Oh shit, I Am Legend

I want to talk for a moment about I Am Legend. No, not the film with Will Smith, but the 1954 novel by Richard Matheson. The film is (allegedly) based on the novel, but if you’re familiar with the movie and not the book, then some explanation may be required (because it was not a great adaptation). Of course, it goes without saying that if you continue reading, expect spoilers (of both novel and film).

The novel details the life of Robert Neville in the years after a pandemic has killed (presumably) the rest of humanity, turning the victims into what amounts to zombies. Incidentally, these zombies conform to the stereotype of a vampire. They are nocturnal, crave the blood of the living, and are averse to garlic, but they are also mindless and inept like a zombie. The book recognizes vampires as works of fiction and folklore, and suggests that perhaps legend gave rise to them after some earlier pandemic (art imitating life). Zombies are never mentioned, this novel was actually the inspiration for the contemporary zombie.

Ok, now this is a post-apocalyptic story where the world ends, not with a bang, but a whimper; Our demise drags on for an agonizingly long time. Early in the pandemic, everyone does their part and life goes on. People go to work, they watch the news, they hope for a breakthrough, and dispose of their dead (before they can resurrect and wreak havoc). As it progresses, there are fewer and fewer survivors. Critical services begin to break down. TV stations go off the air. Again though, all of this happens on the timeline of years. Meanwhile our protagonist spends his days scavenging fuel, and food, and when he encounters a sleeping vampire, he drives a stake through its heart. He does this both as a mercy to the person the vampire used to be, but also to prepare for/enable civilization’s eventual (re)ascendency.

And the story drags on (and on, and on). All the while Neville just keeps going, keeps fighting for the world as he knew it, one free of the vampire scourge. His encounters with other survivors become fewer and fewer, until eventually there are none. He begins to seriously consider whether he might be the last man on earth¹. Yet even through all of the unimaginable loneliness, loss, and dispair, he carries on because he still believes that his world can be fixed.

And then he’s captured, by vampires no less! You see, it turns out there is a correlation between how long a victim was dead before becoming undead, and the degree to which they are mindless and inept. For some —a very small percentage— their resurrection happened quickly enough that they’ve retained their intellect. These vampires have been organizing. Forming a new society. And they’ve come for Neville, the man who visits their homes while they sleep, and drives a stake through their hearts.

It is only in Neville’s final moments that he realizes that for all these years, he was fighting in vain. The world order he knew has been supplanted by a new one, and in this world he is the monster. He is legend.

I have always loved this novel, as it explores so many interesting themes. Loneliness, isolation, and depression. Otherness. Human-caused environmental collapse. However, the twist at the end is the thing that has stayed with me in all of the years since I first read it. This notion that you could be so locked into some idea of how you think things are, or how they should be —of what is right— only to realize that the world as you knew it has changed without your realizing. That you are now other. You are legend.

In the wake of the 2024 Presidential Election, I find myself in one of these I Am Legend moments. We have entered into a new political order, one that will likely be in place for the remainder of my life. This didn’t suddenly happen on November 5, 2024. This has been in the works for a while, all that has changed is my awareness of it. For Neville, there was some relief in his revelation. For him, the world hadn’t in fact ended (even if he was about to), life would go on. For my own part, I only wish I were able move forward with this kind of optimism.