The Death of Grass

4/5
This is my first introduction to what I think is referred to as 'cosy catastrophe' type novels. While The Death of Grass is certainly a brutal and dark story, everything is viewed through the lens of the 'stiff upper lip' of stereotypical British sensibilities. Characters spring back from traumatic events rather quickly, and more often than not they think that they could've had it worse, even as society crumbles around them. This ties into the authors criticism of both British exceptionalism, and government inadequacy. It's clear that Christopher has a pessimistic view on both, as both the characters in the story and their government fail to prepare for the oncoming storm at all, even when given several years warning.

Christopher show more also explores the psychological effects that a catastrophe like this might have on their survivors. How fast will someone change their morals and values for survival? What will we sacrifice to help our tribe? Would we relish a new power structure regardless of who it exploited if we were at the top? Christoper goes to some dark places to showcase just how slippery of a slope it is to go from a mild mannered suburbanite, to a feudalistic warlord.

The novel itself was extremely well-paced. I was never bored or stalled in my reading. The characters are unique and all easily hate-able in their own way. I enjoyed being given context on the world outside of Britain in the form of the characters listening to the radio during their travels, a really smart way to build the world. The conclusion is morally depressing, but satisfying and well-written. Overall, I really enjoyed it. I think it stacks up well to other post-apocalyptic classics, though obviously set at the beginning of events instead of after. show less

One of the classic 'floral apocalypse' novels of the post-war sci-fi era. All species of grass - including wheat, rice, rye, barley, pretty much all the staples of civilisation - die out following a global virus outbreak. The story follows a band of people, led by John Custance as they make their way from London through the barren English countryside toward the promise of a relatively fertile and fortified rural sanctuary owned by John's brother David.
The Death of Grass was first published in 1956, two years after William Golding's Lord of Flies and five years after John Wyndham's Day of the Triffids. I mention these two books because, while the scenario of Death of Grass is similar to that of Day of the Triffids -the breakdown of show more society in response to an apocalyptic event - the author's take on how crisis influences human behaviour is closer to that of Lord of the Flies. In other words, we witness the less attractive, though more pragmatic side of human nature.
In the excellent introduction to the book, Robert MacFarlane makes the point that, like Lord of the Flies before it, The Death of Grass demolishes the notion that England could be relied upon to be a bastion of civility and upholder of morals when global disaster strikes.Such ideas, coming so soon after the Allies victory over the evils of Nazism a decade before, must have been quite confronting at the time.
What makes Death of Grass still compelling to read more than half a century later is the skill with which the author describes the unravelling of a civil, at times apathetic, society and the radical changes this imposes upon the moral outlook of ordinary law-abiding citizens. John Custance realises pretty quickly that he must make some unholy alliances in order to prevail.
The Death of Grass is speculative fiction at its best, for it not only poses the question Could this happen?, but asks of the reader What would you do? show less

In the immortal words of Ron Burgundy: boy, that escalated quickly. I mean, that really got out of hand fast. A perfectly robust post-apocalyptic yarn – with all the regular tropes of survivors fleeing the chaos and then losing their humanity as they make the moral choices they feel they must in order to survive – is undermined by the fact that our survivors (and not only our survivors, but most everyone they encounter) resort almost immediately to rape, robbery, child abandonment and cold-blooded murder. It was almost as though everyone was waiting for the end of the world just so they could go crazy. And it's not panic; it's all justified soberly on the basis of long-term survival. Bear in mind that the story takes place in the show more immediate aftermath of the collapse of civilization – i.e. the first few days and weeks. Short of horses, and a man on fire, and Brick killing a guy with a trident, there's little more that could have been done to show how nutty it all becomes.

It is a shame that things were not unpacked with a more considered pace, because The Death of Grass is otherwise a very compelling story. Those regular post-apocalyptic tropes I mentioned above were far from regular when author John Christopher wrote the book (1956), and the chilling tension of the moral dilemmas are done as well here as anywhere I've seen. The book demands respect, and was very innovative for its time. Christopher's apocalypse is a very modern one: it is caused by a resistant plant-based virus that kills off all the grass (hence the title) and leads to worldwide food shortages (grasses include rice and wheat). This is quickly followed by societal collapse. Alas, rather too quickly. show less

It is the 1950s, and a devastating virus is sweeping Asia. It attacks grass, and grass feeds the world. Wheat is grass. And cows, sheep, etc all live on grass. At first people in Britain watch in horror as it strikes at the wheat supplies in those far-off lands. But the Chung-Li virus could never come as far as England, not without science coming to the rescue. And even if it did, surely British society would cope. Civilization would find a way to ration food and the hold things together until a fix was found, and surely that wouldn’t take too long.

But Europe and Britain do not remain unaffected for long, and in London John begins to wonder if he should take his family across the country and try to make it to his brother’s farm. It show more is isolated, and the valley has only one entrance, it can be defended.

But what effect will this virus have on people. How long will civilisation hold up under this threat?

This was written in the 1950s, and it really is a book of its time. It was hard to ignore the sexism, classism, and racism. Straight away, once the old order was stripped away, the men took charge. Not even a hint that any of the women might prove useful. And every time a woman showed up she was classified as weak and in need of defence. For the most part they were nothing but wives, an aside to their menfolk. Women and children were constantly referenced as being the same, in need of leadership, protection, and telling what to do.

