When you talk about writing a post-apocalyptic story, the general theme tends to be the ongoing struggle to survive after a huge event wracks humanity, tearing down civilisation as we know it. There are stories abound of this, where man is pitted against man, unspeakable mutated horrors, scorched and inhospitable landscapes, and from these darned hell holes are sprung heroes, who go around, doing what they do, bringing order to chaos.
A main theme in these stories does strongly assert itself. Hope. Hope from the rubble and mess; somehow humanity manages to rebuild itself and begins to become stronger in the process. As the saying goes 'What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger' and it couldn't be more wrong in these stories. It is a generalisation of course and sometimes humanity's struggle doesn't always go to plan, and sometimes it is a long and hard slog.
The most common cause of an imagined apocalypse is war. Specifically, nuclear war. Ever since the fact that atomic weapons actually existed had permeated into popular culture, many have imagined what would happen if nuclear war were to occur. What would spark it off? What effect would the war have? When would it start? And how would humanity pick up the pieces during and after the war came to an end? Typical stories focussed on all these aspects, with varying and imaginative results.
These stories exist in varying formats, as novels, short stories, comic stories and video games. For the last few months, I have been immersing myself in the very popular First Person Shooter game, Fallout 3. The game is set in the year 2277, 200 years after a nuclear war which began in 2077. This really helped put things in perspective, as you could experience a post-apocalyptic environment, interact with it and play your own part in the story. In all senses apart from smell, touch and taste.
I feel ready to write my own story, not to plagiarise what is already there, but to impart on the world my own take on the subject. For a while, I'm been playing with a couple of ideas in my mind, one to do with a massively destructive war, the other one isn't. That other idea is more biological, and imagines the world when a supermould destroys virtually all plantlife on Earth, leaving grey remains and choking dust. And a lot of hungry people.
For my war story, well war stories as it were, I plan to tell this from both sides, both before and after war begins. Before the war, I wanted to write a number of short stories, personal accounts of life pre-war, showing all the little facets of a timebomb ready to go off, to show how things fell, through the eyes of the people who would have to experience it. And after, something different, but that's all I'll say on that matter for now.
A main theme in these stories does strongly assert itself. Hope. Hope from the rubble and mess; somehow humanity manages to rebuild itself and begins to become stronger in the process. As the saying goes 'What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger' and it couldn't be more wrong in these stories. It is a generalisation of course and sometimes humanity's struggle doesn't always go to plan, and sometimes it is a long and hard slog.
The most common cause of an imagined apocalypse is war. Specifically, nuclear war. Ever since the fact that atomic weapons actually existed had permeated into popular culture, many have imagined what would happen if nuclear war were to occur. What would spark it off? What effect would the war have? When would it start? And how would humanity pick up the pieces during and after the war came to an end? Typical stories focussed on all these aspects, with varying and imaginative results.
These stories exist in varying formats, as novels, short stories, comic stories and video games. For the last few months, I have been immersing myself in the very popular First Person Shooter game, Fallout 3. The game is set in the year 2277, 200 years after a nuclear war which began in 2077. This really helped put things in perspective, as you could experience a post-apocalyptic environment, interact with it and play your own part in the story. In all senses apart from smell, touch and taste.
I feel ready to write my own story, not to plagiarise what is already there, but to impart on the world my own take on the subject. For a while, I'm been playing with a couple of ideas in my mind, one to do with a massively destructive war, the other one isn't. That other idea is more biological, and imagines the world when a supermould destroys virtually all plantlife on Earth, leaving grey remains and choking dust. And a lot of hungry people.
For my war story, well war stories as it were, I plan to tell this from both sides, both before and after war begins. Before the war, I wanted to write a number of short stories, personal accounts of life pre-war, showing all the little facets of a timebomb ready to go off, to show how things fell, through the eyes of the people who would have to experience it. And after, something different, but that's all I'll say on that matter for now.
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