Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
"Earth Abides" is a post-apocalyptic novel by George R. Stewart that explores the themes of survival, civilization, and the passage of time. The story follows Ish Williams, a young geography graduate student who survives a global pandemic that wipes out humanity while he is incapacitated due to a rattlesnake bite. Upon emerging from isolation, Ish discovers abandoned towns and signs of devastation across the United States. As he navigates this new world, he finds a few fellow survivors but ultimately chooses to return to Berkeley, where he lives a solitary life with only a dog for company.
Eventually, Ish meets Em, and they form a family, becoming leaders of a small tribe that grows around them. As time passes, Ish witnesses the gradual decline of the remnants of modern infrastructure, with society regressing into simpler, more primitive ways of living. Despite his attempts to educate the younger generation about the lost civilization, they fail to grasp the significance of his knowledge. The novel culminates in Ish’s old age, where he reflects on the cyclical nature of life and the enduring presence of the Earth, ultimately finding solace in the idea that while humanity may rise and fall, the Earth remains constant.
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Earth Abides
First published: 1949
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Science fiction—post-holocaust
Time of work: Approximately 1950 to 2000
Locale: Berkeley, California
The Plot
On a field expedition, Ish Williams, a young graduate student of geography, is bitten by a rattlesnake. He lies near death in a cabin, unaware that a virus is wiping out humanity. When he finally staggers down from the mountains, he finds deserted towns, empty highways, dead bodies, looted stores, and other signs of an incredible disaster. He is unable to make any telephone or radio contact. Old newspapers tell of the plague ravaging every continent. He believes that the rattlesnake venom in his system must have counteracted the virus and saved his life.
Ish decides to drive across the United States, helping himself to supplies along the way. The few survivors he finds seem too stupid, immoral, or psychologically traumatized to qualify as long-term companions. Eventually he returns to Berkeley, with only a dog for companionship.
Although Ish feels lonely, his situation is enviable in some respects. He has unlimited quantities of everything he needs, including a million books at the university. He has been a quiet, studious person all his life and does not need human companionship as much as do others. There is no danger from animals yet, nor any reason to fear other humans because of the abundance of goods.
Ish encounters a woman named Em who has been living alone. They soon become lovers, entering into a form of marriage by pledging their vows. Over the ensuing years, they have a number of children. A handful of men and women join them, eventually forming a tribe of about three dozen. Ish becomes leader because of his intelligence and education. He undertakes the education of the children, hoping to pass on the skills and values of the vanished civilization. Other tribe members contribute their skills to maintaining comfort and sanitation.
The introspective Ish observes the gradual deterioration of the infrastructure of modern civilization. Electricity lasts a short while before generators fail, plunging the Bay Area into darkness. The aqueducts last much longer before water stops flowing and the tribe has to dig wells. Automobiles are useful for years but gradually become rusted hulks. Streets and roads become shattered and overgrown. The tribes world narrows to a few square miles.
All except Ish are content to live as squatters and scavengers. Ish realizes that the time will come when people will have to know the simple skills of hunting, fishing, and agriculture. The children and adults respect his words but do not understand him; they regard him as a mystic and prophet. The only person capable of understanding him is his son Joey, but this perceptive child is killed by a disease brought by an outsider named Charlie who is riddled with germs. At a momentous meeting, the leaders agree to execute Charlie and rid themselves of his potential to destroy their fragile society.
At the end of the novel, Ish is an old man. All of his contemporaries have died. Power has passed to younger members of the tribe who are ignorant of the old civilization but have become expert hunters, fishers, and cultivators. Fires have destroyed most of the Bay Area. People use bows and arrows, and they live very much like the early California Indians. Ish is revered and cared for, although no one has any use for the knowledge he retains from the past. At his death, Ish realizes that the civilization he knew was only one incident in the long history of Earth itself. He comforts himself with a quotation from Ecclesiastes: “Men go and come, but earth abides.”