IT "was like the working of a Wellsian time machine," wrote Henry R. Luce. "I found myself living in the year 1923. It all seemed to be as real and immediate as today's newspaper."

The editorial chairman of Time Inc. wrote those lines last winter, shortly before his death, in an introduction to the first issue in a new series of books being published by TIME-LIFE Books. They are called TIME CAPSULES, and each issue covers a year of TIME, excerpting the original stories. The words, except for forewords and a few connecting passages, are those of TIME, reflecting the flavor, the attitudes, the state of knowledge of the day -- sometimes innocent, sometimes opinionated, sometimes prescient, sometimes wrong but very often right. The first four CAPSULES, for 1923, 1929, 1941 and 1950, will go on sale this week in book stores, variety stores and newsstands for $1.65 each in quality soft cover.

The cast of characters begins in 1923 with Charlie Chaplin and Warren G. Harding, and marches on in these four issues through years in which the figures on center stage range from Herbert Hoover to Booth Tarkington to Clara Bow, from Joe Louis to Adolf Hitler to Virginia Woolf, from Douglas MacArthur to Joe McCarthy to George Orwell. Each issue becomes a history of its year, not only tracing the overriding central themes -- the Roaring Twenties, the Great Depression, World War II, the Korean War -- but also providing vignettes that help bring people alive.

There is Calvin Coolidge, in September 1923, delivering himself of a characteristically terse remark when a U.S. Treasury Department aide brings his first salary check as President of the U.S.: "Call often." And George Bernard Shaw, in December of that year, responding to a request for his sentiment of the season: "Santa Claus be blowed!" Winston Churchill's scornful one-word description of Britain's postwar Labor Government: "Queuetopia." And President Harry Truman, in December 1950, writing to the music critic who had panned his daughter Margaret's singing: "Some day I hope to meet you. When that happens you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below."

These volumes will strike a strong nostalgic note for people who lived through those times. For the young, they will provide a lively new insight into events and personalities that shaped recent history. While the historical aspect of these CAPSULES -- and those covering other years, which will be issued in coming months -- is surely significant, it was not this side of the books that most fascinated Editor Luce. "The point," he wrote, "is to take a ride in the TIME-machine and have fun."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.