Elements of this book were used to create a nazi cult to which most of the top nazis's were members. But thats not the authors fault, except that he wrote something way ahead of its time. I mean consider the fact that it was written in 1871 and at times i felt like i was watching an episode of startrek. I'd break it down into 3 parts, the start is decent the middle drags a bit as the author goes into too much detail concerning languages and other boring stuff but the last third is great. The main character starts having delusions of grandeur which are quite funny, then finds himself in a deadly if also somewhat amusing state of peril. ( )

Well worth a read. The superior race, the real "terrestrials" who live underground are discovered by a man who is welcomed into their society and learns about their language, religions, social structure, politics, achievements, history, sex, and death. I found myself wondering what the Anas did regarding differing aspects of living and Bulwer-Lytton seemed to answer all my thoughts! I believe my reading of many H G Wells' stories before I read this helped as it followed the same sort of structure as a Wells story, and was set in the same time as most Wells' stories. I was very glad to have read this and glad it had a happy ending too - for the protagonist (though bleak for our humankind survival). ( )

SUPER BOVRIL

Published anonymously in 1871 this novel follows in the traditions of a hollow earth theory already explored in [Niels Klim's Journey Under the ground] in 1741 and [Symzonia] in 1820. Like the previous two novels the protagonist describes a utopian society living someway below the earths surface, which is hollowed out and contains it's own atmosphere. Jules Verne also described a hollowed out earth in his Journey to the Centre of the earth (1864) but his hero's did not encounter any utopian societies. As in the previous two utopian novels the book is a first person account by a man who penetrates beneath the surface of the Earth and discovers a race of humanoids (the Vril-ya). Their life style, culture and society is one of harmony and ease compared with the life on the surface of the earth, but of course utopia is not for everyone and like the hero's of the previous books our man risks his life to get back to the civilization that he knows.

Bulwer-Lytton spends most of his energies describing the society of the Vril-ya. There are 29 chapters and the first five describe the circumstances of the narrators descent and reception by the Vril-ya and it is not until chapter 25 that the story starts up again with the narrator planning his escape. This is not an adventure novel, but a description of a utopian society and although the narrator is never entirely comfortable, for the most part he is on a voyage of discovery. He cannot of course help but compare his own society (he is an American by birth) with what he finds in the underground world. In this respect it is quite similar to Thomas More's Utopia from the early sixteenth century, but the difference here is the substance from which the race takes it's name: vril. It strikes the narrator as being like electricity, but in the form of an all permeating liquid that can do almost anything once properly handled and understood. It lights the underworld, it provides power, it can be harnessed as a death ray by almost anybody, it powers airboats, and individual wings for flight, it runs the automatons that do much of the menial work, it heals and cures, and gives the powers of mind reading and telepathy. This unique substance has enabled the Vril-ya to become masters of their environment and has taken away the need for striving and competition. There is no need for war, there is no crime and the city is run for the benefit of all, with the motto of

"A poor man's need is a rich man's shame"

However our narrator is not convinced:

"I longed for a change, even to winter, or storm, or darkness. I began to feel that, whatever our dreams of perfectibility, our restless aspirations towards a better, and higher, and calmer, sphere of being, we, the mortals of the upper world, are not trained or fitted to enjoy for long the very happiness of which we dream or to which we aspire."

Generally speaking the females are better at controlling the Vril and they have developed into the most powerful sex, but choose to live in harmony with the males. The females make all the moves in choosing a mate, but once married they settle into domesticity and hang up their wings. Much of the energy in the society comes from a youth culture dominated by the females.

Bulwer-lytton paints the society as completely alien to the surface world with the threat once mentioned by the Vril-ya almost in passing that when the time is right they will go up to the surface. The narrator sees a coldness behind the harmony of the Vril-ya and is in no doubt that they see themselves as the master race. His unease even when he is shown kindness and friendship keeps the reader in suspense for what may happen. The majority of the book is however a description of an alien culture, and Bulwer-Lytton seems to be indulging his own interests when he spends a chapter on the development of their language. This may be fascinating to those readers interested in linguistics, but for others that want to get on with the story then it might feel a bit like a cul-de-sac. The story does eventually pick up and the uneasiness felt by the narrator is well justified, but of course we know that he lived to tell his tale. This short novel does have its longueurs, but it is well written and deserves its place in the canon of proto science fiction. It was quite popular in the nineteenth century and the word vril became associated with life giving elixirs. There was a Vril-ya Bazaar held at the Royal Albert Hall in 1891. 3.5 stars (I prefer Marmite) ( )

LA RAZA VENIDERA

La Raza venidera es una obra maestra de la sátira
utópica y un extraordinario logro de la imaginación
profética. Anticipa con extraordinaria precisión el moderno
surgimiento de la mujer, los desarrollos de la
energía nuclear y la tecnología láser, y los terribles
genocidios étnicos que llevarían a cabo pretendidas
razas superiores. Una de las primeras novelas de
ciencia ficción de la literatura inglesa.

«En La Raza venidera, lord Lytton representa a un
vulgar hombre de nuestro tiempo atrapado por
accidente en un país subterráneo habitado por una raza
varios cientos de años por delante de nosotros en la
evolución. Y, esta teoría de la evolución, introduce
algo así como un método científico en la novela
moderna.»

George Bernard Shaw

«Hace ya bastante tiempo que hemos aprendido a
reverenciar el fino intelecto de Bulwer. Podemos coger
una cualquiera de las producciones de su pluma con
la seguridad de que, al leerla, las más salvajes pasiones
de nuestra naturaleza, nuestros más profundos
pensamientos, las más brillantes visiones de nuestra
fantasía y las más ennoblecedoras y elevadas de nuestras
aspiraciones serán, a su debido turno, encendidas en
nuestro interior.»

Edgar Allan Poe

LA RAZA FUTURA

La novela La Raza Futura, cuya traducción al castellano
ofrecemos a nuestros lectores, es una exploración
del porvenir; tanto más sorprendente cuanto
fue escrita en 1871, en una época en que la ciencia,
la mecánica y la electricidad se encontraban
en un estado casi embrionario. Lord Lytton
se revela como escritor de clara intuición, rayana
en clarividencia; de otra manera no hubiera
podido desplegar ante el lector un panorama del
desenvolvimiento humano tan avanzado; el cual,
si cuando escribió la obra pudo considerarse
como fantasía irrealizable, hoy, ante los progresos
de las ciencias, de la mecánica, de la electricidad
aplicada y, sobre todo, de la aeronáutica, nos
ha de parecer no sólo realizable, sino en curso
de realización.

El hecho mismo de situar en el centro
de la tierra el escenario y el medio ambiente
del relato es, en clerto modo, simbólico;
parece como si el autor quisiera indicar
que la humanidad, para alcanzar el grado de
perfección de la raza futura y más avanzada,
cuyo cuadro nos presenta, tendrá que adentrarse
más en sí misma.