The life of Robert Neville.

Robert Neville’s life was, as he put it, “monotonous horror.”  The interesting part is that he had gotten used to the horror, it’s the repetition of life that was such a droll to him.  He lived in a sort of limbo of emotions, not having a high point or a low point in the day. His life was one of perversion and twisted fantasies that were forged from a life of solitude. The interesting thing is that acceptance of this life, and odd dependence of it led to his death.

            At the beginning of the story we are introduced to a naïve Robert Neville, he spent his day making wooden stakes to stab vampires with. At night he would drink himself into a stupor. Listening to Cortman, egging him on to come outside. This is when you first notice the morality of Robert, you notice how he thinks to himself, as if he were talking to himself. Then there are the women, the ones who flaunt their goods at Robert Neville when he is looking through the peephole. His instinctual needs had the most destructive affect on him in the early days. He overcame these issues when he almost died one night by arriving late after visiting his wife’s grave.

            After almost a year of being alone, he spots a dog in the daylight. This dog becomes a symbol for hope to Robert and more than anything, a companion. Weeks go by and Robert tries to coerce the dog with food.  This obsession with befriending the dog really hits the reader with just how lonely Robert is.  When the dog dies, Robert isn’t sad. As he buried the dog, he just felt void of emotion. At this point you can see the mental toll that solitude has on Robert. He is slowly becoming less and less human.

            When he found Ruth, another human, he could never trust her. He even contemplated killing her a few times to go back to his old life. When he beings to show her compassion and regains a bit of his human essence, he is bashed unconscious and Ruth turned out to be a vampire spy. She warns him to leave. He doesn’t. This is because of his dependence on his life of solitude, it drove him insane, like it would to any man.

            The part that stood out as his true departure from humanity is when the living vampires roll up in a car and started slaughtering the dead.  Robert, felt bad for the dead vampires. He understood their agony and was furious about the butchery. Just before he died, he realized something. That in this new world. He was the monster.

           

-Jack