Post by edwin on Nov 10, 2011 8:50:11 GMT
I have placed this post here because it is really about current attitudes.
First of all I have to say that no criticism is intended of anyone writing in the Zombie genre, in fact I am full of admiration for someone who can actually finish and produce a book that other people want to read which Is more than I have done!
Why the popularity if the Zombie as the "other" in PA scenarios? I would suggest that nowadays there is no safe "other" than the zombie. Dennis Wheatley in Black August had the "communist" working classes as the other, in After London Richard Jefferies has Gypsies, Welsh and Irish insurgents. More recently John Wyndham used walking stinging plants which, although a brilliant book, was the other sort of cop-out. I won't name them but some American authors got there rioting mobs from the Afro-Caribbean population or Bikers.
Dangerous as they might be in fiction, the zombie is safe. You can castigate them all you like and kill them in any ingenious way possible but no Zombie Rights organisation is going to sue you or picket your house (now there is an idea for a story!).
This is what makes the book I am Legend by Richard Matheson so great in that the twist is (SPOILER............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................)
that the proper human being becomes the villain to the vampire/zombies he is trying to cleanse.
First of all I have to say that no criticism is intended of anyone writing in the Zombie genre, in fact I am full of admiration for someone who can actually finish and produce a book that other people want to read which Is more than I have done!
Why the popularity if the Zombie as the "other" in PA scenarios? I would suggest that nowadays there is no safe "other" than the zombie. Dennis Wheatley in Black August had the "communist" working classes as the other, in After London Richard Jefferies has Gypsies, Welsh and Irish insurgents. More recently John Wyndham used walking stinging plants which, although a brilliant book, was the other sort of cop-out. I won't name them but some American authors got there rioting mobs from the Afro-Caribbean population or Bikers.
Dangerous as they might be in fiction, the zombie is safe. You can castigate them all you like and kill them in any ingenious way possible but no Zombie Rights organisation is going to sue you or picket your house (now there is an idea for a story!).
This is what makes the book I am Legend by Richard Matheson so great in that the twist is (SPOILER............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................)
that the proper human being becomes the villain to the vampire/zombies he is trying to cleanse.
