Status
Available
Call number
Publication
Ballantine Books
Pages
280
Description
Fantasy. Fiction. Literature. Science Fiction. HTML:"The most shocking fiction I have read in years. What is shocking about it is both the idea and the sheer imaginative brilliance with which Mr. Shute brings it off." THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE They are the last generation, the innocent victims of an accidental war, living out their last days, making do with what they have, hoping for a miracle. As the deadly rain moves ever closer, the world as we know it winds toward an inevitable end....
Description
After a nuclear World War III has destroyed most of the globe, the few remaining survivors in southern Australia await the radioactive cloud that is heading their way and bringing certain death to everyone in its path. Among them is an American submarine captain struggling to resist the knowledge that his wife and children in the United States must be dead. Then a faint Morse code signal is picked up, transmitting from somewhere near Seattle, and Captain Towers must lead his submarine crew on a bleak tour of the ruined world in a desperate search for signs of life. On the Beach is a remarkably convincing portrait of how ordinary people might face the most unimaginable nightmare.
Collection
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
1957
Physical description
280 p.; 6.8 inches
ISBN
0345311485 / 9780345311481
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User reviews
LibraryThing member Meredy
Six-word review: Disturbing apocalyptic vision still delivers chills.
Extended review:
Like a number of other novels of Nevil Shute, On the Beach is a moving tale of ordinary people jolted out of the normal course of their lives and into something--this particular something very dark and
Here, the Northern Hemisphere has been obliterated by nuclear war and its radioactive fallout, and weather patterns are inevitably carrying the lethal airborne particles southward. Australia is among the last places to be visited by the deadly cloud.
The main characters are an Australian naval officer and his wife, an American captain of a submarine, and a young woman he meets in Melbourne. The story is set in 1963, a few years into the future from the time of its publication in 1957. I was a young schoolchild in 1957, and I remember having air raid drills in school--duck and cover, file out of the classroom in an orderly fashion and stand against your locker, get under something. Civil defense sirens were tested every week in our city, and every week the radio broadcast a test of a civil defense alert that would sound in the event of an emergency. In 1957, before Sputnik, before escalation of the war in Vietnam, before the Cuban missile crisis, there was the terror of the Cold War. Shute's imagined eruption of a third world war and its aftermath must have been all too plausible to those who had lived through World War II and found that the hoped-for era of peace had been dashed on the rocks of international politics.
More than half a century later, it still resounds with a chilling relevance. At a time when the news is full of panicky, overreactive shootings of civilians by cops, of cops by civilians, and of civilians by civilians, it's easy enough to envision a chain of major events set off by accident, a series of mistakes compounding, with irrecoverable, irreversible global consequences. In the end, everybody pays--at the mercy of a natural process after all.
What's so striking about this novelist's depiction of a world in its final stages is the relative calm of those who are facing it. There is little in the way of hysteria, and even denial seems for most to be a deliberate, conscious turning away from awareness rather than an inability to acknowledge what is about to occur. Seeming like madness at first, denial eventually becomes a saving grace. People appear to be able to hold two incompatible notions at the same time, acting as if the one were true even as they recognize the other.
An important theme is the stabilizing effect of routine and structure. This appears to hold true across all social classes, from the habits of the distinguished retired gentlemen at the club to the tram driver who keeps showing up for work. Taking courses in skills that they will never use, harrowing fields that will never be planted, following the rules of professional conduct to the last even when there will never be any call to answer for breaking them: abiding within these principles points to the strength of an inner moral sensibility and the compelling power of human dignity that transcend the eradication of everything we are. There is no comforting sense that life goes on and that someone will remember us; there is no assurance of any future beyond one's own consciousness. And yet even on the last day someone is still buying garden furniture and putting out plantings that will bloom in the spring.
That made some sense to me. I recalled that on the morning of 9/11/2001, I heard the news of the attacks in New York and Washington as I was getting ready for work on the West Coast. That morning my department director came around to our cubicles to see that everyone was okay. He told me, "Go home if that's what you need to do to take care of yourself." I said, "No, I need to be here doing normal stuff." Sticking to routine seemed to be a refuge, the closest thing to a feeling of safety that I could embrace on that horrifying day.
Shute's gift for making his settings compellingly vivid, supported by technical details that make his stories sound like conscientiously recorded histories, provides a solid grounding in authenticity. As a result his fictions have the ring of truth even when impossibly set in a future time. This, his best-known novel, allows us to both picture and ponder the unthinkable, and the hope it leaves with us is that even in the face of the ultimate disaster our humanity might be the last thing to go.
The novel doesn't explain the title, but Wikipedia does: the phrase "on the beach" is a Royal Navy term that means "retired from the Service."
Extended review:
Like a number of other novels of Nevil Shute, On the Beach is a moving tale of ordinary people jolted out of the normal course of their lives and into something--this particular something very dark and
Show More
troubling--that they must somehow face and cope with.Here, the Northern Hemisphere has been obliterated by nuclear war and its radioactive fallout, and weather patterns are inevitably carrying the lethal airborne particles southward. Australia is among the last places to be visited by the deadly cloud.
