I think the general anxiety of the 1960s - '70s spawned our interest in the living dead. When people worry about the end of their world, they need a safe vessel for all their fears. Zombies provide that vessel because they're 'safe.

Max Brooks

Categorized in : Thinking People Worry

I think the fascination with zombies is that they don't obey the rules of monsters. The first rule of monsters is that you have to go find them. You have to make a conscious choice to go to the swamp or the desert or the abandoned summer camp.

choices summer thinking

Sometimes you find your path, sometimes it finds you. by Max Brooks

Sometimes you find your path, sometimes it finds you.

world-war-z path sometimes

1. Organize before they rise! 2. They feel no fear, why should you? 3. Use your head: cut off theirs. 4. Blades don't need reloading. 5. Ideal protection = tight clothes, short hair. 6. Get up the staircase, then destroy it. 7. Get out of the car, get onto the bike. 8. Keep moving, keep low, keep quiet, keep alert! 9. No place is safe, only safer. 10. The zombie may be gone, but the threat lives on.

cutting hair moving

I think Americans are at our best when we recover from a crisis. We've suffered some blows that other countries would have never recovered from.

blow country thinking

The dead walk among us. by Max Brooks

The dead walk among us.

zombie walks

Zombies have no memories of their former life. You wont see the undead trying to wash windows or do your taxes. All they know how to do is swarm and feed.

zombie trying memories

During the Qin Dynasty, all books not relating to practical concerns such as agriculture or construction were ordered burned by the emperor to guard against "dangerous thought." Whether accounts of zombie attacks perished in the flames will never be known. This obscure section of a medical manuscript, preserved in the wall of an executed Chinese scholar, might be proof of such attacks.

wall flames book

If I knew anything about what people wanted and was popular, I'd still be writing for 'Saturday Night Live'. I can only write what I want, and hopefully people will like it.

writing night people

Zombies will try to scale any surface no matter how unfeasable or even impossible. In all but the easiest situations, these attempts have met with failure. Even in the case of ladders, when simple hand-over-hand coordination is required, only one in four zombies will succeed.

zombie simple hands

There's a word for that kind of lie. Hope. by Max Brooks

There's a word for that kind of lie. Hope.

world-war-z kind lying

I wanted to serve. It was Desert Storm. I thought, 'I was a rich... by Max Brooks

I wanted to serve. It was Desert Storm. I thought, 'I was a rich kid, and America's been good to me.

storm kids america

They were viewed very much like castles, I suppose: as crumbling, obsolete relics, with no real modern function other than as tourist attractions. But when the skies darkened and the nation called, both reawoke to the meaning of their existence. One shielded our bodies, the other, our souls.

real soul sky

I don't mind my work being a record of the time it was written in... by Max Brooks

I don't mind my work being a record of the time it was written in.

records written mind

With so much protection, wouldn't one be able to wander among the undead ranks, taunting them at will with no danger of repercussion?

zombie protection able

There comes a point when you have to realize that the sum of all your blood, sweat, and tears will ultimately amount to zero.

sweat zero blood

...because I'm sure that as soon as things really get back to "normal," once our kids or grandkids grow up in a peaceful and comfortable world, they'll probably go right back to being as selfish and narrow-minded and generally shitty to one another as we were.

selfish growing-up kids

I think that most people would rather face the light of a real enemy than the darkness of their imagined fears.

real fear thinking

Since 2001, people have been scared. There's been some really scary stuff that's been happening - 9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, anthrax letters, D.C. sniper, global warming, global financial meltdown, bird flu, swine flu, SARS. I think people really feel like the system's breaking down.

iraq people thinking

After all we'd been through, we still couldn't take our heads from out of our asses or our hands from around each other's throats.

ass throat hands

But there were alternative media outlets. Oh sure, and you know who listens to them? Pansy, overeducated know-it-alls, and you know who listens to them? Nobody! Who's going to care about some PBS-NPR fringe minority that's out of touch with the mainstream? The more those elitist eggheads shouted "The Dead Are Walking," the more most real Americans tuned them out.

npr media real