The Father And The Son In Cormac Mccarthy's The Road

The father and the son lived in dark and dreary world, filled with violent people. In the book The Road, the father looked at his son for hope and mercy. The son carries the fire within him throughout the book showing that he has the light and hope to stay positive and survive through the rough and ashed world. The motif of this novel is light versus dark because they live in a dark place that they are trying to escape by making fires and the son carrying the fire. The way they lived was hard having no resources has changed the way people are living. At one point in the book they came across some road rats and they tried to kill the boy, the father ended up having the kill the man to save his son. The author described the man as “an animal inside a skull looking out the eyeholes” (McCarthy 102.5). He used the dialogue between the son and the father to show the two kinds of people that are alive in the post …show more content…
Life has been a major struggle for survival. The father’s legacy is the son, the son is the reason the father struggles to survive. That shows that the son has the fire in him the whole time. “All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one’s heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes. So he whispered to the sleeping boy. I have you” (McCarthy 54). McCarthy’s wasteland of the post apocalypse indicates his son is without a doubt the reason to stay alive. The father says all of that because he already has a sense that the son is special and worthy of something. The father has already lost hope in life and he doesn’t want his son to lose hope either. “He wrapped him in his own parka and wrapped him in the blanket and sat holding him, rocking back and forth. A single round left in the revolver. You will not face the truth. You will not” (McCarthy 68). The son could be lost and helpless to live on his father’s deathbed because the father realizes that without faith life is