Avail Yourself Kumsalda/ Kıyamet Gününe Doğru Adım Adım! Scripted By Nevil Shute Released As Hardbound
do you do when all hope is lost
For the people in this book about our world dying of radiation after an atomic war the answer seems to be carry on as normally as possible.
Go to the beach, swim, sail, go to work, enjoy parties and drink, plant the daffodils, clear the trees and chop the wood,
There is no let up for the reader, always the knowledge that it will happen,
It's a bleak vision of a post apocalyptic world that is at once both terrifying and moving,
As I said in my earlier update it felt like a black and white film from the fifties, the manners, the correctness, the language of the book is of that time.
There is no humour, no let up as it slowly arrives at the inevitable conclusion,
/but rounded up to, Nevil Shute once again held me captive with this haunting story, Unlike many others by Nevil, I've only read this one once, Didn't see movie. Remember enjoying the Australian setting and characters, how Shute depicted their mindsets and behaviors,
Encourage readers who have read only this to try others by the author, Pied Piper, Round the Bend, and, . . Alice.
sitelinkPied Piper
sitelinkRound the Bend
sitelinkA Town Like Alice
A classic post holocaust speculation from when terrorism wasn't.
. .
When stationed at SAC, near Omaha, in the earlys, my barracks was closest to the flight line, The sounds of brakes on the big war birds, . .
Recommended Genre Companion Pat Frank's Babylon
sitelinkAlas, Babylon Kitabı çok beğendiğimi ve beni derinden etkilediğini rahatlıkla söyleyebilirim.
Doğrusu Bilimkurgu Klasikleri serisi içerisinde bu kadar etkileneceğim bir kitabın olacağını sanmıyordum, benim için hoş bir sürpriz oldu.
Kitap genel anlamda yoğun bilimkurgu öğeleri içermiyor hatta kitaptaki tek bilimkurgu öğesi nükleer savaş sonrasını anlatması ancak kitapta ön planda olan tema bilimkurgu değil bizzat insanın kendisi.
Çaresizlik oldukça başarılı bir şekilde işlenmiş, İnsanın son ana kadar ölümü kabullenmek istemeyişini çarpıcı bir şekilde anlatıyor, Tüm insanlığın biriki kendini bilmez devlet başkanının aptalca kararıyla yok olabileceğini tokat gibi insanın yüzüne çarpıyor.
Bu kitapta anlatılanların gerçekleşme ihtimali o kadar yüksek ki, bence bu kitap mükemmel bir savaş karşıtı propaganda görevi görüyor.
Savaşın ne kadar korkunç bir şey olduğunu, savaşın onun bir parçası olmayan insanlar üzerindeki etkisiyle göstermek gibi bir başarısı da var.
Son derece beğendim ve herkese tavsiye ederim, Hepimiz Aynı anda hastalandık. Talihli sayılmaz mıyız Bir nükleer savaş çıkarsa dünyanın durumu ne olur, insanlar nasıl bir felaketle karşı karşıya kalır, savaş alanları dışında kalanlar için kurtuluş yolu var mıdır.
. . Eğer kurtuluş yolu yoksa, bütün insanlık yok olup gidecek midir
Bu sorular bugün hâlâ birçok insanın aklını kurcalıyor.
Yeni binyılda da insanlığın peşini bırakmayacak olan en büyük kaygılardan biri de bu, hem de en dehşet verici olanı.
İşte Nevil Shute, Kumsalda'da bugün de birçoğumuzun düşünmekten kendini alamadığı bu dehşet verici konuyu ele alıyor, Üstelik onun işlemiş olduğu bu konu üzerinde, ikinci mesleği gereği, bilimsel açıdan olsun, askeri açıdan olsun geniş bilgi sahibi olması da eseri etkili kılıyor.
Kumsalda, yayınlanır yayınlanmaz hakettiği ilgiyi görmüş, Amerika'da beş milyondan fazla satmıştır, Kumsalda adlı roman yönetmen Stanley Kramer tarafından sinemaya da uyarlanmıştır, Başrollerini Ava Gardner, Gregroy, Peck, Fred Astair ve Antony Perkins'in oynadıkları film, birçok ülkede, roman kadar ilgi çekip gişe rekorları kırmıştır.
