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The History of Mr. Polly

by H.G. Wells, John Sutherland (Introduction), Simon J. James (Notes), Simon James (Annotations)

3.6 of 5 stars 3.60 · rating details · 415 ratings · 46 reviews

Mr. Polly is an ordinary middle-aged man who is tired of his wife's nagging and his dreary job as the owner of a regional gentleman's outfitters. Faced with the threat of bankruptcy, he concludes that the only way to escape his frustrating existence is by burning his shop to the ground and killing himself. Unexpected events, however, conspire to lead the bewildered Mr. Pol...more

Paperback, 272 pages

Published December 27th 2005 by Penguin Classics (first published 1910)

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Nov 30, 2012 Tony rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction-mainstream

THE HISTORY OF MR. POLLY. (1910). H. G. Wells. ****.
After having read most of Wells’ science fiction novels I thought I’d sample his other works. The only other novel of his I’ve read that was not science fiction – and which I plan to read again since that was about 30 years ago – was “Tono Bungay.” This novel would be hard to classify. It’s the story of Mr. Alfred Polly, a lower-middle-class individual who has nothing much to look forward to in life except what comes his way. He was not good i...more THE HISTORY OF MR. POLLY. (1910). H. G. Wells. ****.
After having read most of Wells’ science fiction novels I thought I’d sample his other works. The only other novel of his I’ve read that was not science fiction – and which I plan to read again since that was about 30 years ago – was “Tono Bungay.” This novel would be hard to classify. It’s the story of Mr. Alfred Polly, a lower-middle-class individual who has nothing much to look forward to in life except what comes his way. He was not good in school and not much stuck with him. He finally finds a job after graduation in a department store as a clerk. There he makes friends with two other clerks with whom he shares a dormitory, Platt and Parsons. They call themselves the ‘three P’s.” They don’t have much to look forward to in terms of promotions, so they tend to sneak in things that are fun where they can. Parsons does manage to make a step up, however, to the position of window dresser. He soon loses that job when he decides to do his window in a new way. There is no room for individual expression at the store. Polly, mostly from boredom, begins to visit his aunt on a regular basis. She has three daughters, one of whom, Miriam, eventually gets proposed to by Polly. He’s not sure why, but it seems the thing to do. When his father dies and leaves him an insurance policy of £330, he decides to open a shop selling mens’ wear. He thought he picked a good spot for the shop, but it turns out that he didn’t. He works there day after day, watching his money slowly disappear. He also discovers that Miriam is a slovenly wife. In a fit of despair, he decides to kill himself. He settles on setting himself and the shop on fire. It doesn’t turn out as expected. When the fire starts, it gets out of hand quickly and soon envelopes the other shops in the street. He finally flees the store to go and rescue an old woman who lives upstairs in the shop across the street, and then watches the other buildings go up in flames. Since that didn’t work, he decides to take off and live a life of freedom on the road. He abandons Miriam, leaving her all of his money with the exception of £20, he takes off. His adventures along the way take up most of the rest of the book. He discovers that life doesn’t have to be structured according to the rules of his caste and becomes a free soul. The whole point of the novel was to show the reader the effects of the caste system in England at the time and the smothering effect it had on people. There was hope – though not necessarily the best way out as proposed in this novel. This is not great literature, but it is a good read. Recommended.
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May 26, 2013 Jonfaith rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The esteemed M.J. Nicholls dryly encircled the genius of this novel. It was fitting to conclude my week-long tour of Britons electing paired initials as Christian names - to rest easy under the warm praise of the Scotsman with his love of completeism and exhumation.

