Favorite Quote = “Most people in this world seem to live "in character"; they have a beginning, a middle, and an end, and the three are congruous one with another and true to the roles of their type.”

From 1001 Books to Read Before You Die (edited by Peter Boxall) reading list.

Este livro é, para muitos, tido como a obra suprema de Wells. Um romance que se prolonga através de tiques dickensianos e de muita originalidade.

A história insurge-se na pele de George Ponderevo. A sua juventude e a transição até atingir a fase adulta são o espaço temporal da narrativa. Aliada a esta fase, está, o crescimento meteórico de um elixir milagroso e da sua vertente empresarial. Inserida numa Londres industrializada, esta história, visita o submundo da veia comercial e do seu papel ativo.

O elixir apresenta-se como a solução para muitas das maleitas que coincidem com o indivíduo. Podemos comparar este produto ao Calcitrin, por exemplo, só que sem a oferta do livro Viva Melhor às cem primeiras chamadas. Pelo menos, é uma forma de hiperbolizar o produto em questão. Nas mãos de Ponderevo e do seu tio, este produto, é capaz de purificar tudo e mais alguma coisa. Uma invenção milagrosa.

A publicidade assume um papel preponderante e dá a tónica ao núcleo que alimenta as arestas do enredo. O capitalismo utiliza essa mesma ferramenta para se manifestar e obter os seus resultados, não olhando a meios, nem aos lados que estão ao lado do meio.

Um livro denso, no bom sentido, e bastante abrangente. Tem tanto de cómico, como de dramático. As personagens conseguem oferecer diversas perspectivas e espelham a diferença de classes sociais e os seus respectivos poderes ou falta deles.

Quem for fã de uma sátira social que, facilmente, poderíamos enquadrar nos dias hoje este livro é aquilo que procuramos. Já podem para de procurar, acabou de ser encontrado e aqui está.

I really enjoyed this story that makes you think of crooked salesman and controversial new medicines.
When George Ponderevo's uncle Edward hires him to help sell medicine, George knows the drug is a sham, but then it sells like crazy. This is a great story and makes you think.

From the back cover blurb, I expected a science fiction centred around the snake-oil medicine Tono-Bungay in the usual Wells tradition. A work of spectacular imagination where perhaps an entire population sickens and dies, while totally convinced that this placebo is in fact the cure-all that solves everything.

What I got was not that. The medicine barely factors in at all, save for being one of the major stepping stones along the narrative path before being quickly eclipsed.

Tono-Bungay is a life story which reminded me in many parts of John Williams' Stoner. George is not nearly as sympathetic or, in his strange way, charismatic, but he has a self-effacing, reflective attitude as he looks back on the story of his life that is appealing. He tells us upfront that he's no writer or artist, and that his memories will be spotty or marred with his own biases and prejudices.

So they are, and we see him travel from end to end of the British class system, from highs to lows, from the bleakest misery to unutterable ecstasy. Though hard to read at times in the way that a lot of classics are, Tono-Bungay made me reflective and a bit morose. A story always feels better when things don't wrap up so nicely, and I like where we end with Tono-Bungay.

A book often starts a bit slowly for me, but after 30 or 40 pages, I'll gather more interest. I did not expect this to be any different. Early, is this: I thought of my uncle as Teddy directly I saw him; there was something in his personal appearance that in the light of that memory phrased itself at once as Teddiness -- a certain Teddidity. Tedditity. Certainly I could look forward to more such imaginative phrasing.

Unfortunately, I never noticed another. I wonder if Wells got tired writing this, because I kept falling asleep reading it. I expected more action, or more concentration on this flamboyant Teddidity character. Nope. Instead, the first person narrator wandered off into his rather boring life and told about it completely analytically, as if he had not lived it.

My only Wells, as science fiction doesn't interest me, so I'm unlikely to read anything else by him.

At times, I almost really liked this book for its criticism of consumer capitalism (for a book published in 1909, T-B feels ahead of its time in this respect) and the realness of some of the characters, but I got fed up with the narrator/author constantly explaining his own symbolism... not to mention his random anti-semitic remarks, his problematic relationship to women/marriage, and that especially disturbing Heart of Darkness voyage into Africa, where in a typical heart-of-darkness/Quap-fevered state, he loses all his "european morality/civility/etc" and kills a totally innocent African man. I mean, shit, come on.