The main characters are an Australian naval officer and his wife, an American captain of a submarine, and a young woman he meets in Melbourne. The story is set in 1963, a few years into the future from the time of its publication in 1957. I was a young schoolchild in 1957, and I remember having air raid drills in school--duck and cover, file out of the classroom in an orderly fashion and stand against your locker, get under something. Civil defense sirens were tested every week in our city, and every week the radio broadcast a test of a civil defense alert that would sound in the event of an emergency. In 1957, before Sputnik, before escalation of the war in Vietnam, before the Cuban missile crisis, there was the terror of the Cold War. Shute's imagined eruption of a third world war and its aftermath must have been all too plausible to those who had lived through World War II and found that the hoped-for era of peace had been dashed on the rocks of international politics.
More than half a century later, it still resounds with a chilling relevance. At a time when the news is full of panicky, overreactive shootings of civilians by cops, of cops by civilians, and of civilians by civilians, it's easy enough to envision a chain of major events set off by accident, a series of mistakes compounding, with irrecoverable, irreversible global consequences. In the end, everybody pays--at the mercy of a natural process after all.
What's so striking about this novelist's depiction of a world in its final stages is the relative calm of those who are facing it. There is little in the way of hysteria, and even denial seems for most to be a deliberate, conscious turning away from awareness rather than an inability to acknowledge what is about to occur. Seeming like madness at first, denial eventually becomes a saving grace. People appear to be able to hold two incompatible notions at the same time, acting as if the one were true even as they recognize the other.
An important theme is the stabilizing effect of routine and structure. This appears to hold true across all social classes, from the habits of the distinguished retired gentlemen at the club to the tram driver who keeps showing up for work. Taking courses in skills that they will never use, harrowing fields that will never be planted, following the rules of professional conduct to the last even when there will never be any call to answer for breaking them: abiding within these principles points to the strength of an inner moral sensibility and the compelling power of human dignity that transcend the eradication of everything we are. There is no comforting sense that life goes on and that someone will remember us; there is no assurance of any future beyond one's own consciousness. And yet even on the last day someone is still buying garden furniture and putting out plantings that will bloom in the spring.
That made some sense to me. I recalled that on the morning of 9/11/2001, I heard the news of the attacks in New York and Washington as I was getting ready for work on the West Coast. That morning my department director came around to our cubicles to see that everyone was okay. He told me, "Go home if that's what you need to do to take care of yourself." I said, "No, I need to be here doing normal stuff." Sticking to routine seemed to be a refuge, the closest thing to a feeling of safety that I could embrace on that horrifying day.
Shute's gift for making his settings compellingly vivid, supported by technical details that make his stories sound like conscientiously recorded histories, provides a solid grounding in authenticity. As a result his fictions have the ring of truth even when impossibly set in a future time. This, his best-known novel, allows us to both picture and ponder the unthinkable, and the hope it leaves with us is that even in the face of the ultimate disaster our humanity might be the last thing to go.
The novel doesn't explain the title, but Wikipedia does: the phrase "on the beach" is a Royal Navy term that means "retired from the Service."
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LibraryThing member DeltaQueen50
On the Beach by Nevil Shute tells the story of the last month’s in the lives of the last people on earth, and although slightly dated, still makes chills run up and down my spine. Nuclear war has come and gone, there is no one left alive in the earth’s northern hemisphere and clouds of
From the very beginning of the book, the people know that their time is limited, the story starts on January 27th and they know that the end will come sometime by the end of August or early September. We follow a small assortment of people living in and around Melbourne, Australia, through these end times and see them live out their time with dignity and honor. There are times when one or another gets a little shaky, but overall I was very moved by how they handled what was coming, of course the war was a year or so in the past so they had had time to work through their feelings of disbelief and anger. Slowly the cities of the southern hemisphere are blacked out by radiation poisoning and eventually the sickness arrives and the last surviving people on earth ready themselves for the end.
In Nevil Shute’s On the Beach, the world ends with a whimper not a bang, but this was nevertheless a shocking and terrifying read. I can imagine that this book had a powerful impact when it was released in the early 1960’s during the Cold War and the Cuban Missile Crisis and such a future seemed possible. The author’s vision of a kinder, gentler end of life struck a cord with me, but sadly, I fear that people in today’s world of terrorism, religious intolerance and partisan politics would not go with so quietly or with such nobility.
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radiation are slowing flowing south.From the very beginning of the book, the people know that their time is limited, the story starts on January 27th and they know that the end will come sometime by the end of August or early September. We follow a small assortment of people living in and around Melbourne, Australia, through these end times and see them live out their time with dignity and honor. There are times when one or another gets a little shaky, but overall I was very moved by how they handled what was coming, of course the war was a year or so in the past so they had had time to work through their feelings of disbelief and anger. Slowly the cities of the southern hemisphere are blacked out by radiation poisoning and eventually the sickness arrives and the last surviving people on earth ready themselves for the end.
In Nevil Shute’s On the Beach, the world ends with a whimper not a bang, but this was nevertheless a shocking and terrifying read. I can imagine that this book had a powerful impact when it was released in the early 1960’s during the Cold War and the Cuban Missile Crisis and such a future seemed possible. The author’s vision of a kinder, gentler end of life struck a cord with me, but sadly, I fear that people in today’s world of terrorism, religious intolerance and partisan politics would not go with so quietly or with such nobility.
