Duel - Richard Matheson

Hell House - Richard Matheson

I suspect that the majority of you reading this have not heard of the author Richard Matheson. Despite producing two of the best horror novels of the last century ('I am Legend' and 'The Shrinking man'), Matheson is still not as familiar a name as Stephen King or James Herbert. And yet you are probably more familiar with some of Matheson's work (or to be precise, products based upon his work) than you know. Have you seen Steven Spielberg's directorial debut 'Duel' about the gripping battle on the road between a travelling salesman and a truck driver? It is based on a Matheson short story. A more recent example is the 1998 film 'What ...

Hell House - Richard Matheson

I suspect that the majority of you reading this have not heard of the author Richard Matheson. Despite producing two of the best horror novels of the last century ('I am Legend' and 'The Shrinking man'), Matheson is still not as familiar a name as Stephen King or James Herbert. And yet you are probably more familiar with some of Matheson's work (or to be precise, products based upon his work) than you know. Have you seen Steven Spielberg's directorial debut 'Duel' about the gripping battle on the road between a travelling salesman and a truck driver? It is based on a Matheson short story. A more recent example is the 1998 film 'What ...

I am Legend - Richard Matheson

does the reader feel that the story is becoming bogged down with unnecessary descriptive sidetracks. I would say that Stephen King, a writer by his own admission heavily influenced by Matheson, is my favourite author - he writes beautifully. However some of King's more recent works ('Bag of Bones' comes to mind) could have been equally effective if they were 50 to 100 pages shorter. At just over 150 pages, 'I am Legend' is actually a rather brief novel and it is no longer than it needs to be. Secondly, no writer seems to be better at summarising the human condition. It should be impossible for the reader realistically to empathise with what Neville ...

I am Legend - Richard Matheson

does the reader feel that the story is becoming bogged down with unnecessary descriptive sidetracks. I would say that Stephen King, a writer by his own admission heavily influenced by Matheson, is my favourite author - he writes beautifully. However some of King's more recent works ('Bag of Bones' comes to mind) could have been equally effective if they were 50 to 100 pages shorter. At just over 150 pages, 'I am Legend' is actually a rather brief novel and it is no longer than it needs to be. Secondly, no writer seems to be better at summarising the human condition. It should be impossible for the reader realistically to empathise with what Neville ...

I am Legend - Richard Matheson

Barricaded into his house and only daring leave during the hours of daylight, Robert Neville is the last surviving member of the human race, surrounded on all sides by those who were, formerly, his neighbours and who have now been changed into vampires. Charting Neville’s solitary life, including his encounter with a dog, terrified into savagery, who becomes his only companion for a time, and his attempted scientific investigation of the vampire condition, this novel, written in a simple style consisting of short sentences, is very effective; all the more so because of the fact that it chooses to approach the subject of vampirism from an sf rather than horror standpoint, ...

I am Legend - Richard Matheson

Barricaded into his house and only daring leave during the hours of daylight, Robert Neville is the last surviving member of the human race, surrounded on all sides by those who were, formerly, his neighbours and who have now been changed into vampires. Charting Neville’s solitary life, including his encounter with a dog, terrified into savagery, who becomes his only companion for a time, and his attempted scientific investigation of the vampire condition, this novel, written in a simple style consisting of short sentences, is very effective; all the more so because of the fact that it chooses to approach the subject of vampirism from an sf rather than horror standpoint, ...