Conference noted::sf

    <somebody> Stewart wrote "Earth Abides"
    
    Go to any decent bookstore and ask to see "Books in Print."
    If it's in print, it'll be listed there.                  
    If it isn't start looking in used bookstores.
    
    					andrew                  

    Tsk Tsk Tsk, -1!!!  Go to your local Bookstore, indeed!  Don't you
    know that right here at Digital, there are Libraries, (and sf reading
    librarians!!!) which have Books in Print (we say BIP)!
    
    Earth Abides
    George R. Stewart
    
    currently in print in hardcover:  Archive Press, ISBN 0-910720-00-2,
         $14.95  or
    
    paperback: Fawcett-Crest, ISBN 0-449-20390-5, $2.75
    
    
    You're welcome!!!  ;^)
    
    Sherry
    
    

    Thank you Sherry, for reminding me.  (Goes to show, I haven't
    been over to the library in a bit...)
    
    					andrew

    Excellent book, that's still on my list of all 5 all time favorites!
    
    Willie

    	Of course you have to remember that some of us are *not* in the
    Greater Maynard area and do *not* have access to any corporate
    libraries.  (Hell, we still don't have a DCU branch within hundreds
    of miles, and we have over 1000 employees in our plant!)
                          
    Forgive my tangent,
    
    tlh

   
    
    spoilers follow !!
    
     that was a good read, it would make me angry because i kept on thinking
    of better ways of getting technology started again, it struck me
    as very sad the way it ended for the protagonist.

    I think what I liked about it most was that is was _so_ realistic,
    no stretching of technology needed, no deus-ex-machina, no suspension
    of disbelief nessesary, and you could really see it happening.
    
    There may have been ways to stretch out the technology, but everything
    is so interrelated it would be about impossible to restart.  Can
    a few remaining survivors repair water mains, make lightbulbs from
    scratch, rebuild car engines, manufacture ICs, etc, etc, etc....?
    
    Willie
    

In the end, if we're lucky enough to live so long, the fate Ish suffers is
what will befall all of us: gradually being ignored by the younger generation
as they come into their own, pinning our hopes on our progeny and seeing them
succeed or fail without regard for our prejudices and fervent wishes, finding
ourselves increasingly alone as old friends and comrades are taken from us by
death and infirmity, and at last, a final vision, like Ish's last vision of
Twin Peaks, piercing and full of unspeakable significance, before the final
darkness.

It's a sometimes overly stylized book, but it addresses important _human_
issues as few other science fiction books do ("A Canticle for Leibowitz",
which was written around the same time, is the only other one I can think
of that comes close).

								Pc.

    I saw the movie but have not read the book. From what I read in
    the notes file I should have read the book first. The movie was
    hard for me to understand why Ish did some of the things he did.
    Oh I understand THE things he done, but what really happend to the
    people I never understood. The movie seemed to jump from one point
    to another without giving good reason. Has anyone else seen the
    movie AND read the book. I need some comparison.
    
    Ben 

    I've never heard of a film version of EARTH ABIDES. Which doesn't
    mean that it doesn't exist, but with all due modesty, I do know
    my sf films and this doesn't ring a bell.
    
    --- jerry

    THE MOVIE?!?!??!??!!!??!
    
    I wanna see it, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna!  Any info greatly
    appreciated!
    
    Willie
    

re: .8 people being unable to rebuild a technological soceity

Actually, industrial soceities are pretty tough.  They can keep going
in circumstances that would probably destroy other cultures.
Look at Germany and Japan in World War II.  Industrial production actually
PEAKED in 1944, in spite of constant aerial bombardment, the drain
of supporting millions of soldiers out in field, and the 
conscription and death of most skilled workers.  After the worst war
in human history, these countries bounced back in only ten years.
By way of contrast, look at Russia after WW I and China after WW II.
In these non-industrial countries, the pressure of war induced the collapse
of central authority, revolution, and decades of famine and turmoil.

