Decay in Naples

Some photos from my last trip to Naples. It’s surprising how a city can be so full of live and on the other side have so much ruins, so much decay.

Cormac McCarthy: The Road

Since I read Blood Meridian a few years ago Cormac McCarthy belongs to my absolute favorite authors. So it isn’s surprising that I was deeply impressed by his dark post-apocalyptic novel The Road. A man and his son are on their journey across a desolated landscape some years after an unspecified catastrophe, probably a nuclear war. They are suffering coldness and hunger and above all they have to fear the cannibalistic bands of other survivors.

Maybe that The Road is no book about ruins but it derives from the same post-apocalyptic spirit which is nourishing the contemporary inclination to ruins and decay. Some critics call Cormac McCarthy even a “gothic” writer and The Road a “gothic novel”.

In Blood Meridian McCarthy described the barbarization of civilized people, and the book is much more violent than The Road. But the violence is part of the wild colorful life at the frontier. In The Road the violence is always present but more like a threat, like the darkness in the background. And therefore I fear that the film, which will be released in October this year, will convert the whole thing in a typical action movie. But I don’t think that this is the intention of the book. That is much more about the slowly and unspectacular dying humanity, about the apocalypse we deserve.

UFO Ruins

In Taiwan near Taipei there is an abandoned vacation site called San Zhi constructed of modular houses. It is said that there happened some fatal accidents during its construction, so that the project was abandoned.




It’s not only me who is fascinated by these photos. They are very popular on web pages dedicated to ruins and strange places. So it may happen that the ghost city of San Zhi will be one of the first of modern ruins which will be converted in a real tourist attraction.

Life After People

Life After People is a television documentary film shown on History Channel in January 2008. The film shows how animal life and plant life will develop when humans have disappeared. Slogan: Welcome to Earth – Population: 0.

Sure that this is a nice idea. But the really interesting thing is to watch with what a lust civilization is abandoned to decay and destruction in this "documentary". It’s a real satisfaction to see how skyscrapers and famous buildings are coming down, to see how animals and plants reconquer their old space.

The animation is not the best, there are a lot of video games showing better destruction and nicer ruins. I think the real kick is especially provided by the experts and scientists speculating how it will happen. They give the whole "fantastic" thing a kind of realistic background.

The audience liked it a lot, and because of it’s great success there followed a 10-part television series in April 2009.



A 2 minutes promo, but the whole film can be seen in 9 parts on Youtube.

Lady Liberty Ruins in Pulp Magazines

When Hollywood started to use the ruins of Lady Liberty as an icon to illustrate the coming apocalypse these images were long popular in comics and pulp magazines. As an admirer of pulp illustration this is not a small satisfaction to me. Pulp does not always banalize popular trends and images it’s as well capable of establishing them.

Astounding (1941)

Fantastic Universe (1953)

Tales of the Unexpected (c.1957)

Amazing Stories (1964)

All these magazines were published long before the Planet of the Apes (1968).

Faked Roman Ruin

In the rococo garden of the Schwetzingen Palace in Germany can be seen the roman ruin of a temple of Mercury.


But it was neither roman nor a temple, it was already constructed as a ruin (between 1784 and 1787). The classical taste of that time loved roman ruins decorating a bucolic landscape.

Photo Engravings

Fountains Abbey in North Yorkshire was founded in 1132 as a Cistercian monastery. Now it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.



These photos are from the beginning of the 20th century and it’s easy to see how the photographer was imitating the older steel engravings of ruins. The aesthetic view had been formed by painting and engraving.

Post apocalyptic cities

There are a lot of pictures like these in the web, they are offered as desktop wallpapers. It’s a pity that normally nobody cares about explanations, if they are taken from games, movies or made by some artist.

Anyway I like them, and they provide a good idea of the latest mainstream of the interest in ruins.

Abandoned quarry in Menorca

The quarry was used for hundreds of years and closed in 1994. It’s really impressive to walk through the artificial canyons. It seems that the engines cut the stone like butter.

Prypiat, abandoned city

Prypiat is a city in northern Ukraine and was abandoned in 1986 following the Chernobyl disaster. The movie about this empty city gives a strong impression and reminds a lot of the prophetic movies by Andrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky.