The Invisible Man

The Invisible Man is a science fiction novel by the English writer H. G. Wells, first published in 1897. It centers on Griffin, a brilliant but reckless scientist who has discovered a method of altering a body's refractive index to render it invisible, and who, having used the technique on himself, arrives at a rural English inn in the village of Iping wrapped from head to foot in bandages, dark glasses and heavy clothing in a desperate attempt to conceal his condition and reverse it. As the invisible and increasingly unstable Griffin is exposed and driven from Iping, the novel recounts, largely through his own later confession to a former medical school acquaintance, Dr. Kemp, how his invisibility, intended as a triumph of scientific discovery, has instead left him unable to eat in public, unable to move undetected in cold or rain, and dangerously isolated from other people, driving him toward theft, violence, and finally a self-declared reign of terror over the surrounding countryside as he tries to force Kemp into becoming his confederate. Kemp instead alerts the authorities, and the novel ends with Griffin hunted down and beaten to death by a mob, his invisibility vanishing at the moment of his death to reveal an ordinary, defeated human body. Notable for its early and influential exploration of the psychological cost and moral corruption that unchecked scientific power can bring on its possessor, the novel has remained one of the most frequently adapted of Wells's scientific romances and helped establish invisibility as a recurring subject of speculative fiction.