/jlr

PS In a way, the scenario of "The Earth Abides" is already being
played out.  AIDS is an invariably fatal disease with no known cure.
It might well end up killing some percentage of the population of the
US and Africa. However, it's hard to imagine AIDS causing the collapse
of America, and it's easy to imagine it causing the collapse of the
Congo.  The epidemic has already reached nightmare proportions, of
course, but it won't destroy the country.  So far, it hasn't been as
bad as the flu epidemics earlier this century.   Small consolation for
its victims and their loved ones.

    I'm more of a movie fan than an SF fan (Translation: A fan will
    be more interested in learning something new about what they're a fan
    of than the quality of the source of knowledge.  Thus, I'm a
    "The Prisoner" fan cause I enjoyed Disch's crappy novelization -
    I'm not an SF fan cause I don't enjoy Disch's crappy novels), and
    I've NEVER heard of a movie version of "Earth Abides".
    
    More info, please.

    RE: 10
    
       .11 has it right ! It is a video tape. I rented it 2 weeks ago
    and looked it over twice. But It's still a mystery to me. 
    
    Ben 

    Are you perhaps thinking of the New Zealander film that came out
    about 2 years ago called THE QUIET EARTH?
    
    --- jerry

    re: .12
    
    First I don't see AIDS wiping out 95 percent or more of the population
    overnight, and during the first part of the book you can't be sure
    that Ish isn't the _only_ survivor.
    
    I suspect that our current industrial high-tech society is a lot
    more interrelated and interdependent than you think.  With very
    few people left (say even 10 percent of the population), there would
    be no way to keep everything running indefinately.  Pick any artifact
    of today and think about what it takes to make it, from the raw
    materials to the finished product....
    
    Willie

    RE: 15
            I think you are right. I was wrong. It was "The Quiet Earth"
              Sorry about that chief !
    Ben

    Oh, no, it would have made a great movie!
    
    Willie

Path: muscat!decwrl!pyramid!pyrnj!rutgers!vlsi.jpl.nasa.gov!raoul
From: [email protected] 
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf-lovers
Subject: THE QUIET EARTH
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: 25 Jan 88 20:06:54 GMT
Sender: [email protected]
Lines: 28

                              ***SPOILERS***
  
    I just saw the film THE QUIET EARTH" on a friend's new VCR and I
do not understand the ending.  Did the man "reincarnate" on Mars after
he tried to sacrifice himself?  The reason I think he appears on Mars
is that Saturn clearly rises over the horizon and is very large and
visible.  Since Mars would be possibly the next habitable planet... 
 
    To jog your memories, the plot is about a man who one morning
discovers he is about the only man left alive on Earth.  Later he
discovers there is a redheaded woman and a black man who have also
survived.  There are hints of what might have happened (The "Grid" the
man was working on with the secretive Americans, Operation Flashlight,
the Sun pulsing, the electron valence energy oscillating between two
diverging energy levels, etc.), but nothing is certain.  It turns out
these three people survived because they were about to die when the
"effect" happened.  At the end of the movie, they decide to try to
destroy this "Grid".  They bring a truck loaded with explosives to an
antenna station that is evidently part of this "Grid".  They find out
that this antenna station is spewing out unhealthy microwaves, so the
man decides to sacrifice himself by driving the truck into the antenna
station and sets off the explosives.  Later we find him on a beach with
a huge Saturn-like planet coming over the horizon like a moon. 
Reincarnation on Mars is my best bet, since Mars is closer to Saturn
than Earth - Eat your heart out John Carter... 
 
Al

From: fiddler%[email protected] (Steve Hix)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf-lovers
Subject: Re: THE QUIET EARTH
Date: 26 Jan 88 20:53:01 GMT
Sender: [email protected]
 
    In article <[email protected]>, [email protected] 
writes: 

>    I just saw the film THE QUIET EARTH on a friend's new VCR and I do not
> understand the ending.  Did the man "reincarnate" on Mars after he tried
> to sacrifice himself?  The reason I think he appears on Mars is that
> Saturn clearly rises over the horizon and is very large and visible.
> over the horizon like a moon.  Reincarnation on Mars is my best bet,
> since Mars is closer to Saturn than Earth... 
 