Likewise the racism was blatantly obvious.

Right from the start the ‘Asiatics’ were referred to as not as civilised as the English. And in such a manner that you could read nothing but racism into it. There was also a mention to the Mediterranean-types, the Latins as being of a temperament that wouldn’t respond well to such disaster.

It is hard to look past those, but at the same time the reader can’t assume that those are the attitudes and beliefs of the author, instead they are the attitudes of the characters, and I am sure that there are plenty who hold similar views today, let alone back in the 1950s.

Books like this one always make me think that I must have a very positive view of humanity. I don’t think that people would revert back to such barbarity so quickly. At least, not all of society. But perhaps I am misguided. I mean, I have never lived through such panic or through a collapsing society. Christopher would have lived through world wars. Maybe he is more accurate than I would like to believe.

Apart from my possibly naive view of people, and the racism etc I have to say that I quite enjoyed this book. It is really well written, a gripping book that doesn’t bother to waste time with anything. It dives straight in to the story and the disaster, but at the same time it doesn’t feel rushed at all. show less

Probably the best and most stark post apocalyptic novel I have read. This beats Day of the Triffids for me. It dates from the same era, being first published in 1956. The characters similarly come across as slightly cliched by modern standards. What makes this so good is the uncompromising grimness of the harsh choices the characters make as they cross the country to the safety of an isolated valley in the extreme north west of England. This reminded me of the TV series Survivors and the film Threads in the tone and atmosphere. Brilliant stuff. Christopher should be as well known as Wyndham. And all hail the taut 200 page novel. Almost no novels published nowadays are that short, but a great novel doesn't need to be overblown at 500+ show more pages to succeed. show less

DEATH OF GRASS (aka No Blade of Grass) is a terrifyingly good book. Terrifying because in this day of genetically engineered crops the plot is plausible and you wish that it wasn’t.

It is dystopian (or doomsday) tale where the world is facing death by starvation. In DEATH OF GRASS the end of the world as we know it is brought about by the Chung-Li virus. This is a disease that starts in China and kills off all grass species – not just the grass on the front lawn but rice, wheat, barley and rye. Food staples for every human and most animals – especially the ones human‘s eat. China falls to famine, and then the virus spreads to South-East Asia, India and the Soviet Union, and before long grasses are dying in Great Britain.

In show more England John and his friend Roger continue to eat their bread and cakes feeling safe. John’s brother owns a farm in a valley in the north of England and feels that the virus is going to arrive in England, he urges John and his family to move in with him. John dismisses this and returns to his home in London. He believes the government when it assured Britons that a genetically engineered bio-weapon has been found to destroy the virus. Gradually John and Roger realise that the government has been lying, and the genetically engineered weapon has made things much worse. The virus has arrived and Britain now has little to no footstock to feed its residents. Almost immediately they learn that the government has come up with a plan to reduce the population, the two families have to get out of London and fast and head for the farm.

From this point DEATH OF GRASS focuses on the breakdown of society and is chilling in the way it portrays the desperation of people to survive. Life for the characters quickly becomes survival of the fittest and that life quickly gets very brutal. John and his friend are now heading north with their young family as society falls apart both civilly and morally, picking up guns and stragglers to strengthen their numbers. Will they reach safety? What is safety?

DEATH OF GRASS is bleak, but it is hard to write a happy end of the world scenario. Written in the 1950s the roles of men and women are a bit dated and likely to offend some who don’t take the time context into consideration. I enjoyed the story which is now widely regarded as a ‘classic.’ Author, John Christopher, is a very talented and very underrated writer and needs more recognition for his work. show less

SPOILERS HERE

[b:Greener than You Think|41094|Greener Than You Think (Classics of Modern Science Fiction 10)|Ward Moore|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1277779664s/41094.jpg|2865433] far better, if you want an English-language novel of eco-collapse from this era, not only because of its anticapitalism and feminism, but because of its antihumanism: there, at least, grass has agency.

Here grass can just die, and we're obligated to cathect onto some everyman human (a well-off white Englishman, an engineer and thus as clear a representative of modern culture as Christopher could imagine) and to play the standard make-believe of collapse novels by imagining what we will do to save our families when the end comes. That said, credit to Christopher show more for sending up the notion of British exceptionalism: they're on their way to cannibalism, just like everyone else.

And...the women. Somehow Christopher's worse than Wyndham. The women of Death of Grass are available only to be insulted by Tories, shot by jealous gun-nut husbands (the analogue to the old men of The Dog Stars), raped by ibid., or raped by others, and sometimes to dispense mercy to children and to intercede--like the BVM--with the father-gods to keep alit the flame of culture.

Cheers, though, to Christopher for an obvious fraud of an ending. It's a lie, by design. Nothing will return to what it was. Custance will be a medieval tyrant, an obscene father, master of the women and children, keeping his Eden safe by murder and indifference.

And this isn't the future. Calls in other reviews for a sequel, for a continuation, miss the point. We're living in it right now, keeping ourselves alive through murder and indifference, clinging to our families, hoping that our wooden stockade keeps out the next virus that will come, inevitably, to destroy us all. show less