The book was translated into Dutch in 1873 and into German in 1897.
Butler wrote to Charles Darwin to explain what he meant by the "Book
of the Machines": "I am sincerely sorry that some of the critics
should have thought I was laughing at your theory, a thing which I
never meant to do and should be shocked at having done." Soon after
this Butler was invited to Down and paid two visits to Mr. Darwin
there; he thus became acquainted with all the family and for some
years was on intimate terms with Mr. (now Sir) Francis Darwin.
It is easy to see by the light of subsequent events that we should
probably have had something not unlike Erewhon sooner or later, even
without the Russian lady and Sir F. N. Broome, to whose promptings,
owing to a certain diffidence which never left him, he was perhaps
inclined to attribute too much importance. But he would not have
agreed with this view at the time; he looked upon himself as a
painter and upon Erewhon as an interruption. It had come, like one
of those creatures from the Land of the Unborn, pestering him and
refusing to leave him at peace until he consented to give it bodily
shape.
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