Alfred Polly is my hero. His neologisms are remarkable. I thought of citing a half dozen examples but feel that out of context, it would prove to be shit. His suspicions and pleasures appear to be my own. One can't just sit around fo...more

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Jun 16, 2012 S. Nikolova rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: work-bc

The last third of the book is what moved it from a one-star to a three-star read for me. The beginning two thirds left me quite annoyed with the main character, Mr. Polly, who is the kind of passive person that lets life happen to him. It was no surprise to me that he ended up having the expected mid-life crisis after realizing that his existence was not at all what he wanted out of life. What followed this realization was a suicide attempt, an arson, and a series of events that were as engrossi...more

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May 03, 2013 Greg Deane rated it 4 of 5 stars

“The History of Mr Polly” (1910) is a disturbing comic novel that Thoreau’s observation that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” The petit bourgeois shopowner Alfred Polly, starts his working life as an apprentice window dresser, reads novels and dreams of a life of wild freedom and romance. Despite the years of quiet hopelessness he is destined to live, the protagonist holds onto a yearning for an ideal: “Deep in the being of Mr. Polly, deep in that darkness, like a creature whic...more “The History of Mr Polly” (1910) is a disturbing comic novel that Thoreau’s observation that “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” The petit bourgeois shopowner Alfred Polly, starts his working life as an apprentice window dresser, reads novels and dreams of a life of wild freedom and romance. Despite the years of quiet hopelessness he is destined to live, the protagonist holds onto a yearning for an ideal: “Deep in the being of Mr. Polly, deep in that darkness, like a creature which has been beaten about the head and left for dead but still lives, crawled a persuasion that over and above the things that are jolly and ‘bits of all right,’ there was beauty, there was delight; that somewhere — magically inaccessible perhaps, but still somewhere — were pure and easy and joyous states of body and mind.”

Yet it is difficult for him to keep faith in his dream; his friend Parsons is dismissed from his window dressing position after he tries to break free of the stores rules and decorate his window creatively, having complained that there is “no Joy in it, no blooming Joy!” Parsons attempt at a meagre revolution finds him cast penniless and jobless into the street. Mr Polly is desolated when he leaves the shop at the end of his training but is also unable to find work. He is increasingly dejected until father dies, leaving him a tidy sum from insurance. But the opportunity to have his own shop and marriage to his cousin turns into a downward spiral to immiseration where suicide appears to be his only chance for redemption. Yet Wells tells the reader, “For fifteen years Mr. Polly was a respectable shopkeeper in Fishbourne.” He still felt “an insatiable hunger for bright and delightful experiences, for the gracious aspects of things, for beauty.” On his way to sate his hunger, he becomes a hero in the course of a fire he started. The fire is a purification that prepares him for the next phase of his life.

He abandons his debts and his unhappy marriage by feigning his death. He enjoys life as a tramp travelling on his bicycle, finding the romance that had filled his fancies when he lived a downtrodden life. In time he finds an Eden, one that he is prepared to defend, driving off his own alter ego three times, each time more vigorously and more confidently. Having established his right to a home, he goes back to his wife who has also built a life of her own without him. She releases him, being more than happy to do so. Ultimately, both Mr and Mrs Polly can be grateful to each other because each had liberated the other.
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Apr 23, 2013 MJ Nicholls rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: novels, penguin-classics, sassysassenachs

Everyone at some point in their lives will suddenly realise in their naive exuberance they made a colossal mistake that now has its python-like grip around their cowardly little necks, and that the only solution is to burn the shop and down and become a country hobo. Or maybe only the first part of that sentence. Life in the early 1900s was uniformly dreary for the working classes, but at least they were born and raised to expect nothing—nowadays we are taught from the womb to reach for the star...more

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May 30, 2013 Bob rated it 2 of 5 stars

This is not one of Wells' better books. He had an interesting enough premise for a novel--A man who chooses to abandon his wife and flee his former life--but the story sort of fizzles out from there, including a couple of strange and impertinent chapters involving some confrontations with a violent drunkard that have no relation to the rest of the story, and seemingly no purpose other than to fill space and tie up a string or two. The novel runs out of steam and then Wells hastily wraps things u...more

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Jun 29, 2011 Leslie rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2011, 20th-century-fiction

Not uncommonly, at a certain point in their lives, people look up from their daily tasks and ask themselves something like, "How the hell did I get here? How did I end up in this place in my life, with this partner or with no partner, with these children or with no children, with this job or with no job? This isn't what I intended at all." So thinks Mr Polly at the age of 37 (middle age came earlier then) as he sits on a stile one day, realising that his life is in a "Beastly Silly Wheeze of a h...more

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Jun 04, 2012 Pete rated it 3 of 5 stars