I read this book in honor of Pamela, a dear, witty, and well read GR friend who passed away three months ago, It was on her list of favorites, She is missed. .
This book was made into a successful film starring Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, Anthony Perkins, and Fred Astaire, I saw it years ago and it is their faces I saw when I read the book, WWIII has just ended in the total destruction of life in the Northern Hemisphere and the radioactive cloud is moving into the Southern Hemisphere, killing all in its path.
The story is set in Australia, which is still radioactive free and follows the lives of four main characters and how they are dealing or not dealing with their impending deaths.
It took a while to get used to Shute's use of what appeared to be an overabundance of small talk among the main players but it soon became clear that he was providing the reader with an indepth character study of each one which would play a part in their acceptance and actions as the end was near.
The book moves slowly but surely toward the inevitable as the characters attempt to go on with their lives and make decisions that will break your heart.
The final page moved me to tears, It is a downbeat but also somewhat uplifting story and I recommend it, "It's not the end of the world at all," he said, "It's only the end for us, The world will go on just the same, only we shan't be in it, I dare say it will get along all right without us, "
On the Beach details the experiences of a mixed group of people in Melbourne, Australia as they await the arrival of deadly radiation spreading towards them from the Northern Hemisphere, following a nuclear war a year previously.
As the radiation approaches, each person deals with their impending death differently,
Okay, this was rather dated but the story of course is still very relevant in today's world,
But the way it's dealt with here is similar to other Cold War era novels of similar subjects,
This particular book was playing on the fear of nuclear war and how terrible radiation fallout/sickness is,
I guess I went into this with my expectations too high, I think Nevil Shute is a great writer but this one wasn't as great as I thought it would be but still gets three.
I didn't like the ending and the hopelessness of it, I have wanted to read this book for quite some time, and when it was offered on edelweiss, I decided to take it on.
Perhaps it was not the best time to read a book about the world ending through nuclear war, but then again, it just might make me realize that there are and were truly worse things that threatened our existence.
I realize the Wuhan virus is awful and a terrible ordeal for us all, but in this story most of the people of the world are already dead through radiation poisoning, and the characters in this story live in the last bastion of remaining living things.
However, this too shall end as the radiation traveled southward into Australia and New Zealand, places where the bulk of the story take place.
People know, they realize that their time is limited, and yet they hold out hope that perhaps maybe there will be a next Spring and Summer, that perhaps it won't be as they know it will, perhaps they will escape the ravages of nuclear fallout.
We follow a number of characters and because of the time when this book was written, the threat of nuclear war was real.
Each character handles their ultimate doom in a different manner knowing that their death in imminent, It is a bit dated of course, but the message it carries is quite clear, We must all learn to enjoy the life
we have been given for we never know when it could be taken from us,
Interestingly, the title "On the Beach" is a Royal Navy term meaning "retired from service, " I am glad I finally had an opportunity to read this book, Thank you to Edelweiss for providing me the opportunity to do so, “It's not the end of the world at all," he said, "It's only the end for us, The world will go on just the same, only we shan't be in it, I dare say it will get along all right without us, ”
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An Instructional Manual fromon what to do in the event of an ABomb attack,
On the Beach was published in, but the novel is set in what was then the near future of.
Those years betweenproved to be tumultuous years indeed, When I checked this book out of the library, the librarian, the same one who gave me such good material for my sitelinkIn Cold Blood review, said that this book terrified her, not because of the horrifying circumstances in the book, but the plodding calmness of the characters.
I was intrigued,
I wanted to ask what it was like to have read this book in, but that is a rather delicate question to a woman of an indeterminate age.
Luckily she bailed me out and told me she read the book much later, but still while we were up to our eyeballs in the Cold War.
My Father has always said he has never been more afraid of the World Ending than induring the Cuban Missile Crisis.
