

Richard Matheson dies, aged 87 - alexholehouse
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-23043116

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gadders
That's a shame.

For those that only know I Am Legend via the film, I definitely recommend
reading the book. They don't have much in common apart from zombies and the
title.

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laumars
_> They don't have much in common apart from zombies and the title._

According to the BBC, the book doesn't even have zombies: _" Richard Matheson,
who wrote the 1954 vampire novel I Am Legend"_

I haven't read the book, so I might be making an unfair judgment here, but I
was fairly sure it was about zombies as well.

~~~
masterzora
That's pretty much a question of what the divide between zombies and vampires
really is. They are, in essence, very similar, especially compiling variants
of the myths. They are undead in some way feeding off of humans in a manner
that, some percentage of the time or by some means, turns the human into one
of them. Pre-Dracula vampires are generally hideous in manners that could be
confused with some versions of zombies.

The book is pretty explicit about them being vampires including distinctly
vampiric traits (nocturnal, traditional vampire weaknesses, killing them with
stakes through the heart.

The film of the same title, however, rides the line pretty close, coming
closer to vampires with the original ending. Their weakness to sunlight and
their intelligence are clearly more vampiric, but it doesn't really do much
more than that.

Either way, though, Matheson's influence on zombie fiction certainly makes the
vampires look more zombie-ish from a modern perspective and can probably be
uncontroversially explained at least as a stepping stone from between vampires
and zombies.

~~~
gadders
Let's just go with Zombires. Or maybe Vampies.

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varelse
Richard Matheson was the Donald Knuth of horror and SF TV tropes. A giant has
fallen.

As for _I am Legend_, _The Last Man on Earth_ was debatably the closest
adaptation.

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jdmitch
...a legend indeed ;)

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rfnslyr
He lived a long, great life and left a wonderful legacy behind and for that I
thank him. Goodbye Richard, you will be appreciated more than you will be
missed, a rare feat.

