After London or Wild England

Loved the story, which felt like a medieval fantasy at times, though it's set post-apocalypse of some kind. It's one of the "England is the cheese that stands alone" kind of stories. The upper class just leaves the country, leaving the less educated (in sciences and things) and those who can't

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afford to emigrate. Jefferies doesn't try to explain why. There is some weird narrator separation from the story, which takes place some hundred years after everybody cleared out and some undefined amount of time before the story is written. The protagonist is some historical character of note—though, again, Jefferies doesn't really go into it. I'm kind of a sucker for a) wilderness post-apocalyptic themes and 2) stories where a lot is left to hang, expository-wise ("Scanners Live in Vain" as an example).The end felt overly abrupt, though. Of the books I've read this month, bits of it have stuck the most (besides Borges, but I adore his work so much it doesn't factor in). This promises to be a book and idea that snuggles perfectly amidst the scraps of sf ideas and notions that have shacked up in my brain. I wonder if it'd have the same impression on someone from a totally different geographic locale.

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After London is made up of two distinct parts. First is "The Relapse into Barbarism", which describes the decline of civilization, but more importantly the recovery of nature, after an unspecified disaster. This section draws heavily on Jefferies background as a nature writer, and is essentially a

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detailed thought experiment on what would happen to the English countryside without many men around. For a potentially dry topic, it is surprisingly readable - largely because Jefferies describes the reaction of each aspect or species plausibly, then moves on without bogging down in details. Normally, this kind of material would exist mainly as backdrop for the characters. Here, one gets the feeling that the second half of the book was written mainly as an excuse for this imagination of the environment.

The second part of the book "Wild England", is a more standard adventure story about a sullen and disaffected young noble and his search for a place in the world (one that will impress his beloved). The story is simple, and still relies heavily on descriptions of the environment as the hero travels around. But it is again well thought through, and the hero's emotions are as plausible and realistic as the scenery around him.

The book is a pleasant read, if not exciting. I would have considered giving it a higher mark, but for the fact that the story effectively stops mid-stream. We can imagine what happens next; it's not essential that we're told. But because there's no gradual letdown, it feels very abrupt - enough so that on reading an e-copy a couple of decades after the print version, I went looking on the internet to see whether I had somehow been shortchanged.

So, a fun, interesting read, but a little disappointing at the end.

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Jefferies' descriptions of what Britain would be like without its population to maintain the roads and fields started out as quite interesting, but the book became tedious quite quickly and the adventures of the pouty and disgruntled young noble Felix didn't liven it up at all. Overall, it's

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probably worth a mention as an early post-Apocalyptic novel, but I couldn't recommend it as something to read for entertainment.

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It's really interesting comparing this to modern post-apocalyptic literature, particularly in the depiction of the post-apocalyptic world and in the things it things it concerns itself with. It's idyllic in a way, an England returned to its natural state—for the most part there is nothing to

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'clean up' where in most of what I consider to be post-apocalyptic literature the world itself is destroyed and the survivors are shown dealing with that. This book concerns itself largely with the loss of knowledge, particularly as it concerns politics and warfare, alongside the little things, like fifty years without tea.

The darkest part was also my favourite: the journey into the heart of ravaged London, still toxic and completely unrecognisable. I liked the book (aside from the inevitable sexism and other prejudices of the time) and there were some particularly lovely insights and descriptions, but it would have been more to my taste if there had been more of that.

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This novels portrays a well drawn and quite eerie depiction of a London and an England after some devastating apocalypse has transformed the landscape and driven away or killed most of the population, leaving survivors to set up small warring feudal communities or function as wandering bands of

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brigands or gypsies. The nature of the disaster is never made clear and no obvious single solution presents itself. The storyline against this backdrop concerns one man's struggle to find peace of mind in his place in this society, but was a little banal in places. Worth looking for, though (this was a Kindle edition).

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After London takes place several generations into the future, after a mysterious disaster has ripped through the heart of Victorian Britain, turning the Thames into a giant lake and London into a deadly swamp. With the upper and middle classes having fled the country for parts unknown, civilization

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and technology collapsed, leaving a new feudal order to come about, constantly under threat from invasion by the Welsh, the Irish, and the Scottish, all out for revenge. The first third of the novel is just a description of this postapocalyptic world, telling how animals and plants have been affected (Jefferies was a nature writer), and about the political and social setup, with marauding bands of gipsies and the sinister Bushmen lurking between cities for hapless travelers. It's well-thought-out, detailed world-building, the best I know of in the nineteenth century, almost Tolkienesque. There are so many fruitful avenues for stories suggested in just five chapters.

The last two thirds of the book are less successful, but still a decent read, concerning the adventures of an intellectual who tries to sail across the Lake at the heart of England and make his way in the world-- with very limited success. It's a little slow and incident-free at times, but depicts well England's fall back into barbarism and its consequences, proving more details of the setup of this world. It cuts off at a weird point, leaving you wondering if Felix will establish a new social order, and having scantly interacted with all the potential stories the first part suggests. It doesn't appear to be a book that's much read or much studied (this 1980 Oxford World's Classic is its most recent edition!), and that's a pity; there's a lot to like here.

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note I haven't finished the medievalist narrative of Part II, but I imagine it'd be wonderful to teach. Part I, Victorian lit of collapse, nature writing, and the imagining of a return of a nasty feudal society: would teach beautifully. Basically 'After Man' but done in 1880s.

This book was of interest to me because I read and collect post-apocalypse fiction. The first part of the book is a study of what has happened in nature as a result of the fall of mankind, and while some of it is interesting, it quickly becomes monotonous hearing about the three kinds of wild dogs,

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the three kinds of wild cats, the three kinds of wild pigs. The second part of the book, detailing the adventures of a young noble in what is left of civilization, has only the slightest connection to this setup--aside from a a few references to the ancients and a brief visit to what is left of London, it could be taking place in medieval England. Still it held my interest. My most serious criticism is that story reaches a certain point and simply stops there, for no reason I could see, with no resolution, nothing much learned, it doesn't even point towards anything. It's as if the author set it aside intending to pick it up later and never got around to it.

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