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LibraryThing member bragan
In this classic 1957 novel, humanity has played a game of global thermonuclear war, and everybody has lost. Everybody. Now, in Australia, the last (temporary) survivors go about their lives knowing that very soon the wind will shift, the fallout from a conflict they had nothing to do with will
I first read this as a teenager, in the 1980s. I didn't remember anything about the details of the story or the characters, but I have never, ever forgotten the feeling of it, the bleak, oppressive hopelessness of it all. Well, I don't suppose I could have; it's a feeling that cropped up a lot in my nightmares in those days when Mutually Assured Destruction was the law of the land.
Reading this book now is not quite the unbearably harrowing experience that it was back then, when some part of me genuinely believed that the kind of events it describes were not just possible, but a little too likely. And I'm glad of that. It's not something I'm eager to relive. But even now, man, it still hits hard.
It almost seems like it shouldn't. Shute's writing isn't anything special, and features a few stylistic quirks that don't exactly thrill me, starting with his weird refusal to use a scene break when he switches place and POV. And I don't truly believe that people would react to a situation like this exactly the way that the characters in this book do. But none of that matters, because it works. It works distressingly well. The understated, matter-of-fact way that Shute and his characters approach the end of the world is infinitely more devastating than any amount of angsty hair-tearing could ever possibly be. Mostly it's tiny little details that got me, that snuck up on me and kicked me in the heart. But there are a lot of those. Ultimately, perhaps, the entire novel is made up of them. Just one small, subtly heartbreaking detail after another, on and on, until there aren't any more left, ever.
Yeah, it's going to take a while for me to recover from this one. Although, now that I think about it, I'm not sure I ever actually recovered from it the first time.
Rating: I don't think I can rate anything that wrecked me this thoroughly anything less than a 5/5. I sort of feel like maybe I ought to. But I can't.
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reach them, and they, too, will die. They approach this ending with a mixture of fatalism and denial, and, if those things fail, large quantities of alcohol.I first read this as a teenager, in the 1980s. I didn't remember anything about the details of the story or the characters, but I have never, ever forgotten the feeling of it, the bleak, oppressive hopelessness of it all. Well, I don't suppose I could have; it's a feeling that cropped up a lot in my nightmares in those days when Mutually Assured Destruction was the law of the land.
Reading this book now is not quite the unbearably harrowing experience that it was back then, when some part of me genuinely believed that the kind of events it describes were not just possible, but a little too likely. And I'm glad of that. It's not something I'm eager to relive. But even now, man, it still hits hard.
It almost seems like it shouldn't. Shute's writing isn't anything special, and features a few stylistic quirks that don't exactly thrill me, starting with his weird refusal to use a scene break when he switches place and POV. And I don't truly believe that people would react to a situation like this exactly the way that the characters in this book do. But none of that matters, because it works. It works distressingly well. The understated, matter-of-fact way that Shute and his characters approach the end of the world is infinitely more devastating than any amount of angsty hair-tearing could ever possibly be. Mostly it's tiny little details that got me, that snuck up on me and kicked me in the heart. But there are a lot of those. Ultimately, perhaps, the entire novel is made up of them. Just one small, subtly heartbreaking detail after another, on and on, until there aren't any more left, ever.
Yeah, it's going to take a while for me to recover from this one. Although, now that I think about it, I'm not sure I ever actually recovered from it the first time.
Rating: I don't think I can rate anything that wrecked me this thoroughly anything less than a 5/5. I sort of feel like maybe I ought to. But I can't.
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LibraryThing member GirlFromIpanema
Argh! I haven't been so angry about a book for a very long time! I could take a bite out of the keyboard right now, and it's been two hours I read the last page of the book.
A while ago I got into a discussion on a film board with someone who insisted that the 2000 film version of the above book was
OK. I dredged amazon.uk and ordered the book in English (I had read it ages ago, as in years, in a shortened version). I had two very long train trips this week, so today finished it.
And I was so angry at the end. Not because everyone had to die because of a stupid nuclear war, but because of the way people were characterized and how they behaved. I cannot *believe* that people in the 1950s would have taken those characters seriously.
I am not even sure that the picture of women in this book is 1950s. More like 1930s, where your man is the one that defines you. I don't know how old Nevil Shute was in 1957, but it might have something to do with that.
The blokes fare a bit better characterwise, but I felt really insulted by the way the author described Cmdr. Towers, the American submarine commander. The man is supposed to be the commanding officer of a million-dollar high tech war ship with a crew of 100 or so, but he has his head in the clouds? All the time? Like John Osborne says in the book: "He's all right. Only a bat or two flying round the belfry."
I loved "A town like Alice" and have read it a number of times. But this one? Only when I want to scream.
A while ago I got into a discussion on a film board with someone who insisted that the 2000 film version of the above book was
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utterly ridiculous and that the 1959 film version and especially the 1957 book were so much better plotwise and characterwise.OK. I dredged amazon.uk and ordered the book in English (I had read it ages ago, as in years, in a shortened version). I had two very long train trips this week, so today finished it.
And I was so angry at the end. Not because everyone had to die because of a stupid nuclear war, but because of the way people were characterized and how they behaved. I cannot *believe* that people in the 1950s would have taken those characters seriously.
I am not even sure that the picture of women in this book is 1950s. More like 1930s, where your man is the one that defines you. I don't know how old Nevil Shute was in 1957, but it might have something to do with that.
