Earth Abides - George R Stewart

Why I had not heard of this author prior to reading this novel amazes me.  When I googled it and checked out the forums it seems a lot of people did it at school in their English Literature Classes.  Why could I have not gone to one of those schools!  I had to do Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare!!

The godfather of the modern disaster movie, George R Stewart is famous for his novels such as Fire and Flood where the disaster is the central character.  However with Earth Abides, written in 1949, he has written an enduring post apocolyptic tale of survival and hope for mankind.

The inspiration for Stephen King’s The Stand I could see many parallels but rather than a supernatural tale what we have here is a matter of fact chronicle of what will happen when man loses his footprint on the Earth. The central character Isherwood Williams is a post graduate Geography student, recovering from a snake bite he obtained whilst taking a break in the mountains, when a plague decimates most of the world’s population. 

The novel spans through Ish’s lifetime as he comes to terms with the loss of his family, civilization and learning.  As nature recovers from Man’s dominance, those that are left find that rather than trying to reclaim civilization they slip back to a simple laid back existence, scavenging from the supermarkets and clothes stores. Relationships are formed and children are born and Ish becomes more of a tribal leader, much revered due to his learning but also a figure of awe who is rarely seen without the hammer that he had found in the mountains (and which becomes a symbol of superstition for the younger members of the tribe).

The University Library is taboo, and Ish’s last link to his life as a student, but as he grows older he realises that studious learning is no longer important. Practical knowledge of  how to hunt without bullets and how to make fire without matches are the only way to survival as the last links of civilization rust away or are burned to the ground.  Ish was lucky in a way that he still had his books, as you have to wonder with the advent of electronic resources and with book stores now closing their doors what would there be left if such a plague took place is our distant future?

Jake: Thank you so much for recommending this novel to me, I enjoyed every word.