I first read Earth Abides when I was a teenager. Science fiction was my passion, and this was one of the books that you had to read. If you considered yourself a serious SF fan, Dune, Stranger in a Strange Land, City, More Than Human, the Foundation Trilogy, Childhood’s End, were on the mandatory reading list.
I loved Earth Abides then. It opened my eyes to the potential horrors and possibilities of the future. It’s an apocalyptic novel, in which most of humanity perishes from an infectious disease. In the seventies we were more afraid of nuclear holocaust. Both are terrifying scenarios.
I read Earth Abides again when I was in my forties. This time the novel failed to engage me so deeply. I was bound up in the confines of civilized life at the time. Raising children, working a demanding job, exploring the potentials of electronic communication with computers.
I was also reading a lot of hard horror writers like Edward Lee, Jack Ketchum, Brian Keene, and Richard Laymon. There’s certainly nothing wrong with these authors, but Earth Abides is much larger in scope. It’s an epic novel that feels like reading mythology.
Now here I am, two months away from my sixty-fifth birthday. I’m not as caught up in the treacherous tendrils of society.
This time Earth Abides struck me in a primal area of my brain. It was less like reading a novel for entertainment than poring over verses in a religious text. I had around thirty pages to the end last night, and I wanted to finish reading the book, but I couldn't bring myself to continue on. That final chapter isn’t, for me at least, late night bedtime reading. I picked it back up this morning, outside, which felt appropriate.
Earth Abides begins with loner intellectual Isherwood Williams on a camping trip. He is bitten by a rattlesnake, but luckily he has antivenom in his cabin. He has a few nights of intense sickness, more than seems normal for a treated snakebite. His fever eventually breaks and he returns to civilization, only to find it’s no longer there.
An epidemic has decimated most of the population. Many initial survivors quickly follow, due to madness or helplessness. Ish takes to the road, hoping to find other people.
Ish eventually settles and after meeting numerous individuals he doesn’t wish to spend his life with, he finds a lone woman, Em. Em is strong, capable, and most importantly, calm. Between the two of them, and a few other decent people who join them, a new world begins to grow.
It’s not always easy to like Ish. He’s a bit of a pedant and he possesses a sense of superiority to those who do not share his intellectual curiosity.
In addition to that, Ish makes several racially inappropriate remarks. Let me elaborate upon that. Ish never has any truly hateful thoughts. It’s more like the kind of reflexive attitudes that were so pervasive in the mid-nineteenth century. Earth Abides was first published in 1949. Ish treats everyone with fairness and only readers are privy to his private thoughts.
More importantly, we do not realize until near the end of Earth Abides that Em is Black. Her race is never brought up, nor does it have any bearing in her relations with the other characters. In fact, Em is regarded as the strength of the survivor group. Ish never fails to point out that Em is far smarter and more courageous than he could ever be. Her race is only mentioned when she draws a parallel between the survivor group and her African ancestors.
Ish is far from perfect, but he tries to do the best he can in regard to his beliefs. Ish’s curiosity never dims. He reveres a local library. Books are sacred things, reminders of centuries of knowledge of the human race. If Ish has a church, it's there among the books.
He is a thinker, a ponderer, not a doer. Ish is constantly reminded of his inferiority in practical matters. Yet he has contemptuous thoughts about others in his extended family. An intellect, he is vastly superior to a carpenter or a farmer. Or so he tells himself.
Tell the truth: haven't you harbored condescending thoughts of superiority to the illiterate people around you? The ones who don’t read books or pursue mentally challenging tasks?
Years pass. The survivors adapt at their own pace. Children are born and grow, while Ish grows frustrated at their lack of desire to learn the lessons of history. As the old song goes, they are immune to our consultations.
We talk, instruct, and kids politely listen. Or impolitely listen, and then they go about their lives as they wish. For the most part they will follow the path of least resistance. They will figure out the things they need to know as problems arise. Same as it ever was.
Early on, Ish finds a hammer and begins to carry it everywhere with him. It’s a tool, yes, but also a lucky piece. A lucky charm from one who disdains superstition. Like most of us, Ish is a creature of contradictions.
The hammer is a central image in Earth Abides. It represents the rebirth of humanity. It also becomes a talismanic object in the eyes of the young people. A sacred symbol of power from a mythical land of gods called America. The hammer is both feared and respected.
The group grows over the years. They experience joy and they endure tragedy. A decade older than Ish, Em passes on, leaving a hole in his life than can never be filled. Memories fade as Ish grows older, with only one possible destination ahead of him. His final thoughts are of the majesty of the Earth. He feels greater kinship to it than his family, because only he and the hills, the mountains, the waters, were there when man’s civilization held the world in its grip.
Isherwood Williams, a decent man who tried, and yes, accomplished a lot of good things in the new world. He was the last American, and like the Richard Matheson novel I recently re-read, he became a being of folklore, a legend.
Tears in my eyes, I finished Earth Abides this morning. In my yard, the earth under my feet. The soil to which I will return in fewer days than I’d like. I felt different, bigger, and yet also somehow smaller. Earth Abides filled me with overwhelming thoughts and feelings. Very few books have that kind of power.
Men come and go, but earth abides.
Written by Mark Sieber
I loved Earth Abides then. It opened my eyes to the potential horrors and possibilities of the future. It’s an apocalyptic novel, in which most of humanity perishes from an infectious disease. In the seventies we were more afraid of nuclear holocaust. Both are terrifying scenarios.
I read Earth Abides again when I was in my forties. This time the novel failed to engage me so deeply. I was bound up in the confines of civilized life at the time. Raising children, working a demanding job, exploring the potentials of electronic communication with computers.
I was also reading a lot of hard horror writers like Edward Lee, Jack Ketchum, Brian Keene, and Richard Laymon. There’s certainly nothing wrong with these authors, but Earth Abides is much larger in scope. It’s an epic novel that feels like reading mythology.
Now here I am, two months away from my sixty-fifth birthday. I’m not as caught up in the treacherous tendrils of society.
This time Earth Abides struck me in a primal area of my brain. It was less like reading a novel for entertainment than poring over verses in a religious text. I had around thirty pages to the end last night, and I wanted to finish reading the book, but I couldn't bring myself to continue on. That final chapter isn’t, for me at least, late night bedtime reading. I picked it back up this morning, outside, which felt appropriate.
Earth Abides begins with loner intellectual Isherwood Williams on a camping trip. He is bitten by a rattlesnake, but luckily he has antivenom in his cabin. He has a few nights of intense sickness, more than seems normal for a treated snakebite. His fever eventually breaks and he returns to civilization, only to find it’s no longer there.An epidemic has decimated most of the population. Many initial survivors quickly follow, due to madness or helplessness. Ish takes to the road, hoping to find other people.
Ish eventually settles and after meeting numerous individuals he doesn’t wish to spend his life with, he finds a lone woman, Em. Em is strong, capable, and most importantly, calm. Between the two of them, and a few other decent people who join them, a new world begins to grow.
It’s not always easy to like Ish. He’s a bit of a pedant and he possesses a sense of superiority to those who do not share his intellectual curiosity.
In addition to that, Ish makes several racially inappropriate remarks. Let me elaborate upon that. Ish never has any truly hateful thoughts. It’s more like the kind of reflexive attitudes that were so pervasive in the mid-nineteenth century. Earth Abides was first published in 1949. Ish treats everyone with fairness and only readers are privy to his private thoughts.
More importantly, we do not realize until near the end of Earth Abides that Em is Black. Her race is never brought up, nor does it have any bearing in her relations with the other characters. In fact, Em is regarded as the strength of the survivor group. Ish never fails to point out that Em is far smarter and more courageous than he could ever be. Her race is only mentioned when she draws a parallel between the survivor group and her African ancestors.
Ish is far from perfect, but he tries to do the best he can in regard to his beliefs. Ish’s curiosity never dims. He reveres a local library. Books are sacred things, reminders of centuries of knowledge of the human race. If Ish has a church, it's there among the books.
He is a thinker, a ponderer, not a doer. Ish is constantly reminded of his inferiority in practical matters. Yet he has contemptuous thoughts about others in his extended family. An intellect, he is vastly superior to a carpenter or a farmer. Or so he tells himself.
Tell the truth: haven't you harbored condescending thoughts of superiority to the illiterate people around you? The ones who don’t read books or pursue mentally challenging tasks?
Years pass. The survivors adapt at their own pace. Children are born and grow, while Ish grows frustrated at their lack of desire to learn the lessons of history. As the old song goes, they are immune to our consultations.
We talk, instruct, and kids politely listen. Or impolitely listen, and then they go about their lives as they wish. For the most part they will follow the path of least resistance. They will figure out the things they need to know as problems arise. Same as it ever was.
Early on, Ish finds a hammer and begins to carry it everywhere with him. It’s a tool, yes, but also a lucky piece. A lucky charm from one who disdains superstition. Like most of us, Ish is a creature of contradictions.
The hammer is a central image in Earth Abides. It represents the rebirth of humanity. It also becomes a talismanic object in the eyes of the young people. A sacred symbol of power from a mythical land of gods called America. The hammer is both feared and respected.
The group grows over the years. They experience joy and they endure tragedy. A decade older than Ish, Em passes on, leaving a hole in his life than can never be filled. Memories fade as Ish grows older, with only one possible destination ahead of him. His final thoughts are of the majesty of the Earth. He feels greater kinship to it than his family, because only he and the hills, the mountains, the waters, were there when man’s civilization held the world in its grip.
Isherwood Williams, a decent man who tried, and yes, accomplished a lot of good things in the new world. He was the last American, and like the Richard Matheson novel I recently re-read, he became a being of folklore, a legend.
Tears in my eyes, I finished Earth Abides this morning. In my yard, the earth under my feet. The soil to which I will return in fewer days than I’d like. I felt different, bigger, and yet also somehow smaller. Earth Abides filled me with overwhelming thoughts and feelings. Very few books have that kind of power.
Men come and go, but earth abides.
Written by Mark Sieber
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