Surviving the end: A study of encounters with post-apocalyptic evil and survival strategies in Matheson's I am Legend, McCarthy's The Road, and Kirkman's The Walking Dead: Compendium One

Abstract

In this thesis the aim is to explore the dichotomy/duality of man in three post-apocalyptic texts and discuss how and why survivors react to the post-apocalyptic setting. Since a majority of post-apocalyptic fictional texts focus on the destruction of the world set to contemporary issues, this thesis will explore how the post-apocalyptic setting will force survivors into making difficult survival choices and discuss how the survivors cope with living in a devastated place. Additionally, the thesis will discuss notions of humanity, civility and evil in the selected texts and why these are important. The selected primary sources for this thesis are Richard Matheson’s I am Legend (1954), Cormac McCarthy’s The Road (2006) and Robert Kirkman’s The Walking Dead: Compendium One (2009).