"А теп��рь каждый, если только у него не слишком высокие требования к
жизни и он не обременен чувством собственного достоинства, может позволить
себе кой-какие излишества. Ныне можно прожить всю жизнь кое-как, ничему
всерьез не отдаваясь, потворствуя своим прихотям и ни к чему себя не
принуждая, не испытав по-настоящему ни голода, ни страха, ни подлинной
страсти, не узнав ничего лучше и выше, чем судорога чувственного
наслаждения, и впервые ощутить изначальную суровую правду бытия лишь в
свой смертный час. Так, я думаю, было с моим дядей, почти так было и со
мной"

The History of Mr. Polly was so good that it gave me high hopes for this one, but I found it mostly dull. Lots of commentary on it as speaking to the threats of advertising and capitalism, but that criticism feels thin, simplistic, and undeveloped. The intro to the Penguin Classics talks about the trip to Africa as especially symbolic, but it has the feeling of The Stranger--an off-hand murder that has no real effects but here it's not an existential comment but an indictment of colonialism (though not clear that Wells argues for that). Plot-wise, everything is made clear before the narration, so there's nothing that happens that gave me a reason to keep reading--you know everything will go wrong, and then it does, but there's not much exploration of how or why things went wrong beyond marketing isn't a great thing but science and truth probably are.

Having heretofore only read Wells’ science fiction, I was surprised to find such a wonderful critique of society and capitalism. I guess I shouldn’t have been, as similar themes were present in his SF, but this was such a different and unexpected direction from what most people are familiar with. Would have been 5 stars except I found it a little slow to get going.

Tono-Bungay
or
Waste

This one is a different flavor of Wells but follows his usual formula. This time, his focus is less on the science fiction aspect and more on his philosophical musings. Ruminations on English class structure, capitalism, advertising, international exploitation, organized religion, and consumption for its own sake is the name of the game here. In addition, Wells was clearly up to date on contemporary science of the time as the narrative arc is complimented by facile side plots about radiation, early flying machines, and other true-science nuggets. The bulk of the novel is a critique of English society, the sea change after industrialization, and the meaning of it all. All of this is provided through a misanthrope of a protagonist, narrated dryly and with an emotional distance except where emotions are explained matter of factly. Save for some uncomfortable descriptions of race and gender, I rather related to and enjoyed the narrator’s journey of discovery, advancement through science, and finding himself.

Wells’ critique of capitalism and dabbling in socialism--something this book is more famous for--are relatively superficial. George's uncle serves as the arch-capitalists, an energetic bungler who gets by through bombast and swindling, adding little to no value to the system but successfully extracting much from it. The snake oil salesmen trope is such an extreme that the critique can only go so deep. But such a system allows such a person to exist or perhaps turns an otherwise well-meaning man into one. George only appears to half-heartedly commit to socialism, being more of a contrarian than anything. He neither employs a systematic critique nor employs his socialist beliefs save to weakly criticize capitalism in vague ways. Thus George's and the novel's ideas on the subject are not fully formed.

This is a melancholy and pessimistic book. George's description of his uncle's death, his tumultuous and ultimately excruciatingly unfulfilled love life, and frequent existential musings will make you think but may not make you happy. The theme of "waste"--in regards to consumption, empire-building, and relationships--asks you to question it all. What's the point if it all ends anyway? George seems to find his answer and meaning in pursuing the only source truth he can comprehend, science.

The final scene has George sailing through the Thames on a destroyer of his own design, lamenting the look of modern London and its overshadowed glories of old. He makes it clear that his loyalty lies with no man or country but to science alone. I wonder if that is enough. Regardless, the novel gave me enough food for thought in an entertaining and well-written package.

Audiobook review.

This was a long, roaming, rambling book which takes pages to make a point which could have been made in one sentence. It's critically acclaimed because the author uses big words and goes on literary tangents which are beautiful to behold, but boring as all get out for the regular reader. Furthermore, the protagonist is an extremely bitter person, and his bitterness clouds the entire book told through his first person narrative, until it's a complete downer of a tale.

Tono-Bungay is an underrated and under-read novel in my opinion. With an engaging narrative style, you easily get carried away with the quick-pace of the novel and it is enjoyable to read.
I see this book as a warning for capitalism. George (the narrator) has a mother who is a housekeeper, so he is born to a lower financial position. He and his uncle invent this medicine called ‘Tono-Bungay’ which does not actually heal anyone, yet it makes them their fortune. Yet with this fortune comes immorality, George and his uncle both cheat on their wives, and George even kills a man - which is stated matter-of-factly and without any emotion at all. I think the novel makes you question whether it was all worth it, whether the immoral acts they both commit were worth the fortune that they ultimately lose in the end.
This book was really enjoyable to read, but it can’t be a 5 star novel because they characters needed to feel more real and personal. With everything stated as a fact, with no real time to dwell on some of the tragic or shocking events that happen, it just lacked an element of connectivity for me.