THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW 27IN HIS 1901 BOOK,“Anticipations,” H. G. Wells of-
fered his predictions for the future and his belief
that only an elite group of enlightened scientists
and technicians could save humanity. The book
caught the attention of London’s Fabian Society, a
small group of accomplished men and women
whose aim was to bring about socialism peacefully
through the “permeation” of socialist ideas into
universities and government. Some members
thought that having Wells in their midst would
make Fabianism interesting again, and in 1903 the
red-bearded George Bernard Shaw, chair of their
executive committee, led a group who put up the
mustachioed Wells for membership.
Wells, like the younger members who had joined
to save the world, was disappointed to find a cliqu-
ey institution controlled by Shaw and a few others.
Wells served passively for two years, then sug-
gested an inquiry into the society’s effectiveness.
He was allowed to deliver his critique, “The Faults
of the Fabian,” at a members-only meeting, and
began by berating those assembled as inactive,
silent on the Boer War and not concerned enough
with reforming education. He scoffed at their re-
quirement that applicants obtain letters of recom-
mendation from existing members, as if they were a
swanky social club. But his main concern was that
while labor organizations were turning manual
workers into socialists, not enough was being done
to recruit doctors, teachers and other professionals.
“Make socialists and you will achieve socialism,”
he exhorted.
The old guard conceded some points, but quickly
realized that the kind of action Wells proposed did
not fit in with the elitist sensibility of their society. A
civil war ensued for the next two years, until Wells
overplayed his hand and Shaw, using his skill as a
debater, forced Wells to resign. Those who sided
with Shaw saw Wells as the sort who could not
work under any structure that he himself had not
designed. In his 1934 memoir the novelist confessed
that his behavior had been a case of “real inexcus-
able vanity,” but he defended his opposition to the
Fabians’ plan to “permeate the existing order
rather than change it.”
Thanks to Wells’s five-year association with the
group, its membership had tripled, and its income
had quadrupled. Wells had joined to promote social-
ism, but instead, had only succeeded in promoting
the Fabians. 0The Literati/G. B. Shaw vs. H. G. Wells/By Edward Sorel
The author of ‘The Island of Dr. Moreau’ and ‘War of the Worlds’ takes on an elite society of socialists.
EDWARD SORELis an illustrator and caricaturist and the author, most recently, of “Mary Astor’s Purple Diary.”