781535821230

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11

The Country of the Blind

H. G. Wells

1904

Introduction

H. G. Wells's story The Country of the Blind was first published in the April 1904 issue of the Strand Magazine and later appeared in his 1911 collection The Country of the Blind, and Other Stories. It examines the adage In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king through the adventures of Nunez, a South American mountain climber, who discovers an isolated community high in the Ecuadorian Andes whose members have all been blind for fifteen generations. His quest for power and glory is derailed by the villagers' belief that his talk about being able to see is nothing more than a mental defect that must be corrected. The story illustrates Wells's belief that forward-thinking individuals are usually dismissed by backward societies to their own detriment.

Wells published two versions of The Country of the Blind. By far the most popular is the original 1904 version, in which Nunez escapes the village and dies of exposure trying to make his way back to civilization. In the lesser-known version, published as a limited-edition volume by Golden Cockerel Press in 1939, Nunez tries in vain to save the villagers from an impending avalanche that only he can see coming. The only survivor besides Nunez is the blind woman he loves, Medina-saroté. While the subtexts of the two versions are completely opposite, the story remains one of the best-known and well-regarded tales of physical disability in the literary canon. Wells considered The Country of the Blind one of his best stories, although he had little regard for the genre of the short story, which he believed was an antiquated literary form that had run its course by the time he published his collection in 1911.

Author Biography

Herbert George Wells was born on September 21, 1866, in Bromley, England. His lower-middle-class parents struggled to support their four children, and Bertie, as young Wells was known, suffered an early education in false starts and dead ends. From 1880 to 1883 he served unhappily as an apprentice in the fabric trade, but in 1884, he received a scholarship to study biology at the Normal School of Science in London. He joined the school's debating society and plunged headfirst into an exploration of politics and society, becoming an advocate for socialism and an enthusiastic member of the reform-minded Fabian Society.

Wells, who had always enjoyed literature, began writing both fiction and nonfiction in the Science School Journal, which he helped found at the college. In 1887, he published an early version of his first novella, The Time Machine, in the journal. Nevertheless, he soon lost his scholarship and was left penniless, and he did not receive a college diploma until he graduated from the University of London in 1889. Shortly thereafter, he