    From Mars, Saturn would look pretty much like Jupiter from Earth -
a bright star.  The gas giants are petty good sized, but they are a
*long* way out from Earth.  You just might get away with Saturn's moon
Titan (after a bit of warming and a major cleanup of its smog, um,
atmosphere. 
 
    On second thought, better figure on some other solar system and a
satellite of some really big jovian-type with rings. 

    re: 1 and 2
    
        Thank you for the references, I'll look them up and hopefully
        find "The Earth Abides".
    
    
        Thanks
    
          Mike

    
      I read this book when I was about 12, I think, and it *haunted*
    me.  I've never lost the disquieting feeling this title brings to
    mind.  Maybe it's because I was young and impressionable, or maybe
    because I'm too fond of the warm womb of civilization.  Anyone else
    have this reaction?
    
    Brian W.

    It's been a number of years since I read "Earth Abides" so I reread
    it.  It's still good.  I originally read it for an antropology course
    I took at IIT, Social Science Fiction.  We read science fiction
    books on possible future societies and then we wrote a paper on
    our idea of a future society.  Not bad for 3 credit hours!
    

    Funny that I saw this note but never realized it referred to a book I
    had read 12 years ago till I asked for help in finding a title in
    826.13 .
    
    From what I remember of the book, I liked it's balanced sensitive
    style. The descriptions of how man's artifact's are slowly overgrown by
    the cylces of nature are described in a nearly poetic manner. This is
    similar to the style of a folk song where actions of great
    emotional importance are described simply - as knife cuts clear and
    deep.
    
    I recall how the main character comes together with his wife. When 
    he had met her, earlier, she and another man where spending their day's in
    an end-of-the-earth drunken spree. On meeting again later, he reads the
    sorrow in her face, but doesn't question her on the past.
    
    Since I'm interested in how technology and culture develop and in how
    communities function, this book has stayed in my memory. I prefer it to
    "A Canticle for Liebowitz" because I feel that that book doesn't fully
    pursue the periods of development portrayed. Certain emotional themes
    such as the Wandering Jew aren't developed. The space colony ending
    doesn't offer a fulfilling vision to me. 
    

    
    	"Earth Abides" is beautiful.  Sad, but beautiful.  I just read
    	it for the first time, based on recommendations found here.
    	One thing that struck me is the timeless quality to it.  There
    	are very few parts that place it in time.  Early, the reference
    	to the radio.  Later, the silver dimes hammered into arrowheads.
    	And I kept thinking, "why don't they get a generator?"
    
    	What happens to Ish's dreams is sad, but there was more hope
    	for the future than he allowed in his vision.  I was immersed
    	in this story, and I admit it was a place I wanted to be, on
    	the frontier.  I love these kinds of stories.
    
    	"Canticle for Liebowitz" is next.  Hey what can I say, I'm
    	not that old!  Lot's of catching up to do...
    
    	-rick

    Gaa!  Earth Abides, then Canticle..., what's next?  I'd say go for
    Brunner's The Sheep Look Up. 
    
    Willie

    The Sheep Look Up?  Arrrrggghhhhh.  Terminal depression!
    
    len.
    

re: Brunner

Brunner presents a basically dystopic vision in the books i've read (_The
Jagged Orbit_ and _Stand on Zanzibar_, for instance--i haven't read _The
Sheep Look Up_).

_Earth Abides_ and _A Canticle for Leibowitz_ are neither utopian or
dystopian.  They attempt a rather naturalistic view of civilization falling
apart and coming back together in different (but not necessarily better or
worse) forms, as viewed through the eyes of real people.  Both are unusual
and dissimilar in their literary styles, but both have a haunting quality
that strongly parallels the degree of their concern for the impact of tidal
changes in civilization on the moral dilemmas of ordinary humans.

BTW, i always thought that Brunner's strongest work was his Brazilian
chess game, _The Squares of the City_.  While the plot was based on a highly
artificial bit of trickery, the human dilemmas of Hakluyt, Vados, Diaz,
Maria Posador and the others were nonetheless pretty real to me.  I have
often found myself in Diaz-like opposition to my Vados-like managers in
Digital over the years.  You can't impugn the motives of these people, no
matter how much you disagree with their implementation.
								paul