My bellwether librarian agreed that she remembered how difficult it was for everyone to go about their regular business with the oppressive presence of the eminent demise of civilization looming over their lives.
I paraphrase.
I still cant quite peg her age, I could dig around a bit and probably discover her birth date, but then that wouldnt be very sporting of me now would it
So it is the end of the world.
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John Riordan comic strip,
”In the last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but with a whimper.
T. S. Eliot
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Ok, . . so, Nevil Shute has the world ending with Albania attacking Italy, Egypt then bombed the United States and the United Kingdom, NATO bombed the Soviet Union because the planes used by the Egyptians were Soviet made, The Soviets bomb China because of Chinese attacks on their border, All of this bombing well is nuclear infused with cobalt to insure the maximum amount of radiation fallout, So those countries that were not involved in World War III, are fully involved in the dying part of the war,
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I glanced through some other reviews of this book, The people who didnt like this book were looking for the standard apocalyptic novel with desperate people fleeing in front of the radiation zombies, tidal wave, Ebola etc hoping to live days longer or maybe even hoping for a reprieve.
They wanted people clinging to every last drop of their remaining existence, I would guess that the book would have been more fulfilling for them if a pocket of those people had found a way to survive thus leaving them with some hope that they too could be among the survivors.
This isnt that kind of book, Im sure there were people fleeing South, but Shute focuses on the people who stay in Melbourne, The people who are measuring their lifespan in days and minutes as word arrives of radiation sickness three hundred miles away, one hundred miles away.
Dwight Towers, commander of probably the last remaining operational American submarine, has attached his vessel to the Australian Navy, He has a wife and kids in the United States, He is a practical man who knows logically they are dead, but he continues to think about them and talk about them as if they are alive.
He meets Moira Davidson who drinks brandy around the clock, loses her top while swimming see how fun she is!, and is coming to terms with the fact that she is never going to get married or do any of the things she hasnt even thought of yet.
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movie poster
John Osborne is a scientist who has been attached as a liaison officer to the USS Scorpion.
Shute was an aeronautical engineer by trade, His love for machines comes out in the Osborne character, John finds a Ferrari and buys it for pennies on the dollars, even for that price it seems like an act of pure lunacy, but he has always wanted to race cars and has a stash of fuel that will make that dream come true.
He organizes the final Australian Grand Prix and so many drivers come out of the woodwork that they have to organize heats to determine the drivers for the final race.
Peter Holmes is a lieutenant commander in the Australian Navy, receiving promotions so quickly due to resignations that he will soon be an admiral.
He has a wife, Mary, and a daughter, He cuts down trees and expands the flower and vegetable garden, It gives Mary something to do, something to think about other than winds of death, Moria is discussing the strangeness of planting a garden with Dwight,
“Someones crazy,” she said quietly, “Is it me or them”
“Why do you say that”
“They wont be here in six months time, I wont be here. You wont be here. They wont want any vegetables next year, ”
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There are old men at the Gentlemens Club slowly depleting the lastbottles of port, There are debates about whether it is ethical to move the fishing season up, There are people still going to school trying to finish course work, The people who stay are trying to be as productive with their lives as if a normal life span was still stretching out before them.
”Typically for a Shute novel, the characters avoid expressing intense emotions and do not mope or indulge in selfpity, Some reviewers thought the characters were wooden, I found the calmness of the people populating this novel more terrifying than if they had been fleeing for their lives, There was a part of me that wanted to go shake some sense into them and extort them to help me come up with a plan, but as I started to accept the circumstances I realized that the only sane course was the course they were already on.
Do you want to die in a tent surrounded by people you dont know, going hungry more than likely and yet, as doomed as if youd stayed in your home surrounded by your friends and family Do you want to take the chance that you will survive the apocalypse I say put on a pot of tea, keep the bourbon close to hand, and finally finish War and Peace.
Maybe there is even time for a quick nap in the hammock with the sun on my toes and bees buzzing by my ear.
A fascinating, historical look back to when the threat of nuclear war hung like a shadow around the sun,
.out ofstars
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