Please use the space below to write on any aspect of the novel. You might also want to check out The Road movie trailer and website here.
This interview with Cormac McCarthy appeared a few months ago in the Wall Street Journal. Please read it. Also, The Road was chosen for Oprah's Book Club in 2008, and Oprah lured the famously reticient McCarthy out of his writerly seclusion for a very rare interview. Watch a clip of the interview here. You might also want to take a look at how her book club presents The Road here. What are your opinions about the interview and about the book club's take on The Road?
I can’t seem to decide my thoughts on this book. I usually dislike stories based on apocalypses, but at the same time it’s written in an interesting manner. I absolutely love the description McCarthy uses, I just wish a little bit more happened in the plot. I finally gave up and had to read the last page of the book and I really hope more happens than what I suspect. On the other hand, I found it interesting that in the interview, McCarthy connected the father-son relationship to that of him and his own son. I also like that Oprah added this to her book club, though the link to her interview didn’t work for me. The trailer to the movie convinced me to actually give the movie a chance and looks pretty interesting.
ReplyDeleteI have seen the movie twice now. I started reading the book and despite a few things that don't happen in the same order, the movie seems to follow the book pretty well, and the director did an amazing job at picturing the universe. On the book itself, I am a bit bothered by the constant use of "and", several times in the same sentence. It surely slows the pace of the book which is MEANT to be slow (they are WALKING south on a road in a post-apocalypse world.. can't be fast) but it is a bit confusing and I often have to go back... nonetheless, the book is interesting and I'm "enjoying" reading it so far... if you can actually "enjoy" such a story...
ReplyDeleteBenjamin Bertrand
The novel focuses on the human conflict with death. The characters are emotionally calloused to death. The father and the son see numerous dead bodies as they travel, and the father shows no hesitation when he kills a man. The father even recounts how his wife took her own life and how they had had many long discussions about suicide (reminds me of Sexton and Plath). The father only lives because of his son. It seems that death would be a relief to him. What makes the father interesting is that he tries to hide death from his son. He always walks away to cough up blood, hoping that his son will not hear or see him. And when the boy wishes to join his mother in death, the father refuses to let him. He also tries to keep his boy away from any other human contact. His son is his only connection to life, so he clings to him and shelters him from everything.
ReplyDeleteThe first thing I noticed about this novel were all the items the father uses to see things: his eyes, binoculars, and mirror on the motorcycle. Each of those seem to provoke the images of past (mirror on motorcycle to see what's behind him), present (his eyes), and future (the binoculars to see ahead in the distance). I've just started the novel not long ago, so I'm curious to see if this amounts to anything. I imagine it will cause a contemplation on the events leading up to the beginning of the novel, especially if McCarthy wrote it in response to 9/11. Any insight?
ReplyDeleteFirst, I'd like to say that I was super creeped out by this book so far. I happen to read books like they are movies going on in my head, and the images I have gained thus far have been very disturbing. However, I am enjoying the style in which it is written. McCarthy uses short, choppy sentences that gets the ideas across in the simplest way possible.
ReplyDeleteWe talked about this in class today, but I would like to elaborate a little. He seems to be wanting us to think about where humanity gets its moral/ethical code from. In a world where religion is non-existent, there still seems to be some hopefulness and morality displayed by the young boy who knows nothing of the world before. In my opinion, this is saying that humans are born with a sense of morality without any outside influence. I like it so far, and I'm excited to get through the rest of the book so I can figure out what happened!
I really like this book so far, but it is hard for me to remember much about it because not much happens, or not much has happened so far. I really enjoy the single point of view that the book follows. the reader is able to experience the same discoveries and disappointments as the characters, and this makes the book very real and really draws me in. As i read, i feel as if i am with the characters, feeling the same apathy, and wondering who they will encounter next. That having been said, i would like to talk about a scene that stood out to me, because i had not started the book before wednesday's class.
ReplyDeletethe scene where the father throws away his billfold was very important to me. I liked the fact that the he had been carrying his billfold with him the whole time, and it had worn a hole through his pants. this reminds me of the way that the father's past haunts him and slows him down on his journey. he had to get rid of the important things of his old life for him to be able to fully focus on his new one. by throwing away the picture of his wife, his father is ridding himself of his wife's escape from the constant fear and misery in their lives. ridding himself of her image will help him to forget her, forget the past, and help him focus on his goal of helping his son to survive.
Cormac McCarthy is awesome. Three cheers for Oprah and her giant budget! I just thought it was cool that she was able to coax him out of his self-enforced seclusion, and get him on the tube. Her interview is fluffy but then, that's probably one of the things that appealed to Cormac. He seems to avoid and strongly dislike highblown literary talk -- doesn't he say at some point that he doesn't like hanging out with other writers or have them as friends. Fiction writers tend to be drawn towards practical aspects of life.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't say that McCarthy would have written the book as a direct response to 911, but, indirectly, that event has contributed to an already present sense of living at the end of human history.
