Alienation, Apocalypse and the Postmodern Condition in "I am Legend" by Richard Matheson

Seminar paper from the year 2015 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 2,3, University of Bonn, language: English, abstract: The work that will be focused on the novel ¿I Am Legend¿ by Richard Matheson brings together the idea of the last living human on earth and the myth of vampires. The author shows the theories of the novel that are hidden between the lines. These theories are on the one hand easy to find and very obvious but on the other hand they have to be decoded word by word. To be more specific, I will try to show that the condition of alienation is one of the main topics in Matheson¿s writing. Moreover, I will show some postmodern aspect of the novel and why it is so fascinating to read apocalyptic writings. The novel may be written in 1954 and set in the late 1970s but it can be a model for current interpretations of the apocalypse since apocalyptic writings make sense of bad things and are coping with situations in which people feel helpless.