The Road Final Discussion

Double Bubble

        McCarthy would likely say the meaning of life is to preserve goodness and the just, moral behavior of humans and to find love, and as a result, happiness.  Live life through faith, which you will find in the individuals around you that give you love.  This faith gives you hope that will guide you through all the endeavors of life.  This idea can be garnered by the book from the connection between the two protagonists, in which they mean everything to the other.  Happiness in the book comes from a commitment to carrying the fire, being the good guys, and being with each other.  This is why the characters still live in a world in which death beckons; therefore, this is the meaning of life.  To have something worth living for.

        This book should be in the curriculum because it has powerful ideas of symbolism and those at the center of all human relationships.  It also has great use of literary devices and style to convey meaning, and excellent prose to engage the reader in a connected yet confused sense, much in the way the protagonists go about the novel.  Furthermore, the conflicts in the post-apocalyptic world are also those in the world of today; the exemplary perseverance and moral resilience of the protagonists against these conflicts is the greatest human achievement.

        The tone of the final passage is very contemplative and solemn as evidenced by the short sentences of deep meaning.  This is directly related to the style of the final passage, which is a short yet flowing stream of consciousness, like the trout in the stream, an icon of Earth as it was.  McCarthy uses detailed words like vermiculate and torsional to convey the great unknown of our as it once was.  The trout in the stream, a beautiful picture of the continuity and almost, the piety of the Earth, is juxtaposed with the searing reality -- that Earth will never be the same.  One theme that this passage coveys is the beauty and continuity of our world, that which we must preserve.  The trout could also serve as a symbol for humanity -- swimming upstream, against the obstacles of the world, bearing the burden of the world's sanctity, and eventually nonexistent, in The Road.  McCarthy's final views of humanity are not hopeful because he speaks of the world as something that cannot be reversed.

The Road Memorable Passage

"They squatted in the road and and ate cold rice and cold beans that they'd cooked days ago.  Already beginning to ferment.  No place to make a fire that would not be seen.  They slept huddled together in the rank quilts in the dark and the cold.  He held the boy close to him.  So thin.  My heart, he said.  My heart.  But he knew that if he were a good father still it might well be as she had said.  That the boy was all that stood between him and death." (p. 29)

• This passage clearly shows us a significant idea in the book -- that the man lives for his child, who is the light in the face of darkness
• The tone is somber and contemplative
• Boy as a part of his father's heart -- he lives, loves, and does everything through him and for him -- the boy pumps vital blood through his veins
• The boy, and the solidarity he provides allows the father to keep faith
• They are "each other's world entire"
• His heart still longs for the oblivion of death, perhaps -- but his commitment to fatherhood helps him survive and carry the fire

This passage could be connected to multiple thematic ideas -- among these are love, loneliness, and hope.  The boy is the man's hope to live.  It is most related to this idea -- hope and solidarity interconnected.

        There is something about this passage by McCarthy that exemplifies the idea of solidarity and warmth against the darkness and cold.  As a reader, we can see how overpowering the gray loneliness and darkness is and this passage, with the two protagonists seeming tiny and insignificant.  It is a vast world of hopelessness.  But the father has a small source of hope, his son, the reason why he keeps faith.  The father said earlier, "If he is not the word of God God never spoke."  The juxtaposition of this passage, of light and hope and life, against darkness and desolation and death makes the light all the brighter.  McCarthy does this effectively throughout the novel.

        And the boy as his heart, that which pumps vital blood through the father's veins, is a powerful idea closely connected to love.  The man is determined to be a good father, and this determination keeps him alive.  As human beings in lonely worlds, we strive for solidarity and connection.  We need a role in any world.  The father's is to love and sacrifice for his son -- this is what he lives for, and the boy's is to preach goodness.

        This passage shows me love.  Love for kin and other human beings, which is more powerful than darkness and hate.  It makes me feel grateful for my siblings, my parents, and everyone in my life that gives me light.

I am Legend and The Road

        Both I Am Legend and The Road are heroic stories of survival and preservation of goodness against odds in desolate, apocalyptic worlds.  In The Road, the boy often affirms that he and his father are carrying the fire.  I perceive this idea to symbolize that they are upholding moral principles and surviving despite the temptation to devolve to the brutality of human nature.  In The Lord of the Flies, for instance, the fire is a beacon for light, hope, and civilization, that which brings the boys back to a state of logical reflection -- the idea of being rescued -- rather than the barbarity of their hunting games and killing each other out of desperation.  This is also present in I Am Legend, in Dr. Robert Neville's determination to find a cure, put an end to the epidemic, and restore moral society.  He is also committed to survival, like the protagonists in The Road.  There are many similarities evident between Neville and the father of The Road.  They are alike in their selflessness -- Neville staying in the city of greatest destruction, "Ground Zero," as he calls it, to save the world, and the man sacrificing everything for his boy.  They are different in that Neville sacrifices generally for societal welfare, although he also sacrifices for his equivalent of the son in The Road -- his dog, Sam, whereas the father has no hope of saving the world because it appears to be generally decimated (destroyed more externally than in the film), and therefore sacrifices for his son.  Both stories display ideas of isolation and loss of hope.  They demonstrate the idea that hope is closely connected to solidarity, to having people to wallow with, to love, to mope with, to cry for, and to die for.  Neville and the father similarly draw strength from their companions, giving them motivation to keep their fight for goodness alive.  Solidarity is therefore also closely connected to faith, as faith is a synonym to hope, and the presence of people therefore gives us the idea of a god.  God resembles hope, and when the world is decimated, with no people to love, the world is godless -- as Neville asserts to Anna, "There is no God."  This idea is evident in The Road, with McCarthy generally describing the world in which the father and son live to be dark, barren, and godless.  But the father does say, also, that his son could only be proof of God.  He is the world to him.  He is his hope, his motivation.  This is why Neville is in misery when Sam dies; he is his only source of hope and love -- his only proof of God, so to speak.