The blokes fare a bit better characterwise, but I felt really insulted by the way the author described Cmdr. Towers, the American submarine commander. The man is supposed to be the commanding officer of a million-dollar high tech war ship with a crew of 100 or so, but he has his head in the clouds? All the time? Like John Osborne says in the book: "He's all right. Only a bat or two flying round the belfry."
I loved "A town like Alice" and have read it a number of times. But this one? Only when I want to scream.
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LibraryThing member figre
This was a classic. The operative word here is was. My understanding is that this was a groundbreaker in the 50’s, including a fairly well-received movie. But now, we are in different times. The understated continuation of life with the foregone conclusion of death by radiation sickness was
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probably quite compelling in the A-bomb paranoia that existed in the 50’s. (I can attest for part of this. I still vividly remember dreams I had where I woke to the world being destroyed by atomic bombs.) And this novel does have levels – the message of Australian’s paying for the rest of the world’s stupidity; the whole concept that death comes to us all and we should go gentle into that good night. But it is almost impossible to read this seriously anymore. The 50’s permeates it too strongly – particularly in its portrayal of women. All women see their actualization in their men. One wife goes on blindly (almost stupidly) ignoring what is to come. Another woman – if not the city slut, at least the city drunk – finds that the love of a good man (a chaste love for, after all, he has a good wife waiting patiently for him, even though she is already radioactive waste. Sorry, that was a little snarky) straightens her out. In the end, it is a stiff-upper lip ending and, again, I’m sure this was quite something in the fifties. The only reason to read it now is to get a feel for that part of that time in history, and to complete your readings of important, but not classic, science fiction novels of the fifties Show Less
LibraryThing member esoteric
A tepid little piece of post-apocalyptic fiction. The bland characters and bland prose might not be so bad if Shute's last-days take on Southern Australia didn't seem like such a painful stretch. If there were six months left until a cloud of lethal radiation completely wiped out human life on
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earth, I don't think I'd be heading to work anymore! Shute's premise had the potential to be as horrifying as Camus' The Plague, perhaps more so given the near-absolute certainty of the outcome. Perhaps the author didn't want to retread that idea? Even then, the result hardly does justice to such a frightening scenario. Show Less
LibraryThing member pokarekareana
A gloomy picture of the final weeks of human life after a global nuclear catastrophe; as someone who is barely old enough to remember the Cold War, I found it fascinating to read about this situation of which people at the time must have been genuinely afraid. Shute's writing is enthralling, his
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attention to detail a delight to read. The characters are well-formed and the plot is intriguing. I wouldn't recommend this book as light bedtime reading, but it is definitely worth a read. Show Less
LibraryThing member bigorangemichael
"It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine..."
That line from the old REM song pretty much sums up Nevil Shute's "On the Beach." The world has ended and everyone's pretty much OK with it.
Written in the late 50's and set in the near future of the early 60's, "On the Beach" finds World
It's these survivors that we meet in Australia. And they're all taking it pretty well. There's no chaos here. Everything is running fairly normally, except for the fact that we're all going to die in about six months. And not a pretty death, but a slow, painful one.
The big problem with this book is the quiet acceptance every character has of this. Yes, there are some characters deep in denial and some are planning for a world beyond six months from now, but never is there any sense of panic or desparation by anyone. The most panicked we get is they move up an auto race a few months becuase the time it's scheduled to take place will be after the radiation hits.
There are some moments of hope in the story that someone might be alive in the northern hemisphere or that the coming end might not come. But these are quickly dashed and then everyone accepts it with quiet resignation.
I'm sure when it was written, this book was strangely scary and virtually prophetic. But reading it now, it's a story that seems dated, with characters who fail to spark much interest for the reader. I haven't read a book since "Lucifer's Hammer" where I actively rooted for the apocolyptic event to happen already just to kill off some of the characters in the story and maybe get things moving. And that's the biggest flaw in "On the Beach"--nothing happens. We don't get to see the end of the world and nothing seems to make any impact on the characters. It's a hard book to read, not because of the subject matter but because virtually nothing happens and none of the characters are interesting enough to make the investment of time worth it in the end.
That line from the old REM song pretty much sums up Nevil Shute's "On the Beach." The world has ended and everyone's pretty much OK with it.
Written in the late 50's and set in the near future of the early 60's, "On the Beach" finds World
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War III has come and gone. The final battle was set off by a misunderstanding with the bigger nuclear powers shooting first and asking questions later. The result is the northern hemisphere is gone, nuked to oblivion and the southern hemisphere is waiting for the radiation to slowly spread across the entire planet and kills the survivors.It's these survivors that we meet in Australia. And they're all taking it pretty well. There's no chaos here. Everything is running fairly normally, except for the fact that we're all going to die in about six months. And not a pretty death, but a slow, painful one.
The big problem with this book is the quiet acceptance every character has of this. Yes, there are some characters deep in denial and some are planning for a world beyond six months from now, but never is there any sense of panic or desparation by anyone. The most panicked we get is they move up an auto race a few months becuase the time it's scheduled to take place will be after the radiation hits.
There are some moments of hope in the story that someone might be alive in the northern hemisphere or that the coming end might not come. But these are quickly dashed and then everyone accepts it with quiet resignation.