Mr Polly is everyman; at least one searching for direction or meaning in life that is. He is any middle aged, middle class, middle Englander who has ticked all the right boxes as far as society is concerned and yet still gotten nowhere; financially invested, unhappily married, physically over the hill.
He is a thinker, a dreamer and a chaser after unrealised ideals, but inadequately unable to fully express himself yet without being inarticulate, rudderless yet not without some aims and clueless w...more
Mr Polly is everyman; at least one searching for direction or meaning in life that is. He is any middle aged, middle class, middle Englander who has ticked all the right boxes as far as society is concerned and yet still gotten nowhere; financially invested, unhappily married, physically over the hill.
He is a thinker, a dreamer and a chaser after unrealised ideals, but inadequately unable to fully express himself yet without being inarticulate, rudderless yet not without some aims and clueless without being uneducated.
This book covers the same territory as George Orwell's 'Coming up for Air', a novel roughly contemporary with it.
In this tale when our hero comes to his senses and finds himself in a middle aged rut, he plans his death, wriggles free from the expectancies of life's strangle hold and finds contentment in non conformity.
Maybe he is the first anti-hero of Modern English literature?

Half way through the book Mr Wells, who makes no attempt to remain invisible behind the narrative but rather voices opinions intermittently throughout the text, tells of a certain educated somebody of high standing, in Highbury, wearing a golden pince-nez. The opinions of this certain person regarding the state of the nation and Britain's shortcomings as guardian and educator of her citizens are twice quoted, including the following:-
"that vast mass of useless, uncomfortable, under-educated, under-trained and altogether pitiable people that we contemplate when we use that inaccurate and misleading term, the Lower Middle Class".
One must conclude that Mr Polly, a character who personifies the failings of the nation according to the mystery commentator, is a vehicle for Mr Wells' own ideas on the matter and as such this novel would seem to be a retort to the opinions voiced as well as a meditation on the meaning of life for such a person. Mr Wells, a social commentator, wrote prolifically, as a vehicle for his pseudo prophetic imaginings and fears for the future of British society, re: The Time Machine, The War in the Air etc...as well as the need for social reform in his time, i.e. the late C19:early C20th.

So what then,is Mr Wells trying to tell us?
Whilst this book touches on seemingly universal themes i.e purpose and meaning in life, it does carry a definite sense of time and place and should be interpreted then, at least to some degree, within it's historical context.
Maybe the word universal is ill chosen then, because what I'm trying to say is that this book is inherently English. Whilst it's relevance might well resonate within all North Atlantic or 'Western' cultures, I'm not sure if the questions here answered aren't posed by an exclusively modern, western phenomenon.
(Do Bedouin ,Kalahari Bushmen or Australian Aborigines experience mid life crisis'?!)

Orwell's rhetorical answer to a mid life crisis was a dismissal; aspirations are for the young, chasing the past is an illusion. His hero admitted defeat, grew up and returned, humbled and feeling foolish to his old life; as someone returning to a well fitting but worn out suit.
Well's answer cuts the other way and champions idealism and an ordinary brand of heroism. His hero achieves his ideals, only in an unexpected manner.

Maybe it simply reminds us that there is always hope, that contentment is to be found in the most unlikeliest places and a hero isn't always that heroic,or rather that heroism is a much misrepresented quality lying latent in many everyday people.
Maybe he's just reflecting that life begins at forty!
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Apr 15, 2011 Sara rated it 4 of 5 stars

I read this not long after reading Orwell's Coming Up For Air. This one is a much better novel, but they're interesting as two books about very similar characters in very similar circumstances; in the wrong class in Britain at the wrong time, badly educated, badly married, dreams lost, no real prospects or hopes or pleasure left in life when the books begin. Wells is much more subtle about the blind ignorant ways in which people can make themselves miserable themselves in life, and get what they...more

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Jan 04, 2012 Mrsgaskell rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: british, kindle, classics, 8-star

When the novel opens we meet Mr. Polly sitting on a stile contemplating the view and life. He's a discontented, dyspeptic shopkeeper in his mid-thirties and H.G. Wells soon gives us an account of how Mr. Polly reached this point. The imagination, curiosity, and dreams of the boy were drummed out of him by education and work in a series of department stores and shops. A small inheritance on his father's death enabled him to buy his own shop and impulsively take a wife. Fifteen years on, he and hi...more

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Mar 22, 2008 Noah Soudrette rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

A superb comedy by Wells, who is most famous for his science fiction. This tells the story of an everyman who realizes, after much trial and error, that the path most of us feel obligated to take in life, is not for everyone, and that often our biggest obstacle is our own expectations.

