Summary-
Off on his epic quest to solve the mystery behind the vampirism, Neville scavenges for some microscopes. At first he gets a bad one, but he goes again to find the highest quality microscope. He then takes three days to master how to use the microscope. Through collecting the blood of a vampire, Neville extracts a sample that he then examines with his microscope. With research, he manages to determines that the specimen that he was looking at was a germ, a breed of bacteria. Through even more research, Neville begins to connect the dots. The germ explodes if it does not receive any blood. With that explosion become sporulation which he assumes is the makeup of the dust storms. It would explain the quick spreading of the germ since the germ, in the dust storms, would latch onto anything it touches to infect it. It leads Neville to search history for answers. He questions if the horrible Black Plague in Europe was due to a similar cause. He also finds that there are two varieties of vampire. One where the bacteria controls a living body, and one where a dead body is animated by the bacteria. Garlic was an allergen to the germ. All this knowledge lead to more questions about the vampires. This leads to more frustration on Neville's part which builds up to a tantrum which he resumes his drinking. He quits his quest until a miracle happens. One day, he encounters a dog, in the daytime. In an attempt to get it closer he talks to it. With no encounters with anything living, he hasn't heard his voice in a long time, his voice has a hint of hysteria. The dog runs away in fear. For the next weeks he puts water in a dish and leave it out on his lawn. He slowly befriends the cautious dog. Th dog had to be cautious to survive the vampire apocalypse, it had learned not to trust anyone. After around 2 weeks the dog arrives with a sickly appearance. Neville takes him in to cure him. The dog was Neville's only source of happiness, it was his best friend. He tried to cure the dog. He failed, with tears streaming down, Neville feels something broken in him. With the death of the dog, Neville becomes even more determined to solve the vampirism. He remembers a flashback set around the time of the decimation of the human population. He remembers seeing a crazy cult that believed in salvation from the apocalypse by believing in God. He makes another connection. The living vampires were from the insane cults. They had believed in salvation. It also connected the mirror and the cross. The cross and mirror reminded them of there old life and their sin towards the God that they worshipped. The mirror reminded them of the fiend they had become. It was so simple to Neville now, those weaknesses were purely psychological. He laughs for first time in a long time when wondering if crosses are ineffective towards Muslim vampires. His hobby became to hunt for Ben, his former friend. He suddenly finds a real living woman on one of his searches, Ruth. He brings the girl to his house, but he has a hard time trusting her because he had forgotten how to trust. He insists on testing her blood to see if she is infected. The girl willingly agrees, but sneaks out in the night. Neville catches her and tests her blood to find that she is a vampire right before Ruth knocks him out. All that is left of Ruth was a letter that explained her intentions and how she survived in the light. Ruth tells Neville that some living vampires have had there germ mutated to tolerate sunlight. Her original mission was to spy on Neville for the vampires, but she tells him that she grew fond of him. She warns him that her new society of vampires plans on killing Neville in vengeance for the deaths that he caused to the vampire society. On a night attack by the vampires, dark suited men came to kill the vampires. They were the new vampire society. They invade Neville's house and take him to their court. As Neville is waiting for his execution, he views from his prison, the new society. They fear him, he is an anathema. Ruth comes to bring him poison to make his death painless. Before his death Neville thanks Ruth and makes her promise to make sure that the society does not get too barbarian since she is a high ranking officer. With his death, Neville realizes he is a vampire to them, the last of his kind, a legend.
Quote-
"Full circle, he thought while the final lethargy crept into his limbs. Fullcircle. A new terror born in death, a new superstition entering the unassailable fortress of forever. I am legend" (Matheson 96).
Reaction-
The book was really questioning perspectives and morality. Morals are based on perspective. Neville kills the vampires for his experiment for the "greater good". The fear by which the vampires view Neville bring in a whole new perspective. The vampires view Neville in a way that Neville views the vampires. With his death Neville thoughts are shown in the quote above. Humans had viewed vampires as evil and feared them. Neville realizes that he was now that subject of fear, soon to be merely a legend in the eyes of the vampires. Everything has turned around. It has come fullcircle. The feared fear the fearer and the fearer fears the feared.
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