I'm sure when it was written, this book was strangely scary and virtually prophetic. But reading it now, it's a story that seems dated, with characters who fail to spark much interest for the reader. I haven't read a book since "Lucifer's Hammer" where I actively rooted for the apocolyptic event to happen already just to kill off some of the characters in the story and maybe get things moving. And that's the biggest flaw in "On the Beach"--nothing happens. We don't get to see the end of the world and nothing seems to make any impact on the characters. It's a hard book to read, not because of the subject matter but because virtually nothing happens and none of the characters are interesting enough to make the investment of time worth it in the end.
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LibraryThing member Stevil2001
In his book Rumors of War and Infernal Machines, Charles Gannon argues that "the discourse of nuclear literature has traditionally relied upon images because a personally meaningful quantitative assessment of the bomb’s annihilatory powers is impossible. Its size dwarfs and makes mute any
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discursive attempt to establish a connection between individual experience and the overwhelming total reality of a nuclear explosion." I definitely think this is true when it comes to On the Beach. It's the images that stuck with me between when I read this in high school (for class), reread it in college (for myself), and rereread it to teach it: the cloud of radioactive particles drifting south, the empty cities of North America, the seaman going out for one last fishing trip, the roads taken back over by horses. Shute's perspective on nuclear annihilation is oddly beautiful: even while nuclear war comes from the worst parts of our nature, he uses it to shine a light on our best parts. Everyone in this book does their duty up to the end, even those who didn't have any kind of duty to begin with. I started to cry when I read the last chapter, and that's the first time I've cried at a book in a long while. We no longer fear nuclear war the way we did in 1957, but the book is still a testament to how we all ought to confront death. Show Less
LibraryThing member Stbalbach
On the Beach is probably the most famous atomic war book of the 1950s and 60s, and Nevil Shute's best known book, along with A Town Like Alice. He has a unique vision of the apocalypse, more like catching smallpox or the flu as radiation the silent killer slowly spreads around the world
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exterminating all living things. Shute's characters are exceedingly sober and responsible, and those that cross the line or don't redeem themselves get their due. Yet in the end no amount of sobriety can save them and you are left wondering what is life for. Partying? Racing cars? Scientific exploration? Religious piety? Fishing? Making babies? These were questions facing a generation of WWII vets in the 40s and 50s who were home from the war with its adrenaline highs and who found civilian life boring and slow. Shute's characters act out of duty, even when it's obvious it no longer makes sense to do so. It was this same blind obedience to duty that caused the war. He is advocating, indirectly, the dereliction of duty - rebellion. Just on the cusp of the 1960s, On the Beach was a book of rebellion for the sake of life. Show Less
LibraryThing member devenish
This is one of the most terrifying and truly depressing end-of-the-world novels that has ever been written.Made into a film in 1959,starring Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner.Book and film tell of the last voyage of an atomic submarine in a nuclear-polluted world which is ultimately doomed.
LibraryThing member jimmaclachlan
Well written & so plausible that it's scary, it's also survived the test of time very well. Written over 50 years ago in 1957 by engineer Nevel Shute Norman, an engineer who owned a firm that made secret stuff for the British government, it amazed me by how the politics & cause of the war are still
The book follows about 6 people for the last 6 months of their lives. There is no explicit sex or violence. The northern hemisphere has been turned into a radioactive wasteland & the radioactivity is slowly moving south. Australia has about 6 months to live & they know it. They keep their civilization going. No 'Mad Max' scenarios. Just law abiding folks who know the end is coming.
It's fantastic & horrifying & depressing, but also neat on several levels. Shute shows us people at their very best after the very worst has happened. The coping mechanisms they use & the little problems they have & overcome. it's quite a fantastic journey & well worth the time to read.
I've never seen either film made from the book & don't think I care to since they screwed up the endings according to Wikipedia.
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so possible.The book follows about 6 people for the last 6 months of their lives. There is no explicit sex or violence. The northern hemisphere has been turned into a radioactive wasteland & the radioactivity is slowly moving south. Australia has about 6 months to live & they know it. They keep their civilization going. No 'Mad Max' scenarios. Just law abiding folks who know the end is coming.
It's fantastic & horrifying & depressing, but also neat on several levels. Shute shows us people at their very best after the very worst has happened. The coping mechanisms they use & the little problems they have & overcome. it's quite a fantastic journey & well worth the time to read.
I've never seen either film made from the book & don't think I care to since they screwed up the endings according to Wikipedia.
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LibraryThing member Deelightful
I knew it was going to be sad, but was absolutely devastating.
