Cancer 48

Neville Shute’s On the Beach is a great book, if somewhat flawed about the impact of radiation after a nuclear war. If there is anyone out there who hasn’t read it (and that should be rectified immediately) then it is based around a set of characters living in and around Melbourne – the Australian one, not the Derbyshire one (the former was named after the latter, as Lord Melbourne, from Melbourne in Derbyshire, was Prime Minister to Queen Victoria at the time Victoria became a state). Radiation from a nuclear war in the northern hemisphere has been gradually heading south. It has killed every living thing in the north and is doing the same in the south.

The book follows a number of people who are dealing with the inevitability of death, some coping well, some less so. One person drives in a no holds barred race where several drivers are killed. Others turn to alcohol (for some there isa a cellar to be finished off). Some, including the hero’s wife, are in extreme denial. As the cities of northern Australia go silent and the people die, they are said to be ‘out’. Throughout the book there are frequent reports about how the radiation is gradually but inexorably heading south, how it will inevitably kill everyone. A submarine is sent north to see if anything has changed. The Golden Gate bridge is down, there is random radio chatter from Seattle, but it turns out to be a window banging in the wind. The submarine checks the far north to see if the radiation is decreasing and there is any chance for humanity. It isn’t, and there isn’t. It is the end of the world.

Having cancer which is going to kill you has some of the same qualities of the book, the knowledge of certain death, the wondering what to do with the remaining time, learning to cope, being unable to cope. No doubt some people turn to alcohol – I haven’t, though I have started drinking alcohol free alcohol which, due to my neurotic turn of mind, I believe is getting me pissed. Some people go into denial. I don’t. I am fully aware that in a relatively short time I am going to be dead. Unlike the characters in On the Beach I have no certainty about the timing, but currently I have rotten backache and I now assume all pains are associated with the growth of tumours. The only treatment available in On the Beach is drugs for suicide. I hope I will have access to something similar when the time comes – as I have said before, I have a fear of pain, not death.

The main difference between On the Beach and terminal cancer is that the rest of the world will carry on once you are dead, and will quickly forget you. That is a good thing, both carrying on and forgetting, and I am happy that the world will continue rather than be ravaged by the radiation resulting from a large scale nuclear war. There is one small problem though. In the back of my mind, and the back of my mind has many ugly compartments nowadays, hoarding thoughts and feelings that are not altogether positive, though it is better than having them in the front of my mind. In the back of my mind there is a jealous thought. I am jealous that you will all continue to live after I have died. I also have a selfish thought. Why can’t we all die together as in On the Beach? Of course, I do not mean these things. I am not really jealous (not much anyway), and I am not that selfish – not at all. The thought just passed through my head as I was writing this. It just goes to show that while analogies may be a useful tool when examining and attempting to explain the nature of the world, they can be wrong.

Still, On the Beach is a good book. Read it, even though I have given the end away. They all die, just as we all do in real life.