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'The Death of Grass', by Christopher John is a piece of 50's fiction, exploring how people change when faced with a real end-of-civilisation style crisis.

All the world's grass crops (wheat, Rice, etc.) are killed off by a virus and society falls apart. Two families have to get from London to a remote farm where they're promised sanctuary. But they quickly change during the journey and the challenges and hardships it throws at them.

Just finished reading this and although it's really dated, with 'Johnny Foreigner' and 'stiff upper-lip' type references, it is thought-provoking. How far would any of us be prepared to go in order to survive? Defending yourself from maruading hordes is one thing, but would you be able to be cold-hearted enough to leave behind anyone who is 'dead wood'?

I think that this book is worth reading, to help us to think about the 'community issue'.

broadoak wrote:I think that this book is worth reading, to help us to think about the 'community issue'.

I'd second that.

This is the most depressing and frightening book I've read in a long time, and it really made me think a lot about the issues we might face. It's a bit like Lord of the Flies, only with adults and set in England rather than a deserted island. Very scary and thought-provoking, and left me wondering whether to run to the hills now before it's too late! I managed to resist though, as things don't have to turn out as bad as they do in this book - but it's worth keeping it in mind as a potential outcome if we're not careful...

I'd recommend everyone with an interest in Peak Oil to read it.

They made the film no blade of grass out of this book, and I believe panic in the year zero, another interesting film looking at the whole concept of what will the average person do to survive .

not only do they leave people behind, but they shoot innocent people to get out of london, to get guns and food including a farmers wife .

very good book to read I agree

They published the book in the US under the name "no blade of grass", and the film took the same name. I'd heard the film wasn't so good, but I've not seen it. The book is excellent though.

The film has lots of clips of pollution, and it goes backwards and forwards in time ,but I thought it was good especially for the time it was made.

its not a very upbeat film so I can understand why it wasnt a success in the box office, cant really see hollywood making a film where people start killing each other and in the end are very likely to all turn cannibal.

I haven't seen the filns or read the books.

Do they make you feel more or less that things will break down into deathly anarchy and chaos?

I have a terrible fear that everything will go tits up when the SHTF and things will break down everywhere. This is what concerns me most re oil depletion. I seem to have this irrational (I hope) fear of complete chaos after food doubles in price and gets hard to get (amongst all the other things).

snow hope wrote:Do they make you feel more or less that things will break down into deathly anarchy and chaos?

More likely I'm afraid. Not a book to read if you're already feeling down on the situation - best wait till you feel your constitution is strong enough.

It's not that the literal situation arising in the book would happen, especially the rapidity of events unfolding. The problem is the way the people behave is so horrifying and also so believable, so you begin to wonder just how much it would take to start it happening - does it need to be an event as big as the one in the book, or would something smaller/slower suffice?

I suppose it comes down to faith in the "system", i.e. society, jobs, food supply, law&order. If something happens to make people think they need to start looking out for themselves because nobody else will, then things can start going wrong. For examples, see New Orleans, and on a smaller scale the recent riots in France. I read this book just before hurricane Katrina, so seeing New Orleans made me realise it can really happen.

I left the book lying around for a couple of days after it had arrived, and my wife picked it up and read it through in a day - she couldn't put it down. Afterwards she wanted us to move away from cities a.s.a.p.! The initial panic subsided, but the feeling it left is still there. It left me feeling disturbed and "hollow" if you know what I mean - about as bad as 1984.

I'd recommend people read it, even if the scenario might be more extreme than anythinbg we will face - it can serve as a warning of what could happen if the population at large is not ready. It's not in print, so you need to get it on Ebay or DODGY TAX AVOIDERS Marketplace. I paid ?10 for it - the initial price was 2'6!!!!

The thing that really frightens me, is that this book was written in the 50's and so must have been pretty scarey then, but look how agressive and mean people are these days in comparison with the 1950's .

I used to work on the trams in Nottm until recently and what can I say.....I discovered that the amount of screwy, messed up, violent people at large in society is breath-taking. I had no end of threats and some actual violence because people from the crappier neighbourhoods just didn't feel like paying. Colleagues were even hospitalised. So I'm sure you can all imagine that these days, if we got in to a crisis, it wouldn't take much for people to start killing eachother. Furthermore, I don't think it would take long, either.

We're a far-cry from the 'nice, middle-class, civilised' people of this '50's book. Books like these could be useful for introducing friends to the concept of peak-oil and a collapse. Get them to read the book as just a 'great story', then tell them about all the peak stuff, and the idea that a collapse of society may soon be a reality and not just a '50's pulp story. Play on the emotions a bit.... I'm preparing for post-peak, but i'm also absolutley crapping meself..

They say we're all 3 meals away from anarchy - perhaps the people on the Nottingham trams were just a little closer than the rest of us

Fortunately though MI5 believe the UK is infact 4 meals from anarchy:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0, ... 71,00.html
http://sortapundit.typepad.com/sortapun ... om_ch.html