LibraryThing member jjmcgaffey
Well. That should have been an utterly depressing book - it starts with everyone knowing they're going to die, and no miracle appears to refute that. And it ends with every character we've met dying. And yet...somehow, as they individually work their way through this unwelcome knowledge, as they
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interact and make choices about how they're going to live while they still do, even as some of them reject the knowledge and pretend life will go on - it's not really sad. Strongly emotional, but not in the least sentimental, and they all make their choices in full knowledge - no one panics (that we see), they just go on until there's nowhere to go. I'm almost crying now, writing the review, but I didn't while reading the book; it seemed somehow inappropriate for me to cry for them. Very rich (well, it is a Nevil Shute, after all), chock-full of interesting characters and events. Definitely glad I read it. I can't help thinking of When the Wind Blows - kind of the same subject, but that one is full of pitiable characters helpless against events and is utterly depressing. Strange how this is so similar and so different. Show Less
LibraryThing member AnnieMod
What would you do if you know that you will be dead in a few months? What would you do if you know that humanity will disappear shortly after your death? Most authors will tell you a story of struggle and attempt to save humanity. Shute disagrees - in his novel humanity is doomed, even if they are
It all ended quickly - there was a war, someone threw a bomb, someone returned another and before the dust from the first one cleared, all nuclear arsenals of all nations in the Northern hemisphere were empty - and the end of the world began. There is noone left to tell the story - the people that did not die in those first hours died as the radiation settled on the land. And then it started moving south - due to the way the air masses move around the world, the Southern hemisphere got a bit longer - but Death was coming for them all. And it won't be easy - all the oil used to come from the North so people have to wait to die while finding a way to live.
And down at the south end of Australia, the last operational submarine of the US Navy tries to assist the last remaining command anywhere in the world - the Australian Navy's command structure is still in tact - even if they don't have any ships left - due to lack of oil. Early in the novel a second submarine is also available - attached to a friendly command in South America but as the winds keep on moving in their never ending cycle, that one is also lost.
The novel is not really about the apocalypse - it is there as a background but it is about the people and how to die with dignity. Some characters are almost cartoonish in their refusal to believe that the end is coming. Some realize all too well that they have no chance so they decide that this is the time to live - and drink all the good booze while at it. A man decides to participate in a car race. Another finds love but decides to resist it because he still feels married to his dead wife. And just because the world ends is not a reason for babies to stop being born or farms to be left untended. And people keep working and trying to find something to do.
The start of the novel drags a little bit - it seems almost pointless but as the novel continues that slow start makes more and more sense - the submarine's tour of the North Atlantic destroys the hope of a miracle and that tranquility becomes the counterpoint of the end. It does not even matter who started the war or the fact that as it turns out the retaliation strike was a mistake. One of the last surviving scientists has the best summary: the nuclear weapons got to cheap so everyone had them... even the country which should have been the last one in anyone's expectation to heat the Cold War - the first bomb was thrown by Albania.
Once the submarine is back, it is just a matter of time. And yet, people continue living. Maybe somewhere someone tries something. Maybe someone people decide to die earlier. But not the characters we get to know and the news do not report anything of the type either. As the stations of the world slowly stopped transmitting, the coming end is almost like a character of the novel.
Reading this in 2022 makes it sound too naive in places but at the same time it made me wonder if that passivity and "it won't happen to me" attitude is really that bizarre. I cannot imagine how that novel (or the movie based on it - apparently there is a movie) read to someone who lived in the mid-50s. And what will stay with me at the end is not the lack of hope but what people cared about at the end - their pets, the farm animals, their children, making sure that everything still looks good. And the big irony that rabbits will outlive everyone (that's Australia - they have interesting history with rabbits) and that Earth will be habitable again in just 20 years - but there won't be anyone and anything left.
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not ready to admit it. It all ended quickly - there was a war, someone threw a bomb, someone returned another and before the dust from the first one cleared, all nuclear arsenals of all nations in the Northern hemisphere were empty - and the end of the world began. There is noone left to tell the story - the people that did not die in those first hours died as the radiation settled on the land. And then it started moving south - due to the way the air masses move around the world, the Southern hemisphere got a bit longer - but Death was coming for them all. And it won't be easy - all the oil used to come from the North so people have to wait to die while finding a way to live.
And down at the south end of Australia, the last operational submarine of the US Navy tries to assist the last remaining command anywhere in the world - the Australian Navy's command structure is still in tact - even if they don't have any ships left - due to lack of oil. Early in the novel a second submarine is also available - attached to a friendly command in South America but as the winds keep on moving in their never ending cycle, that one is also lost.
The novel is not really about the apocalypse - it is there as a background but it is about the people and how to die with dignity. Some characters are almost cartoonish in their refusal to believe that the end is coming. Some realize all too well that they have no chance so they decide that this is the time to live - and drink all the good booze while at it. A man decides to participate in a car race. Another finds love but decides to resist it because he still feels married to his dead wife. And just because the world ends is not a reason for babies to stop being born or farms to be left untended. And people keep working and trying to find something to do.
The start of the novel drags a little bit - it seems almost pointless but as the novel continues that slow start makes more and more sense - the submarine's tour of the North Atlantic destroys the hope of a miracle and that tranquility becomes the counterpoint of the end. It does not even matter who started the war or the fact that as it turns out the retaliation strike was a mistake. One of the last surviving scientists has the best summary: the nuclear weapons got to cheap so everyone had them... even the country which should have been the last one in anyone's expectation to heat the Cold War - the first bomb was thrown by Albania.
Once the submarine is back, it is just a matter of time. And yet, people continue living. Maybe somewhere someone tries something. Maybe someone people decide to die earlier. But not the characters we get to know and the news do not report anything of the type either. As the stations of the world slowly stopped transmitting, the coming end is almost like a character of the novel.
