Benni McCarthy

barren wasteland full of ash and debris. Although there are a few survivors, without law and order, they must become the indefatigable defenders of their own lives. The will to survive and level of determination depicted by the characters provides McCarthy with the opportunity to create a story of hope and inspiration, however, the tale is solemn and harrowing. Throughout the novel, the father’s primary concern is his son. Although gaunt and ailing, he must fight for their existence. The…

The Red hunts conducted during the Second Red Scare beginning in the 1940’s and culminating in the early 1950’s took place in the United States. These hunts were enacted to find and expose Soviet sympathizers and Communist spies within the American population and more importantly, it’s government. These hunts culminated in hearings and trials aimed at exposing and removing those deemed “Un-American” by government law enforcement agencies, and federal investigators. Prior to the end of World…

Trash, a heartfelt story about three boys who wouldn't give up. In 2009, Andy Mulligan published a novel called ‘Trash’, a couple years later in 2014, Stephen Daldry released a film called ‘Trash’ based off the story from Andy Mulligan. The question is which is better, the Novel or the Film? The setting I envisage from reading the novel was quite different to the setting I watched in the film. Whilst reading the novel, I envisioned the dump site to be a very large open flat space filled with…

Everybody wonders about the future. People wonder if they, their children or even grandchildren will grow up in a safe, peaceful society. The Dystopian genre in fiction introduces a devastating turn on the future of the world in which no sane person would enjoy living in. Cormac McCarthy’s The Road delivers a compelling sense of misery in it’s shattered, dark atmosphere. The book focuses on describing it’s horrific world, developing it’s few characters, and adding warnings, which are all…

The Red Scare and Palmer Raids Between November 1919 and January 1920, at the height of the first Red Scare, the American Justice Department arrested thousands of people without warrants and federal authorities deported many arrested immigrants. Some of the prisoners were beaten and mistreated while in captivity. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer determined that the “Reds” were a threat to America. Though not well defined, the term “Reds” generally meant those on the far political left,…

Dark, dusty, lonely. Afraid, tired, hungry. Words that describe the life of those living in the faded, deceased country of what was once America. The Road by Cormac McCarthy, depicts the long and difficult post-apocalyptic journey a man and his son endure. Papa and the Boy have roles that completely reverse by the end of the book. They also go back and forth from maturity and growth when the Boy literally grows older, and when choosing right from wrong. The journey begins with Papa reaching…

providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of beauty and grace 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 46) The boy mentioned and the man are the main characters of the novel. In reading, the story it is apparent that the boy and the man have a very dependent relationship. They have no one, but each other in a post-apocalyptic world.…

In the book The Worst Hard Time,created by Timothy Egan,talks about stories from different people who lived in a Dust Bowl.The story sets with a description of the setting and takes place after the Great depression has happened.His goal in this book was to inform the readers on how the Dust Bowl affected many people and uses stories to describe how the Dust Bowl was like.The author also describes the book as a horrible place to live in by describing the ferocious storms how it and affected many…

The novel, The Road by Cormac McCarthy follows a father and his son in a post-apocalyptic world. They are forced to endure many tough situations, which make them test themselves and continually push their limits. Over time, the boy starts to become detached from the horrors he witnesses, which shows that morals are shed when one sees too many cruel acts. In the beginning of the book, the boy is desperately trying to hold onto his morals, no matter what he sees. Along the road Papa and the boy…

Cormac McCarthy’s novel, The Road, shows how a young boy grows to be independent. This makes me believe that McCarthy’s novel is a coming-of-age story. Through various aspects of his novel, McCarthy shows how humans are hybridized; we are a mix between dependency and autonomy and that determines our identity. As we learn, grow, and mature, we must find a balance between the spectrum of independence and community. In The Road, the boy was depicted as dependent on the father. If the boy needed…