Dieser Roman folgt einer Gruppe Menschen, die in einem fiktiven Großbritannien nach dem Zusammenbruch der Zivilisation durch einen Virus, der sämtliche Getreidearten befällt und abtötet, versuchen, ein Tal zu erreichen, in dem sie sich Sicherheit erhoffen.
Tatsächlich ist die Frage, wodurch die Zivilisation zusammengebrochen ist, hier eher nebensächlich. Auch die internationale und die britischen Reaktionen auf die Katastrophe sind zwar interessant und weisen spannende Parallelen zu tatsächlichen Ereignissen auf, werden aber nur knapp geschildert. Das eigentliche Thema des Romans ist, wie in vielen Romanen dieses Autors, die Reaktion der Menschen auf die Katastrophe - wie weit gehen sie, um zu überleben und ihnen nahestehende Menschen zu schützen, welche Dynamik entsteht in einer Gruppe solcher Flüchtlinge und zu welchen Taten ist der Einzelne fähig.
Eine durchaus spannende und zum Nachdenken anregende Charakterstudie. ( )

La Muerte de la Hierba narra el colapso terrorífico de la civilización y los estremecedores cambios que se producen en la superficie de nuestro planeta a consecuencia de una ruptura del equilibrio ecológico. Su poder de convicción le viene de que la acción tiene lugar, no en un hipotético y lejano futuro, sino en el presente. Los personajes son gente de la clase media que viven su existencia agradable y tranquila hasta que la hierba comienza a morir.

The Death of Grass is as visceral as it is vivid. John Christopher weaves a spectacular but scientifically grim tale of a pandemic and how it pushes humanity to the brink of its its very existence in a war for survival. The fact I am writing this during the Covid-19 pandemic makes it all the more poignant (one for the future generations).

The tale of John Custance and his battle for survival reflects on all of us. What makes the novel all the more relevant is that it leaves us on a cliffhanger, what's the future of humanity? ( )

This book was written in 1956, over 60 years ago. There's a lot about this book that hasn't aged well (the casual racism and misogyny), but there's a lot that seems every bit as relevant today (the plant-killing virus that can't be controlled). It's got a rather simplistic view of the rapid decay of society, but I don't think that it's horribly inaccurate (although I really have to question the idea of England mercy-killing it's own people with atomic bombs). The purpose of stories like this is to make you question how you'd behave in a similar situation, hopefully with a sympathetic protagonist. Well, I DID question how I'd behave, and it differed quite a bit from John Cunstance. I did not find him to be a very likable character, and I was not impressed by how quickly he would initiate or condone violence.
Speaking of violence - there's quite a bit more cold-blooded killing in this book than I'm used to seeing in books from this time period. There's even some references to rape and infidelity - topics I'd always assumed were, if not taboo, at least considered Not Dignified.
If you're going to read this book - just a quick warning that it starts off DREADFULLY slow until about the 30% point, and then it keeps moving along rather briskly for the rest of the book.
Finally - I've got to point out that the book has a glossary at the back that I didn't notice until I'd finished the book. It has quite a variety of terms that the reader may or may not know, and they give an interesting insight into 1950's readers. Terms that today would not need to be explained ("aftermath","ammo","hybrid","millennium"), but also some words that I'd never seen before and had looked up the definition while reading the text ("concupiscence" (lust and sexual desire), "phlegm" (meaning calm nature, not nasal mucus), "prodrome" (preliminary book or treatise))
Overall, I'd like to give this book a better rating, but the slow start and the not-aged-well parts are going to keep this from getting any higher than a 3 star. ( )

The Death of Grass is essentially a story about the collapse of human civilization. Since the agricultural revolution 12,000 years ago, humanity has been dependent on grass. Wheat, rice, barley, maize - all members of the Gramineae family - grasses. Even meat is grass, with grass being essential for raising pasture animals.

No matter the form is has or the processing it was subjected to before being finally consumed, grass constitutes more than half of world human calorie intake. John Christopher highlights humanity's dependence and voracious appetite for grass by providing a glimpse into a world without grass, and as you might expect - it ain't pretty. As global famine threatens, the thin veil of civilization is quickly stripped away as the world is consumed by hunger, war, and anarchy.

And all it took was a viral pathogen that targets Gramineae, humanity's primary source of calories.

Even though this story was written in 1956, it remains as relevant and thought-provoking as it was back then. Perhaps even more so today than it had been six decades ago. Despite human ingenuity, something as mundane as grass is as much of a mortal weak point for our civilization as it was thousands of years ago. Gramineae is both our food supply's backbone and our civilization's single point of failure, and the book manages to bring this point across this in a grim, bleak way: Humanity is nothing without grass. And if the grass goes, human civilization will follow. ( )