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ReplyDelete*(Sorry, had to delete and edit a couple of times)
ReplyDeleteThere are some key passages that deal with our class discussion for the year..and I'll give my analysis on just a few.
On page 74:
"All of this like some ancient anointing. So be it. Evoke the forms. Where you've nothing else construct ceremonies of the air and breathe upon them."
-I think this is how people operate. Anything you consider a "purpose of life" or part of the "meaning of life" is something humans have constructed out of air. Even the names of everything we have and the intellectual systems we use are constructed out of air and breathed upon. Humans make their existence what it is and live by convictions that cannot be 100% certain. There is nothing inherently wrong with evoking forms; the problem occurs when people refuse to accept this is how they live or refuse to accept the fragility of their beliefs. The father's thoughts on page 89 illustrate the fragility of our "evoked forms:
"He'd had this feeling before, beyond the numbness and the dull despair. The world shrinking down about a raw core of parsible entities. The names of things slowly following those things into oblivion. Colors. The names of birds. Things to eat. Finally the names of things one believed to be true. More fragile than he would have thought...The sacred idiom shorn of its referents and so if its reality.
I think this ties into our discussions about trying to draw the line between inner reality and outer reality. What is really the truth? What would you believe if you had even forgotten the names of what you now believe in? In other words what is absolute truth?
On page 130 McCarthy gives us a great response to this question when the father sees "for a brief moment the absolute truth of the world." For the father his existence is "Borrowed time and borrowed world and borrowed eyes with which to sorrow it."
-----------------------------------------------One last note I found interesting was the father's attempt not to recall his memories too often, fearing that he would alter them:
"He thought each memory recalled must do some violence to its origins. As in a party game. Say the word and pass it on. So be sparing. What you alter in the remember has yet a reality, known or not."
This quote supports Wallace Stevens's ideas that our reality is a constantly changing entity. Current thoughts and emotions stain memories when they are called upon.
Finishing the novel was rather a bit of disappointment. I felt as though I was betrayed by the sheer simplicity of it. Man, who was sick, dies. Boy, who is sad, finds more good guys. Immediately. God and mysteries. The end.
ReplyDeleteIt just seems like the easiest way to end the novel. Are good people supposed to attract other good people? Like lucky goodness magnets? The ending turns the novel into a post-apocalyptic fairytale. A Brother's Grimm post-apocalyptic fairytale.
Maybe that is fitting, the novel is about human goodness after all. About survival with more than just survival- but, with love and morality. A morality that is not taught but inherent.
I personally found this novel to be one of the best I've read. Try to think what is really important in the world to you. If everything is stripped away but you were still standing...what would you stand for? What would the meaning of human life be? I know this sounds arrogant, but it seems like a lot of people have been shying away from what this book is really about.
ReplyDeleteI think McCarthy's statement "Borrowed time and borrowed world and borrowed eyes..." is what life is at its fundamental core. The Road highlights the irrelevance of each individual in relation to the universe. Too many people often forget this. Try to imagine if your most favorable situation was eternal nothingness (as the wife says it is)...what would you value in your human life? If all of your beliefs are proven false, what do you turn to? What makes humans any more special than anything else?
I have no problem convincing myself this is one of the most significant books of our time. The human race is in a dangerous position, for we keep working against each other.
I think our conversation about The Road should be a little more brave and open. Isn't anyone else scared that McCarthy's world in this novel is where our world is likely headed?
I found the ending of the novel completely irritating. I wish more had happened, in the ending and through the entire story. I understand that it’s supposed to drag on and whatnot, but I felt like I wanted more. Maybe a glimpse into the thoughts of the boy and father would have helped. But with the ending that was provided, I feel it was supposed to be hopeful. The last word being “mystery” says that they probably feel the future really is just that—a mystery. Also the word “humming” seems to be soothing, like a mother humming to her child.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe the ending was "irritating". I believe the ending ended the novel perfectly with a "here is the end with a non-obvious message, do with it what you want."
ReplyDeleteOne point that I made out and wanted to discuss here, is the feeling I got that this book had an underlying subject, the one of "American Individualism". When the boy talks to his father near the end, he asks if there could be people elsewhere. The father asks "Besides on earth?" and the boy said yes. For me, I believe that THEIR "Earth" is the United-States. We live in a time when the whole world is connected, when you can see pictures from every places in a few click or by opening some magazines or newspapers. In the novel, it is not the case, the "earth" for the boy is what he knows of it.. this road going down south. The Father's answer of "Besides on earth?" and "They couldn't live anyplace else" lead me to my point: people couldn't live out of the US, there is no way, even in this devastated earth, the US is the only place to be. Now there is also that with the "Good guys, bad guys". They have to "find the good guys" and stick with them in a good guy community, away from the bad guys. Isn't it what the US used to do? believing they were the good guys, and "God's chosen people" and needed to stay away from the World's matters? And what happened after they opened up? the USA waged more war than they ever did before. Now in this post-apocalypse world, they need to find new good guys and stick together again, to recreate this "isolationism" (spelling?) the USA were in at first.
My interpretation could very much be COMPLETELY off the spot, but hey, that's the one that came to my mind while reading it... and just like the ending of the novel: do with it what you want!
Benjamin Bertrand
Nooooo, I just spent 30 minutes commenting and the webpage timed out when I hit preview... and it's gone. (sigh) Here I go again, but shorter-
ReplyDeleteI definitely think McCarthy had a political agenda when writing _The Road_. The contradiction between the first and last paragraphs describe it well. The man dreams of a big scary monster, and when he wakes up, real life isn't much better. They have waken up in the life that is the future. This directs us to question the trek: What happened to get this way? Did we create this ourselves? The end paragraph comes and it only is there long enough to remind us of what the world use to be. Green, clean, efficient. It is clear (to me) that he is making us question if what we are doing is taking advantage of our home. What would happen if this was our world? It makes people think, and pushes us to change how we consume resources that may not always be there. I really liked this novel, and I hope that it does help to alter our society enough to help make a difference. Happy Earth Day everyone!
I suprisingly absolutely loved this novel. It's suprising to me that I enjoyed it so much because I'm usually more into the modern romance novels by Nicholas Sparks and of course I'm also a Twilight fan!! (cheesy I know)
ReplyDeleteI like books that trigger my emotions and this book was like an emotional rollercoaster for me. I cried, became resentful and angry at timees. It terrifies me to think of this being a possible future for mankind but these triggered emotions made the novel an interesting read that kept my attention throughout.
I became very attached to the young boy. It's hard not to. He has such a kind and innocent heart. His selflessness is intoxicating. It's also hard not to envy the father for his determination. The relationship between father and son created an emotional and heartwrenching plot.
I plan to recommend this book to all those who enjoy reading as much as I do.
I thought that we might be briefly talking about The Road again today in class, and I was hoping that we could spend some time on the old man. In my opinion, the old man's character in this novel was the most intriguing and most layered character McCarthy creates. I actually reread the whole scene from the time we are introduced to this old traveler to the time they part ways. At first he appears to be the most helpless and useless character that they've come in counter with thus far. But after their meal and conversations, this figure seems to represent all of the theological themes within the novel.
ReplyDeleteOne quotation I'd like to highlight is found on page 172. The old man says "Where men can't live, gods fare no better." This was in response to the father claim that his son was a god. Throughout our discussions we've only touched on the theological and spiritual themes of McCarthy's novel, but here I think that these minor themes take a larger role in the overall theme. In my opinion, this old man once had faith in a greater being, but after "surviving" and living out his days in the post-apocalypse he has come to the conclusion that there cannot be a god. In a world where there's no real hope (the one and only being to outlive the others), there's no sign of god. God survives as man survives. Perhaps the old man is hinting at religion being a man-made idea, and now that the existence of man is done for, so is the existence of god.
If we could I'd like to talk about it today, I know I was late getting this post out but I'm curious to hear what others thought about the old man and his ramblings.
~michael a.
McCarthy’s style feels like poetry as much as prose. He formatted the novel to create a visual aesthetic on the page that matches the imaginary aesthetic of the words. By removing quotation marks, almost all contractions, and spacing the paragraphs widely apart, the page appears as sparse as the apocalyptic world he creates. Regarding the voice McCarthy creates, the narration shifts between neutrality and moral subjectivity. McCarthy’s narrator uses objective though poetic description of the landscape but also pauses for evaluative moments to summarize the action’s implications. Also, the dialogue between boy and father falls into similar categories. Their conversations either address survival/objectives or the issues of morality which confront the boy in his upbringing in a violent, selfish world. Using only boy and father as the primary characters creates very interesting tensions about mankind’s primal, survival-oriented nature in the lawless post-apocalyptic setting. The father’s role in this story rarely deviates from protector of his offspring. He seems prepared to do anything to protect his son’s life and presumably insists on traveling South to help his son find a community for his upbringing and reproduction. From the father’s perspective, his son’s discovery of a girl and protectorate family is a success. The boy’s upbringing with no mother also creates interesting tensions regarding man’s tendency towards morality versus survival. The boy’s sympathy towards others shows that humans possess a naturally strong moral compass. Because the father never shows compassion towards others on the road, we must assume that the boy’s sympathies are entirely innate.
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