6/30/2023 0 Comments Earth abides stewartIn February, before the coronavirus was declared a pandemic, I dug out my copy of Earth Abides and put it on the nightstand. At the funeral of Homo sapiens, Stewart writes archly, the three species of human lice will be the only “wholly sincere mourners.” Likewise, wild plants overrun the cultivars and ornamentals, the wisteria bow to the weeds. In Stewart’s novel, animals emerge from the woods and the woodwork as if man had never existed. None of this would have surprised George Rippey Stewart, Berkeley professor and author of the 1949 novel Earth Abides, about a viral pandemic that wipes out most of humanity. Witness the legions of dumpster-deprived rats battling nightly on Bourbon Street. And not just the charismatic megafauna, either. As we shelter in place, the animals are rushing into the void. LATELY, I’VE BEEN COLLECTING NEWS of wildlife appearing in deserted towns and cities around the world: Wild goats roaming shuttered Welsh villages, jackals skulking in the streets of Tel Aviv, Indian bison ambling along vacant highways in New Delhi, coyotes howling in North Beach. Revisiting “Earth Abides,” the novel that inspired Stephen King and Jimi Hendrix
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