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May 07, 2009 Cynthia rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: books-read-in-2009

I've never liked Wells. This is the first of his books I've been able to force myself to finish. I didn't love it but it was FUNNY! My friends, no doubt smarter and more learned than me, told me the book contained social commentary, that Wells was a socialist with an agenda of showing the superiority of that type of system. Poor Mr. Polly seems to wander around with no aim, his past, with a dead mother and an emotionally absent father provides no support and he stumbles into his future with no c...more

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Jun 19, 2010 Michael rated it 5 of 5 stars

I did this book for 0 level (GCSE). I loved it then and it has stayed with me . Despite all the deeply spiritual and worthy books I have read since I think this one had more influence on my life. A young man out in the countryside on his bike enjoying a sense of freedom having inherited a little money and then quickly getting stuck into a loveless marriage and a job that slowly kills him (as Radiohead would say). Desperate measures lead to an unexpected chance to rebuild his life and for him to...more

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Dec 08, 2009 Caroline Herbert rated it 3 of 5 stars

Now I'm finished with my run through the H.G. Wells canon, ending with one of his non-science fiction stories. The History of Mr. Polly seems to be heavily influenced by Dickens, in that the detail on the wide cast of characters was very entertaining and amusing. The book tells the story of a man who is so depressed he decides to kill himself--the plan doesn't work out the way he hoped, however, and the resulting events actually lead him to make a change and end up happy. The protagonist was ver...more

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Feb 04, 2008 Brian Harmon rated it 5 of 5 stars

I love this book, ive read it twice, and that doesn't happen often.

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Dec 28, 2012 Sue rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: classics, humour, guardian-list, favorites

I enjoyed the book. It descibes the life of a Mr Polly, an unhappy character for most of his life who eventually finds the courage to break free from his mundane existance as a failing shop keeper and unhappy marriage. He becomes quite a unlikely hero as he is a coward at heart and descibes how most of us feel when confronted with difficult choices. It is good for descriptions of the era (Edwardian England) and is has similarities with Three Men in a Boat. There is no sugary happy ending but it...more

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Aug 02, 2011 Alun Williams rated it 3 of 5 stars

This odd but interesting novel,first published in 1910, is a humorous (im)morality tale. Mr Polly is a man who has let life happen to him. Now middle-aged, he feels trapped by his wife's poor housekeeping and his own failing business. The first two thirds of the book detail how he gets to that state. In the last part of the book he breaks free of convention (burning down half the town yet becoming a hero in the process) and finds a new idyllic way of life, though one which he cannot keep unless...more

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Aug 26, 2008 Jukka added it · review of another edition

Shelves: biking-adventures

History of Mr. Polly (1910) - H. G. Wells
Even more biking adventure. H. G. Wells is probably thought of by most as a science fiction writer, but he wrote a wide range of works including a series of social comedies. I was caught completely off guard by this book, it is modern, fast moving and really funny. I love the description of bicycle travel through the British countryside. The plot is captivating, with extraordinary but believable twists, and events that spur moral and social thought.
The ev...more

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Jan 29, 2010 Brandon rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: four, 2010

While there were times when I would be bored with the story or be uninterested, within a few lines I would burst out laughing.
From Polly's vocabulary to his situations, everything had me laughing. This bit of self censorship made me put down the book because I was laughing so hard: "You (unprofitable matter, and printing it might lead to Censorship of Novels) - You know I got a weak chess!"
While some of the story dragged to me, this was definitely better than a lot of novels I read.