Reading this in 2022 makes it sound too naive in places but at the same time it made me wonder if that passivity and "it won't happen to me" attitude is really that bizarre. I cannot imagine how that novel (or the movie based on it - apparently there is a movie) read to someone who lived in the mid-50s. And what will stay with me at the end is not the lack of hope but what people cared about at the end - their pets, the farm animals, their children, making sure that everything still looks good. And the big irony that rabbits will outlive everyone (that's Australia - they have interesting history with rabbits) and that Earth will be habitable again in just 20 years - but there won't be anyone and anything left.
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LibraryThing member BookMarkMe
A book I have returned to throughout my life. The sadness envelops me as if wrapped in a comforting blanket
LibraryThing member ladycato
The northern hemisphere has obliterated itself in nuclear warfare. In Australia, humanity continues to exist, at least for a time. In six months the radiation cloud will reach them as well. The book follows very different people as the end nears: the American submarine commander Towers; Moira, who
This is a creepy book. It's really a study of human psychology as humanity itself is at end. The characters feel very real. A few of the scenes really got to me. The pogo stick. The pills and needle that Peter had to acquire as part of his honey-do list for deployment. The sailor at Edmonds. I loved how nobly the situation with Towers and Moira was handled at the end, and it really made me love their characters.
There is a reason this is regarded as a classic. I am very glad I read it, and I'm keeping it on my shelf. I'd rate this as one of my favorites for the year.
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drowns herself in drink and parties; Peter and Mary, working on their garden and worrying over their baby.This is a creepy book. It's really a study of human psychology as humanity itself is at end. The characters feel very real. A few of the scenes really got to me. The pogo stick. The pills and needle that Peter had to acquire as part of his honey-do list for deployment. The sailor at Edmonds. I loved how nobly the situation with Towers and Moira was handled at the end, and it really made me love their characters.
There is a reason this is regarded as a classic. I am very glad I read it, and I'm keeping it on my shelf. I'd rate this as one of my favorites for the year.
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LibraryThing member crazybatcow
Maybe I just don't like "classic" apocalyptic stories?
There is way too much dialogue... the entire story seems to be told via a series of conversations. It's not that the dialogue doesn't tell the story (it has to 'cause that's the only story-telling in the book), but that the characters, for the
bah... it's just not very interesting.
There is way too much dialogue... the entire story seems to be told via a series of conversations. It's not that the dialogue doesn't tell the story (it has to 'cause that's the only story-telling in the book), but that the characters, for the
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most part, are just different names attached to the same "voice"... even the main woman character (not that she's particularly "main") is just a drinking version of the main male character, Most of the characters are in this book only because the story is told via dialogue which, of course, requires that there are people who talk. And because a woman can't be on a submarine in this era, the author created some male characters to go on the sub, and some female ones to stay home and cook and raise babies, etc, but, really, they all have the same point of view/opinion/understanding, except for the obvious "make this character have the opposite point of view so the 2 characters can argue and put in some tension"...bah... it's just not very interesting.
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LibraryThing member Topper
On the Beach is not a great novel, mainly because the characterization is poor. But that can be forgiven, because the novel is less a character study than a thought experiment. And the thought in this case is "how would people react if they knew the human race as they knew it were to cease to exist
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in six months?" And it's interesting how he imagines how Australians would react--I don't think Americans would react so stoically at all. Show Less
LibraryThing member unclebob53703
Another end-of-the-world book, it doesn't have the survival instinct of Alas Babylon or the civilization-starting-over theme of Earth Abides--everyone knows they're going to die and they do. The fact that they go about what's left of their lives with dignity (and some selective denial) only makes
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the end worse. Despite the foregone conclusion I found it impossible to put down. Show Less
LibraryThing member gendeg
My literary tastes lean more maximalist, and I have a more pessimistic view of humanity, so the fact that I enjoyed this understated novel about the last remaining survivors from a global nuclear apocalypse facing certain death was truly surprising. Like the radioactive dust that's circling the
The fate of everyone in On the Beach is pretty much sealed from the get-go, and yet you can't help but root for them and admire their respect for each other and grace in facing the end until the very last page. It makes you think: what would you do if you only had a few more months after some global cataclysm? Would we all slide into one kind of Purge-esque carnal anarchy, or would we keep going about our business, doing the chores, and tending the gardens, and still being neighborly and kind? Shute shows us the possibility of the latter scenario and it's utterly believeable--even to this cynic. Not often you get such a chilling, dark premise in a book, and finish it feeling strangely uplifted.
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globe in a gentle death vise, Nevil Shute creates a tightly written novel about facing one's inevitable doom with dignity that's no less gripping. The fate of everyone in On the Beach is pretty much sealed from the get-go, and yet you can't help but root for them and admire their respect for each other and grace in facing the end until the very last page. It makes you think: what would you do if you only had a few more months after some global cataclysm? Would we all slide into one kind of Purge-esque carnal anarchy, or would we keep going about our business, doing the chores, and tending the gardens, and still being neighborly and kind? Shute shows us the possibility of the latter scenario and it's utterly believeable--even to this cynic. Not often you get such a chilling, dark premise in a book, and finish it feeling strangely uplifted.
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LibraryThing member kvrfan
Most of us have played the mental game, "What would I do if I only had a few months to live?" On the Beach postulates a variation: "What would you do if you knew the entire world had only a few months to live?" You would be faced with the knowledge that not only you would be gone, but also everyone
The setting is Australia. About a year previously, a month-long nuclear war wiped out everyone in the Northern Hemisphere, and though no explosions occurred south of the equator, the resulting radiation is slowly swallowing the southern latitudes. How do the folks in the novel react? They seem to hit only two notes on Kubler-Ross' grief scale--with either denial or sober acceptance.
