I Am Legend (S.F. Masterworks)

Product Details

Author : Richard Matheson
Binding : Paperback
EAN : 9781857988093
Edition : New Ed
Number of Pages : 160
Product Group : Book
Publication Date : 1999-01-21
Publisher : Gollancz

ASIN : 1857988094

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review

It seems strange to find a 1954 vampire novel in Millennium's "SF Masterworks" classic reprints series. I Am Legend, though, was a trailblazing and later much imitated story that reinvented the vampire myth as SF. Without losing the horror, it presents vampirism as a disease whose secrets can be unlocked by scientific tools. The hero Robert Neville, perhaps the last uninfected man on Earth, finds himself in a paranoid nightmare. By night, the bloodthirsty undead of small-town America besiege his barricaded house: their repeated cry "Come out, Neville!" is a famous SF catchphrase. By day, when they hide in shadow and become comatose, Neville gets out his wooden stakes for an orgy of slaughter. He also discovers pseudoscientific explanations, some rather strained, for vampires' fear of light, vulnerability to stakes though not bullets, loathing of garlic, and so on. What gives the story its uneasy power is the gradual perspective shift which shows that by fighting monsters Neville is himself becoming monstrous--not a vampire but something to terrify vampires and haunt their dreams as a dreadful legend from the bad old days. I Am Legend was altered out of recognition when filmed as The Omega Man (1971), starring Charlton Heston. Avoid the movie; read the book. --David Langford

Customer Reviews

Superb. (2008-09-17)

Justifying killing - or trying to - is a more pointed argument when taken in the individual; governments cloud the simplicity with rhetoric, propoganda and patriotism; but, keep the numbers down and the subject is raw and demanding attention.Matheson strips the numbers down to one in this book, and one has no problem in coming down on the side of Robert Neville - the book's lead, and almost only, character.One feels his panic when he discovers his watch has stopped and cannot get back to his safe-house before sun-down; and when he smacks his car into a crowd of Vampires like a macarbre game of skittles, one feels his elation. Matheson recruits the reader from the outset and the reader becomes an observer, living one dimension down from the physical earthbound, able to see and hear all he does - even hear his thoughts - yet is unable to intervene or advise, and that gives the work more power. It frustrates the reader; but Matheson, after sucking the reader in, turns the tables on Neville and strips him of all the moral altitude he has taken for himself, and plunges him into the role of bad guy, of the hated terrorist, and makes him an outsider, a pariah.Matheson has no mercy for his protaganist.I have read short stories of greater length than this novel, and the prose is thin, which is not to say it is bad, but it deals only with the here and now of the story; back-story and poetic flourishes in the prose are kept to a minimum as far as the former go, and are non-existent for the latter. It makes for a story where 99 per cent is action in the present tense, and the book could be read in one sitting, I think.This is considered a classic of genre fiction, and rightly so.

A VERY QUICK READ! (2008-09-16)

I just couldn't put this down and it isn't typical of my preferred reading. I was completely drawn in as soon as I started it and my life went on hold until I finished it.A very enthralling book

Classic. (2008-09-13)

A highly readable classic. There is little I can add to what has been said previously. The most faithful adaption is Vincent Price's 'The Last Man on Earth'. Do yourself a favour and read this book, even if you have seen the recent film. Recommended!

5/5 Not my typical read (2008-08-18)

I read this short book after seeing all the reviews (thank you) and thought I must give it a go. I have tried lots of 'horror' novels over the years and they have never really engaged me. I read this over two evenings and found it totally absorbed me. The text races along wonderfully. This is not my typical read - favourite books include: Papillon, Hamlet, Great Gatsby, To Kill a Mockingbird, Grapes of Wrath and The Old Man and the Sea. I assume it is because having read them they stay with you and insist on being read again. Though my wife prefers to suggest I am simply a bit weird. As for the new 'Mr Smith' film, which I enjoyed, they follow the same theme but to compare them would be like comparing a Mars Bar and a Snickers (I still prefer to call them Marathon).Not sure how helpful my waffling will be but having been persuaded to read this after all the positive feedback I felt I should add something myself. I am sure this book will in time insist on being read again.

Hair raisingingly good stuff (2008-08-03)

This is a brilliant book, that manages to transcend the boundaries of Science Fiction or Horror genres. It was way ahead of its time.I think its impact is down to its focus- rather than a overblown description of a post-apocalyptic world where everyone has turned into vampires, it concentrates on the experience of one man. You feel the claustrophobia of Neville as he shuts himself in his house every night, and you sympathise with his loneliness as the last normal man on earth. Even if you're not someone who normally enjoys SF books, this is so well written you can't help but love it.The ending was so good it made all the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. This isn't just a SF classic, it deserves to be an all-time classic novel.

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