Even a single, apparently straightforward, temporal round trip can generate complexities. On the day after the second dinner, the Time Traveller is simultaneously present in his laboratory three times.
(i) The Time Machine bearing the Time Traveller is invisibly present in the south-east corner of the laboratory, "travelling" into the future.
(ii) The Machine bearing the Traveller is invisibly present against the north-west wall on its return journey. The Traveller says, "'...where you saw it...'" (p. 96) but surely the guests at the first dinner saw the Machine only before its departure?
(iii) Until about midday, the Machine is visibly present against the north-west wall. The Time Traveller, carrying a camera and a knapsack, enters the laboratory, mounts the Machine and departs for a second time into either the past or the future but he never returns. If he travels into the past, then an invisible Machine is present during the earlier part of the day whereas, if he travels into the future, then the invisible Machine is present during the later part of the day.
It is Time Traveller (ii) that glimpses "Hillyer." See here.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
Filmed versions of THE TIME MACHINE seem to generally show the Time Traveler returning to the future of the Eloi and Morlocks. That's fair enough, but I do wonder what Wells might have thought of time traveling to the past of 1890's England? And how far back into that past might the Traveler have gone?
Sean
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