Cormac Mccarthy The Road Hope

The intentions of actions help decide whether it is morally good or evil. The man has many more blurred moral situations than the boy throughout the novel. One example of this is when he kills the “roadrat”(35), out of self-defense for his son. The man assures the boy “[they] are still the good guys”(39) even after he killed the man, because his initial intent was not to harm him. McCarthy demonstrates the idea that good gets evil and evil gets evil with the outcome of the “roadrat”. He refuses not to harm the boy and man and therefore gets killed. Although this exact situation is not the basis of the norm morality in modern society, it still helps demonstrate the triumph of good. In a regular world this intention of good can be applied to simple things, such as; a small lie in order to protect others. The novel helps demonstrate principles by using the extremes. In an apocalyptic

The father and son also have comparisons in their character, they have similar characteristics when it comes to being sensible. An example of this is when, the boy and the man come across a cannibal's lair. In this they find people being prepared to be slaughtered and eaten. In this instance both the man and the son fight to get out of the lair. They both feel the same sense of danger and unease proving that they compare to each other. Another instance of this is when the boy and his father come across other survivors walking along the road with weapons and a pregnant woman. This chills both of the characters and they hide and wait for

Imagine a middle-age man and a young boy walking on a road of ashes in a post apocalyptic world. A novel called The Road by Cormac McCarthy describes a similar situation of where a father and son are trying to survive in post apocalyptic world. However, the emotion of hope forms inside of the two main characters throughout the novel. The father’s role is to protect his son from dangers, and keep them both alive as long as possible. The son’s role is to keep his father’s humanity, and being a media of hope and goodness to the father. In the novel, the father and the son are traveling toward the coast and south to seek hope. On the road the father and the son have experience countless darkness, death, and terror, for example, the son is capture

During my summer, I read The Road, written by Cormac McCarthy. The novel, broadly summarized, is about the journey of a father and his son (both of which are never named throughout the story), heading southward in a post-apocalyptic setting that is covered with ash. The exact place in which the two are in is unknown, but it is widely assumed the United States. Along the way, they encounter little people, most of which are nefarious. They also encounter numerous conflicts, including starvation and grueling attacks by Mother Nature. After concluding this novel, you will come to realize McCarthy’s primary message in his work: Throughout all of the hellish things that occur in this world, there is still hope somewhere.

With nowhere left to turn to, they head back to the forests. The man can go no further and dies, leaving the boy on his own. Grief-stricken, his son returns to the road where he finds a family who takes him in and cares for him. He considers them the “good guys” like himself and his now deceased father. This source of compassion allows for the readers to take a breath of relief knowing that even in a decimated and twisted world, there are still kind-hearted people who seek to build a benevolent

The Road is a post-apocalyptic story about how a man who knows how the world was before everything took a turn goes on a journey with a boy who only knows the world as it is now. The world used to be so normal with tree’s and wildlife everywhere but now it’s so different everything is destroyed, the world is covered in ash, there is no sign of life… anywhere. As the man and the boy take this journey the man day in and day out thinks about the previous world but doesn’t want to tell the boy because he doesn’t want the boy really knowing how bad his life and his world is. The story entails that you can’t lose what you have looking for something that’s gone. The road goes on.

The Road, published in 2006, and written by Cormac McCarthy, is a book of it’s own. You can’t compare it to another, because there is arguably no book quite like it. Many think that while the novel is not as popular as McCarthy’s best works, it gives you just as much to read and think about. McCarthy did this through various literary devices. McCarthy’s dark themes, original Southern Culture, vivid dialogue, unique lack of punctuation, concealed structure, and exotic characters, are all significant in The Road.

The story focuses on the man and the boy, with the man being the boy's father and protector. The man is very pessimistic in his view of the world, in complete contrast to the boy who is very optimistic and slightly naïve

While more positive about surviving, he wants to give up sometimes too, but the love of his father keeps him wanting to live. Though constantly scared of what might happen to him and his father, the boy represents the only light in the novel. Young and innocent he often sympathizes with everyone he sees on the road, although he has fears. He also cries often, but tells his dad that if “ I shouldn’t cry you shouldn't cry either,”showing that though he is a boy, he must mature in this broken world, more broken than any world a young boy should live in (270). He sees the world through a different lense than the rest of the characters. Both the boy and the world are filled with uncertainty. Asking many questions like if his father lies about their near death experiences or asking ‘what is the bravest thing (he) ever did?” to which his father replies “ getting up this morning”(272). Uncertain of the world yet certain of his fate, born into this world he had a different outlook on his life, though he knew he would eventually die. When things get bad the boy has the mindset that though “ a lot of bad things have happened” they were “ still here”(269). This helped him cope with the fact that he knew that the road has a dead end. The father believes that “ goodness will find the little boy. It always has. It will again,” and towards the end of the novel, the boy finds the good that he needs, before he would leave this world (281).