Mostly, they carry on as they always had, making the best of their remaining days as they know the end is near. The book is punctuated by a number of ordinary conversations, e.g. about planting flowers, getting milk for the baby, keeping up life at the country club. When talk moves to the war, people mostly express puzzlement. Nobody really comprehends what it was all about: "It all started with Albania." But that's exactly the point. There is a backstory here that none of us really knows. People moved by nationalism or ideology set this disaster in place, and what does it all matter now? They themselves are all dead, and soon all these good common folks who just wanted to live their lives in peace will be dead too.
So incredibly sad.
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you loved and everything you knew. No memory would remain that any of you had ever existed.The setting is Australia. About a year previously, a month-long nuclear war wiped out everyone in the Northern Hemisphere, and though no explosions occurred south of the equator, the resulting radiation is slowly swallowing the southern latitudes. How do the folks in the novel react? They seem to hit only two notes on Kubler-Ross' grief scale--with either denial or sober acceptance.
Mostly, they carry on as they always had, making the best of their remaining days as they know the end is near. The book is punctuated by a number of ordinary conversations, e.g. about planting flowers, getting milk for the baby, keeping up life at the country club. When talk moves to the war, people mostly express puzzlement. Nobody really comprehends what it was all about: "It all started with Albania." But that's exactly the point. There is a backstory here that none of us really knows. People moved by nationalism or ideology set this disaster in place, and what does it all matter now? They themselves are all dead, and soon all these good common folks who just wanted to live their lives in peace will be dead too.
So incredibly sad.
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LibraryThing member lunacat
There has been a war. Short in length, but devastating for the Northern Hemisphere. No one in Australia really knows what happened during those days, but they know one thing. Nuclear bombs were dropped, and now everyone up there seems to be dead. And the radiation is spreading. Slowly but surely
Peter is posted to a submarine that is going to investigate any possible signs of life, and track the progress of the radiation particles. He leaves behind his wife Mary and his daughter Jennifer. Also on the submarine is Dwight Towers, an American who was in charge of the submarine during the War. Now he's stranded in Australia and, with his wife and children in his thoughts, he gets distracted by Moira, a free loving girl set to drink her way to the end.
This isn't a story of survival against the odds, or of extraordinary things happening. Instead, it is about facing a death that is guaranteed to come. Shute pulls no punches, and the writing is sometimes clinical in its dissection of what on earth happened, but the story draws you in and takes your breath away.
The other thing I loved about this was the lack of sentimentality. This isn't about hysteria, and people screaming against the world and the unfairness of it all. Its about whether acceptance can truly come, and how one lives life when you are guaranteed to not have that life for much longer.
A quietly stunning apocalyptic novel with none of the hysteria or drama that would take the attention away from these people waiting for their deaths to come.
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its coming closer, and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it.Peter is posted to a submarine that is going to investigate any possible signs of life, and track the progress of the radiation particles. He leaves behind his wife Mary and his daughter Jennifer. Also on the submarine is Dwight Towers, an American who was in charge of the submarine during the War. Now he's stranded in Australia and, with his wife and children in his thoughts, he gets distracted by Moira, a free loving girl set to drink her way to the end.
This isn't a story of survival against the odds, or of extraordinary things happening. Instead, it is about facing a death that is guaranteed to come. Shute pulls no punches, and the writing is sometimes clinical in its dissection of what on earth happened, but the story draws you in and takes your breath away.
The other thing I loved about this was the lack of sentimentality. This isn't about hysteria, and people screaming against the world and the unfairness of it all. Its about whether acceptance can truly come, and how one lives life when you are guaranteed to not have that life for much longer.
A quietly stunning apocalyptic novel with none of the hysteria or drama that would take the attention away from these people waiting for their deaths to come.
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LibraryThing member sturlington
What if the powerful countries of the world waged a nuclear war so catastrophic that all life was destroyed, and you were stuck in southern Australia, watching the deadly radiation move slowly, inexorably your way? That is the question posed by this classic post-apocalyptic novel. The inevitable
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conclusion is rather dreary. However, the characters seem a bit too 1950s, and therefore not quite realistic. Still, it’s an interesting, if bleak, what-if scenario. Show Less
LibraryThing member keely_chace
Most depressing story ever? Quite possibly. After a nuclear holocaust in the northern hemisphere, an American submarine commander is stranded in Melbourne, Australia, only to await the change of seasons that will push the relentless advance of radioactive fallout south, bringing inevitable sickness
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and death to all. The novel explores the psyche of Commander Towers and the friends he makes in Australia as they adjust, deny, confront and ultimately accept their oncoming doom--and the end of the human race. Note: It's helpful as you read this book to bear in mind that it was published in 1957, a fact which does not excuse, but at least helps explain, its appalling attitudes toward women and infants. If you can get past women characterized as either simple-minded or merely frivolous, and baby frequently referred to as "it," then this story is a really fascinating portrait of how real people during the Cold War imagined and confronted the very real possibility of worldwide nuclear annihilation. Show Less
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