HOW TO RELAX WITH YOUR VAMPIRE FRIENDS AT PARTIES

I’m currently reading Richard Matheson’s 1954 novel “I Am Legend”. You know, it’s the one about an everyday joe (read as “lantern-jawed survivalist tough guy”) who is the last surviving man on earth after all the other people have rather unhappily turned into vampires. So by day he drives around an eerie, abandoned LA scavenging for useful stuff, and by night he hunkers down in his heavily fortified suburban homestead, fighting the unstoppable armies of the undead. It’s pretty good post-apocalyptic fun, as you might expect, though nothing earth-shattering.

The most interesting bits are the occasional moments where our protagonist appears to doubt the reality of his situation, perceiving for a second that he is actually playing a role in some pulpy, not-entirely-sensible fiction;

“Driving slowly to Sears, he tried to forget by wondering why it was only wooden stakes that should work.
He frowned as he drove along the empty boulevard, the only sound the muted growling of the motor of his car. It seems fantastic that it had taken him five months to start wondering about it.
Which brought another question to mind. How was it that he always managed to hit the heart? It had to be the heart; Dr. Busch had said so. Yet he, Neville, had no anatomical knowledge.
His brow furrowed. It irritated him that he should have gone through this hideous process so long without stopping once to question it.
[….]
Robert Neville compressed his lips suddenly. Forget it, he told himself; you’re not ready yet. The time would come when he’d take a crack at it, detail for detail, but the time wasn’t now. There were enough things to worry about now.

After lunch, he went from house to house and used up all his stakes. He had forty seven stakes.”

Maybe it’s a sign of how far “I Am Legend”s somewhat… blunt… writing style differs from the rather more ‘proper’ literature I’ve been reading in recent years that that last paragraph made me laugh so hard on the train home from work I attracted funny looks from fellow passengers. “He had forty seven stakes” – genius!

Also of note in the book is that classic motif of sci-fi / horror fiction… barely concealed real world anguish masquerading as metaphorical monster-threat! Take for example this little rumination from thinkin’ man Robert Neville;

“Really now, search your soul – is the vampire so bad?
All he does is drink blood. Why, then, this unkind prejudice? Why cannot the vampire live where he chooses? Why must he seek out hiding places where none can find him out? Why do you wish him destroyed? Ah, see, you have turned the poor guileless innocent into a hunted animal. He has no means of support, no measures for proper education, he has not the voting franchise. No wonder he is compelled to seek out a predatory nocturnal existence.
Robert Neville grunted a surly grunt. Sure, sure, he thought, but would you let your sister marry one?
He shrugged. You got me there, buddy, you got me there.”

Nervous, pre-Civil Rights Movement laughter all round. All in good fun until a few pages later when Neville is again feeling the heat of the vampire onslaught;

“He sank down on the couch and sat there, shaking his head slowly. It was no use; they’d beaten him! The black bastards had beaten him!”

Oh dear.

Linguistic subtlety isn’t Richard Matheson’s strong suit, that’s for sure.

Some interesting choices of words here, as a drunken and desperate Neville tries to ignore the lures of the vampire ladies outside his door;

“The women, the lustful, blood-thirsty, naked, wanton women flaunting their hot bodies at him! No, not hot.
A shuddering whine wrenched up through his chest and throat. Goddamn them, what were they waiting for? Did they think he was going to come out and hand himself over?
Maybe I am, maybe I am. He actually found himself jerking off the crossbar from the door. Coming, girls, I’m coming!”

Blimey.

I should point out that I know ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about Richard Matheson’s personality and lifestyle, and as such, he could well have been a cool cat testing the limits of what his editor would let him get away with and poking fun at the hang-ups of uptight skiffy fans. But it’s also easy to picture him sitting alone at home in Compton back in 1954, banging out his vampire sci-fi masterwork, grinding his teeth in sexual frustration and stealing frightened glances at the coloured folks moving in next door. Possibly pausing to “grunt a surly grunt”.

We shouldn’t mock though. Such raving neuroses and purple prose are of course the very bedrock of macabre fiction, as aptly demonstrated by the work of the master himself, H.P. Lovecraft. It is often my contention when discussing such things that effective horror stories/movies/music are rarely produced by reasonable, happy people, and despite it’s crude prose style, “I Am Legend” certainly succeeds as a ripping good yarn, and one which eventually spends far more time examining the psychosis, loneliness and alcoholism of it’s protagonist in a relentlessly hard-boiled pre-Bukowski/Selby Jr fashion than it does on hair-raising vampire shenanigans.

As you may be aware, the book was used very loosely as the basis for the 1971 movie “The Omega Man”, which ditched the vampires and instead concentrated on Charlton Heston wondering around picking fights with some radioactive mutants, or something. Nice one Hollywood. It has also come to my attention that a new adaptation of the book, using the original title, is due for release next year, starring…. Will Smith. Well fancy that.

Labels: books, I Am Legend, Richard Matheson