Author. Although he is primarily remembered as a science fiction writer, he wrote prolifically in a great many other genres as well. His lifelong love of literature was said to have started when he was seven years old and broke his leg after being dropped onto a tent peg at a local sports ground. While he was recovering, he spent a lot of time reading and became inspired to become a writer himself. His schooling came to an end in 1877 when his father Joseph fractured his thigh, which ended his erratic career as a cricketeer. His father's day job was that of a shopkeeper, but that didn't make enough money for the family to get by very well. Young H.G. had no choice but to seek work as an apprentice to help to support the family. From 1881 till 1883 he apprenticed at the Southsea Drapery Emporium, but he did not find it a pleasant experience and eventually quit. He also found no success or happiness when he apprenticed as a chemist and later as a teacher's assistant. In 1883, after being fired, he found work as an assistant teacher in West Sussex at the Midhurst Grammar School. Wells stayed in this position until he won a scholarship to the Normal School of Science and was able to begin his education again. He chose to study biology at the college, and remained there until 1887. His extracurricular activities at the college included being one of the co-founders of 'The Science School Journal' and being a member of the Debating Society. However, he ended up losing his scholarship in 1887 because he couldn't pass his geology exams, in spite of being a brilliant student in all of his other subjects. Wells moved in with his aunt Mary Wells shortly after losing his scholarship and housing, and in 1891 married her daughter Isabel, who was also his first cousin. However, three years later he left her for Amy Catherine Robbins, one of his students at the University Correspondence College, whom he married in 1895. With Robbins, he had two children, George Philip ("Gip"), born in 1901, and Frank Richard, born in 1903. Wells also went on to become the father of at least two confirmed illegitimate children as the result of the numerous affairs he had during his second marriage. In 1909 he had a daughter, Anna-Jane, with the writer Amber Reeves, and in 1914, he had a third son, Anthony, with the writer Rebecca West. During these years, Wells had also started to publish his writing. Among his many novels include 'The War of the Worlds' (1898), 'The Time Machine' (1895), 'The Island of Doctor Moreau' (1896), 'The Invisible Man' (1897), 'Tono-Bungay' (1909), 'The World Set Free' (1914), 'The Shape of Things to Come' (1933), and 'The Holy Terror' (1939). Wells also wrote numerous novellas, articles, essays, short stories, and non-fiction books. Many of his writings reflected his Utopian and Fabian Socialist beliefs. While serving as president of the International PEN (Poets, Playwrights, Essayists, Novelists), a group which was founded in 1921, he had personally overseen the expulsion of the German branch of the organization from the master organization in 1934, because Germany's PEN had begun refusing to let non-Aryan writers join the group. In response to this, and because he was also a Socialist, Wells's name was near the top of a Nazi-compiled list of politicians and intellectuals scheduled to be killed immediately after the German invasion of England in the aborted Operation Sea Lion. His books were also banned and burned in Germany. Unlike many of the other people living in London during World War II, Wells did not flee to the countryside to escape the Luftwaffe's Blitz warfare. He died quietly at home a month before his eightieth birthday. He was cremated at Golders Green Crematorium, Golders Green, London.