The Road Essay - Grade: 89% PDF

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An essay analyzing the novel The Road by Cormac McCarthy....

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Post-Apocalyptic Humanity In the novel The Road, written by Cormac McCarthy, the term dystopia applied towards the fictional novel uses certain ominous tendencies that are reflected in our present world such as environmental destruction, religious sub context, and the language and style the novel is written in. Environmental destruction is explained as climate change and the weather. Religious sub context is used throughout the novel as a symbol of fire and the good versus evil theme. The language and style the novel is written in depicts an ominous tendency reflected in a dystopian environment. The beginning of the novel introduces the threatening climate change environment.

In our present world the threat of climate change is evidently present through greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution. McCarthy was projecting the ominous tendencies that global warming brought to the world by, “When it was light enough to use the binoculars he glassed the valley below. Everything paling away into the murk. The soft ash blowing in loose swirls over the blacktop” (McCarthy 4). The father and son are trapped in this dystopian environment that reflects a world destroyed by climate change that is now a land of murk and ash. The destructive weather in the novel causes the need for survival for the characters in this dystopian world. As the father and son travel south, “He thought the month was October but he wasnt sure. He hadnt kept a calendar for years. They were moving south. There’d be no surviving another winter here” (McCarthy 4). The novel reflects how the weather in present day is not a concern but when forced into a survival instinct the weather becomes the most vital variable that

can be the cause for death. In the novel the cold winter approaching is what the characters must avoid in order to survive.

The theme of carrying the fire is reoccurring through the novel and is projected through the son. The scholar article describes the theme of carrying the light as, “In The Road, individual meaning is symbolized in the son’s sacred responsibility to carry the light of consciousness the only thing of value in a post-apocalyptic world, into the overwhelming darkness that confronts him. This fragile possibility, however, resides in the individual, not within a culture or group” (Bortz 40). The son is responsible for keeping humanity alive in this post apocalyptic world and therefore he is carrying the fire; the fire that was humanity before the dystopian environment affected the world. The father and son continuously discuss what the difference between good and evil is with the father usually answering how they are good because they carry the fire. The man describes to the boy that, “You wanted to know what the bad guys looked like. Now you know. It may happen again. My job is to take care of you. I was appointed to do that by God. I will kill anyone who touches you. Do you understand?” (McCarthy 77). The father describes how it is through God that good and evil are sorted and decided upon. By keeping this faith and humanity the father is also keeping ideals from an ominous tendency from before the apocalypse.

The father and son in the novel are only ever acknowledged as such but the one character who is given a name is Ely, a man they encounter along the road. The lack of names is what, “The Road suggests, the names of the past become meaningless as

well. This is not to say that meaning has gone out of the world. The point here is that the nature of the meaning has changed: the method of naming McCarthy uses offers a refiguring of meaning in the language of the new, post-apocalyptic world.” (Kunsa, Maps the world in it becoming). Names are what humans identify as and are an essential part of humanity. By having the author remove and not mention the main characters names it reflects the dystopian world the author has created because it shows how names are something of the past that no longer matter. The convention of naming things is not as important as survival and human needs in the post apocalyptic world the author has created.

In conclusion, Cormac McCarthy in his novel, The Road, applies the term dystopia to his novel to create a bad place in a post apocalyptic environment in which ominous tendencies of our present day environmental destruction and religion are used with a language and style that reflects a dystopia. The parts that describe the dystopia are environmental destruction shown through climate change and the weather. The religious context is a symbol of fire and good versus evil. The language and style the author chose to write the novel in was used to reflect ominous tendency in a dystopian environment. Therefore, the post apocalyptic world will reflect aspects of humanity that exist right now in the world.

Works Cited Bortz, Maggie. "Carrying the Fire: Individuation Toward the Mature Masculine and Telos of Cultural Myth in Cormac McCarthy's no Country for Old Men and the Road." Jung Journal: Culture & Psyche, vol. 5, no. 4, 2011, pp. 28. Kunsa, Ashley. "'Maps of the world in its becoming': post-apocalyptic naming in Cormac McCarthy's The Road." Journal of Modern Literature, vol. 33, no. 1, 2009, p. 57+. Expanded Academic ASAP, http://link.galegroup.com.library.sheridanc.on.ca/apps/doc/A215306994/EAIM?u= ko_acd_shc&sid=EAIM&xid=d3b5392e. Accessed 7 Apr. 2018. McCarthy, Cormac. The Road. New York: Vintage Books, 2006. Print...