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Apr 13, 2012 Esther rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: audio-book, humor, classic

"Life happened to me." Mr. Polly says. In some ways not funny at all, yet in such a half-asleep, bumbling character, a safer way to laugh at ourselves. A slow beginning that only took off at the point Polly took things into his own hands. He's an anti-hero, but one I somehow wanted to succeed - in spite of his lack of character. Is there hope for the mediocre person? I got a laugh out of this book. (The Librivox reader for this book was excellent.)

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May 13, 2009 Manda rated it 5 of 5 stars

This book was written 100 years ago.

It hasn't dated.

I was stunned. Why hadn't I heard of this book before I randomly picked it off the library shelf? Why is it not on all kinds of lists? The style is deceptively simple but the ideas expressed are universal. Mr. Polly is not unique to any one era, he isn't terribly fashionable. That's why he has not dated. He is just as relevent now as he was 100 years ago.

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May 19, 2010 Ian Russell rated it 3 of 5 stars

Having had a voracious appetite for his Sci-fi novels, Mr. Polly came as a surprise. No science at all. It's a funny little tale, though lengthily told. Written in the style of the time, of course, and not too unlike Jerome K. Jerome, I thought, and possibly an antecedent of Reginald Perrin. (Maybe a little Ignatius J. Reilly in the gene pool too but, no, you can go too far with such spurious comparisons).

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Apr 12, 2013 Neil rated it 4 of 5 stars

Lovely book, light hearted, amusing, though to some degree this will depend on whether your funny bone is tickled by lines like

"'Ello Elfred!"

Rather similar to Kipps. I think this one is better, but my brother thinks the opposite.

May get upgraded to five stars when I get round to reading it again.

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Sep 27, 2011 Ronald Barba rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: classics

I've never been a huge fan of Wells (probably because I'm not particularly fond of sci-fi novels), but I enjoyed The History of Mr. Polly. A much more humorous novel from his normal work, this book felt relevant to how I feel essentially every other day: how did I get here doing whatever I'm doing? Where am I heading? Can I just say "fuck it"?

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Dec 29, 2012 Brittney rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: stuff-i-had-to-read-for-school

Absolutely hated this book. This is a book that's meant to act as social commentary, but unless you are intimately familiar with the time period or own a time machine (wink wink nudge nudge) the references don't make any sense and you will most likely miss them. In other words, this does not stand the test of time

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Aug 01, 2011 Janet rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

After fifteen years trapped in a loveless marriage, and a failure in business, Mr Polly sits on a style on a hill overlooking the town and contemplates his life. He decides to end it all in a way that will mean his wife, Miriam, gets the insurance money.

However he fluffs the suicide attempt and inadvertently ends up as a hero. He leaves Miriam and lives happily for some time working as a ‘pot man’ in a pub in Kent. Eventually his conscience gets the better of him, and he returns to Fishbourne to...more

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Feb 27, 2009 Brenda rated it 5 of 5 stars

I was completely caught off-guard by this book.

Not only was it well-written and poignant - it was absolutely hilarious.
And being in the UK while reading it made it that much more enjoyable.

I love Mr. Polly.

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Jun 19, 2009 Bridget rated it 4 of 5 stars

Full of the most wonderful made up language, something I read HG Wells liked to do himself and something I am a big fan of. Mr Polly is a fabulous character you just can't help but like, a good yarn.

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Jan 30, 2013 Steve rated it 4 of 5 stars

This is a great book. H.G. Wells shows he can write more than science fiction. I particularly liked one scene where there was a chase around a house that I think was a tribute to Mark Twain.

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Mar 13, 2009 Christopher rated it 4 of 5 stars

One of HG Well's finest - brilliant lead character and full of Well's increadible descriptions that with few words form such strong mental pictures.

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About H.G. Wells

Herbert George Wells, better known as H. G. Wells, was the third son of a shopkeeper. After two years' apprenticeship in a draper's shop, he became a pupil-teacher at Midhurst Grammar School and won a scholarship to study under T. H. Huxley at the Normal School of Science, South Kensington. He taught biology before becoming a professional writer and journalist.

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“Figures are the most shocking things in the world. The prettiest little squiggles of black looked at in the right light and yet consider the blow they can give you upon the heart.” — 4 people liked it

“…growing a little tiresome on account of some mysterious internal discomfort that the local practitioner diagnosed as imagination” — 3 people liked it

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