{"product_id":"the-people-of-the-ruins-9780262549073","title":"The People of the Ruins","description":"\u003cb\u003eTrapped in a London laboratory during a worker uprising, a physicist and war veteran awakens 150 years later--on the eve of a new Dark Age!\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn \u003ci\u003eThe People of the Ruins\u003c\/i\u003e, Edward Shanks imagines England in the not-so-distant future as a neomedieval society whose inhabitants have forgotten how to build or operate machinery. Jeremy Tuft is a physics instructor and former artillery officer who is cryogenically frozen in his laboratory only to emerge after a century and a half to a disquieting new era. Though at first Tuft is disconcerted by the failure of his own era's smug doctrine of Progress, he eventually decides that he prefers the postcivilized life. But, when the northern English and Welsh tribes invade, Tuft must set about reinventing weapons of mass destruction. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eOne of the most critically acclaimed and popular postwar stories of its day, \u003ci\u003eThe People of the Ruins\u003c\/i\u003e captured a feeling that was common among those who had fought and survived the Great War: haunted by trauma and guilt, its protagonist feels out of time and out of place, unsure of what is real or unreal. Shanks implies in this seminal work, as Paul March-Russell explains in the book's introduction, that the political system was already corrupt before the story began, and that Bolshevism and anarchism--and the resulting civil wars--merely accelerated the world's inevitable decline. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA satire of Wellsian techno-utopian novels, \u003ci\u003eThe People of the Ruins\u003c\/i\u003e is a bold, entertaining, and moving postapocalyptic novel contemporary readers won't soon forget. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eEdward Shanks (1892-1953) was an English author, poet, critic, and journalist. He was the editor of \u003ci\u003eGranta\u003c\/i\u003e just before serving in World War I and is perhaps best remembered today as a war poet. \u003ci\u003eThe People of the Ruins\u003c\/i\u003e is his only science fiction novel.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eEdward Shanks (1892-1953) was an English author, poet, critic, and journalist. He was the editor of \u003ci\u003eGranta\u003c\/i\u003e just before serving in World War I and is perhaps best remembered today as a war poet. \u003ci\u003eThe People of the Ruins\u003c\/i\u003e is his only science fiction novel.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"MIT Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50893970276626,"sku":"9780262549073","price":14.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_61a4b744-c69b-4cfe-96aa-e5575bd0d1b1.jpg?v=1738243188","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-people-of-the-ruins-9780262549073","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}