Although the world is dead, and hope for survival is small a father and son strive to live. They face cannibals, robbers, nature, and strangers. Throughout all of this the father teaches his boy how to survive how to stay a “good” guy. Not only does the boy learn from the father, but the father learns from the Boy. Cormac McCarthy’s novel, The Road, is a great depiction of a father and son that live to portray the theme of a Father and Son relationship through the literary uses of symbolism and tone.

Hope and humanity are two very important aspects of human nature and without it, life would be very catastrophic to mankind. Cormac McCarthy is the author of The Road. The Road is a dystopian story of an adventure of a father and his young child over a period of several months, over a scene impacted by an unspecified disaster that has demolished a large portion of human advancement and, in the mediating years, all life on Earth. The Road, is plagued by absence such as an absent hope and absent humanity. These absences reveal that without hope and humanity people can’t survive. Cormac McCarthy argues that without hope and humanity, humans can't continue to survive because when people lose hope, they lose their ability to dream for the future and humanity as a universal emotion, people must it have in order to survive for a long time.

Literature has always been a medium to express writer’s concerns; in her award winning book The Handmaids Tale Margaret Atwood warns of the instability in our patriarchal society, likewise Cormac McCarthy in his acclaimed book The Road also gives a warning; that of the fragility of human nature. Using the setting of hostile, post-apocalyptic America these authors explore what happens to both individuals and the wider society when rights and basic human necessities are taken away. Atwood creates the patriarchal dystopia, Gilead, which strips women of their identity and through her protagonist, Offred, she explores a society where human instinct is forcibly suppressed, but cannot be completely stifled. McCarthy on the other hand shows humanity which has not yet rebuilt itself and because of this basic human existence is a fight and the man’s survival is a constant battle throughout the novel. Using hostile environments as well as symbolism, metaphor and characterisation the two authors reveal their ideas about identity and, subsequently, human nature.

The boy and the father have strong morals demonstrating a high level of authenticity, especially in a world where morality is extremely uncommon. To be ‘authentic’ means to genuinely be yourself. Although, as presented by Existentialism, one cannot be their true self until one has defined themselves. First, one must create their authentic selves, then they must live according to that (Varga). The father and the boy have strong principles to do what is right, even when their fellow survivors have completely abandoned morality altogether. At times, the father struggles with following said principles, however, he then justifies his actions which are purely for the safety of his son. This depicts that the father will do anything and everything to assure that the boy lives. The father expresses that “He knew only that the child was his warrant. He said: If he is not the word of God God never spoke” (5). When a man holds a knife to the son's neck, the father does not hesitate to kill him. Although this is

In a world that has destructed itself the most fortunate are those that are able to survive in the most inhospitable conditions. In Cormac’s McCarthy’s novel, The Road, a man and his son keep each other alive through their love which make their life worth living. With no food to neither eat nor clean clothes on their back, the need to survival is more difficult when the rest of mankind has turned their backs against humanity. The man learns that being good begins with taking any measures to keep the one he loves safe first, even if it means brutality towards others. His affectionate side is concealed by the forceful image that he portrays in order to survive; a skill that he hopes passes on to his son who has not yet understood the cruelty of the world. Therefore, the man is the real hero of Cormac McCarthy’s novel, The Road because he possesses heroic characteristics that are realistic to the situation unlike, the boy who speaks and acts bluntly from a naïve point of view as he lacks understanding.

Where there is life, there is hope.” In The Road by Cormac McCarthy a recurring theme is hope, whether it is losing or gaining it. Throughout this novel there are countless instances and events that occur in which all seems lost at a dead end, but in this moment hope carries through and flourishes. In this post apocalyptic world the man and boy or fight to stay alive while keeping their humanity. As well as searching for what humanity is left in this kill or be killed cannibalistic planet. As their time journeying down the road increases, so do the dangers they face to survive. The more they overcome the more hope thrives in them showing that in even in the most catastrophic events having hope helps them get closer to finding the light at the end of the tunnel. Hope is the reason why, the father and son travel to find shelter, hope is the reason why they haven’t giving up on humanity and the son is the father’s hope that is the reason why he is still alive.