Apocalypse

Worth reading: "The Last Man on Earth," an essay by Kathryn Joyce at The Revealer, on the enduring power of such books as 1984, The Handmaid's Tale, and Brave New World. Here is the first paragraph:

"In my father's favorite dark fantasy he is Mr. Mead of Ray Bradbury's short story, 'The Pedestrian': persecuted for walking alone at night without purpose instead of watching television, as everyone else does in a disturbingly-familiar authoritarian state of the future. That Bradbury's dystopia sounds a lot like Westchester, where my father grew up, or any other suburb, is of course the real chill -- an intended one, one of recognition."