Cormac McCarthy’s novel, The Road, transforms our thinking about the world today by creating a world in which few things exist. In plain contrast to the devastated surroundings stands the man and boy's unwilling dedication to one another. In a landscape where nothing grows, their love flourishes and grows deeper, even as they wander into vast nothingness. Through McCarthy’s writing, the reader is left constantly thinking about the “absolute truth of the world” (McCarthy 130). The prospect of humanity in a world that was destroyed is explored through the man and the boy’s journey down the road, and how they interact with the humans that still exist. From this journey, a lesson arises of the ability to retain one's humanity in the face of ultimate
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Through the eyes of the boy, the reader is able to see the humanity that is desperately “glowing in the waste like a tabernacle” (273). This idea of morality, and that it only exists in the ways people do for each other, is the living definition of the boy’s existence in this world. For one, the boy’s intentions for every person left on the earth expresses the morality left in him, and also the idea humanity still can exist. As the boy and the father travel through this death-stricken world the boy is still able to see each human as an individual; the boy expresses concrete human emotion by wanting to help the man who was dying on the side of the road: “He's been struck by lightning. Cant we help him? Papa? No. We cant help him. There's nothing to be done for him” (82).The boy’s desire to help someone in a world which is utterly full with despair and hurt illustrates the difference between him and everyone else. Instead of surrendering to the circumstances and resorting to evil acts to live, like the blood cults, the boy carries the fire and does not compromise his higher human morality. Even his father does not have the capability of taking interest in the well- being of other humans besides the interest of him and the boy’s. In turn, the boy’s ability to possess altruism, even though he was born into the …show more content…
As the boy and the father travel down the road, the father deals with multiple internal conflicts. Since the father has gone through the pain of living through the destruction of the only world he has ever known, the morality within him is gone. The only thing that gives him “life” in this world is his son. Nevertheless, the father feels his job for his son it to: “take care of you. I was appointed to do that by God. I will kill anyone who touches you” (65). This inevitable and unmistakable love for his son is what drives the father’s internal conflicts about his morality; therefore, the act of taking his son’s life comes into his mind every day: “What if it doesn’t fire? Could you crush that beloved skull with a rock? Is there such a being within you of which you know nothing? Can there be? Hold him in your arms. Just so. The soul is quick. Pull him toward you. Kiss him. Quickly” (114). This is powerful for it displays the father questioning doing something unimaginable for the sake of his son. Seeing the death of his son as being “quick” and as if he was “kissing him” justifies the father’s intentions. In today’s world killing the child in which you cherished would be considered a crime and unjust; in the apocalyptic world the father sees killing his son would be letting him free. Ironically, the father ends up being
Through the eyes of the boy, the reader is able to see the humanity that is desperately “glowing in the waste like a tabernacle” (273). This idea of morality, and that it only exists in the ways people do for each other, is the living definition of the boy’s existence in this world. For one, the boy’s intentions for every person left on the earth expresses the morality left in him, and also the idea humanity still can exist. As the boy and the father travel through this death-stricken world the boy is still able to see each human as an individual; the boy expresses concrete human emotion by wanting to help the man who was dying on the side of the road: “He's been struck by lightning. Cant we help him? Papa? No. We cant help him. There's nothing to be done for him” (82).The boy’s desire to help someone in a world which is utterly full with despair and hurt illustrates the difference between him and everyone else. Instead of surrendering to the circumstances and resorting to evil acts to live, like the blood cults, the boy carries the fire and does not compromise his higher human morality. Even his father does not have the capability of taking interest in the well- being of other humans besides the interest of him and the boy’s. In turn, the boy’s ability to possess altruism, even though he was born into the …show more content…
As the boy and the father travel down the road, the father deals with multiple internal conflicts. Since the father has gone through the pain of living through the destruction of the only world he has ever known, the morality within him is gone. The only thing that gives him “life” in this world is his son. Nevertheless, the father feels his job for his son it to: “take care of you. I was appointed to do that by God. I will kill anyone who touches you” (65). This inevitable and unmistakable love for his son is what drives the father’s internal conflicts about his morality; therefore, the act of taking his son’s life comes into his mind every day: “What if it doesn’t fire? Could you crush that beloved skull with a rock? Is there such a being within you of which you know nothing? Can there be? Hold him in your arms. Just so. The soul is quick. Pull him toward you. Kiss him. Quickly” (114). This is powerful for it displays the father questioning doing something unimaginable for the sake of his son. Seeing the death of his son as being “quick” and as if he was “kissing him” justifies the father’s intentions. In today’s world killing the child in which you cherished would be considered a crime and unjust; in the apocalyptic world the father sees killing his son would be letting him free. Ironically, the father ends up being