The Road by Cormac McCarthy

MadArchitect · Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2007 3:30 pm Post subject: Re: the Road

irishrosem: I think it would be much different to read this book as a parent.

Which is, in large part, how I imagine McCarthy to have written the book: as a parent.

(And considering that his wife left him alone? We still need to get to a discussion on the wife/mother.)

Incidentally, I'd still like to hear your thoughts on why females were more often the specific targets of accusations of witch-craft during the crazes of the 16th and 17th centuries (not to mention, in antiquity). In the appropriate thread, of course...

In fact, are we projecting onto the father ideals that he doesn’t even necessarily contemplate. There may be no need for the father to consider when and where to try and trust someone.

Along the same lines, I doubt that the father really goes through any process of considering the pros and cons of trusting any given person. He distrusts as a matter of course the presence of a small boy in one of the villages they pass through, and an old man who can only threaten their safety as a decoy. Neither distrust is particularly rational. But at the same time, I see no particular reason to think it disingenuous when they father talks of their being other good guys. The belief and the practice contradict one another: true; but contradictions of that sort can coexist in a person, and it strikes me as believable that they'd coexist in this particular character. (This ties in to what Mr. P and I were discussing in one of the threads pertaining to "The God Delusion" -- a conversation you instigated.)

irishrosem · Doctorate Joined: 19 Oct 2006 Posts: 536 Gender:

Mad: Based on this novel alone, I see how you might suppose as much.

Yes I guess the approach the father takes in The Road could lead one to believe the author is kind of a loner, but I had developed that idea when I read Blood Meridian.

Mad: And while this is the only Cormac McCarthy I've read (though it certainly won't be the last),

Mad, just to let you know, I prefer Blood Meridian. And my brother, who’s read The Road, Blood Meridian and No Country for Old Men, preferred NCfOM to both.

Mad: I'm aware that a significant portion of his other fiction has centered on the American West. That's probably what made me suppose that he valued family life,

I don’t read anything in American Western literature. Is family life a significant recurring theme in this genre?

Mad: In particular, he lacks one specific experience his father had: that of the actual apocalypse that precedes the events of the novel. I think that, more than anything else, confirmed for the father his distrust of others,

Yes I think the apocalypse would have propelled the father’s distrust, but I also think the wife’s choice would also encourage this same distrust. If you can’t count on your life partner to partner you through life, who can you count on? I think the father has concluded that there is no one to trust.

Mad: and while my memory is a little splotchy on this point, it seems to me that he's been rather meticulous about keeping that apocalypse a rather vague part of the boy's education.

And, as a result, McCarthy has been pretty meticulous in keeping the details from his readers.

Mad: Well, you do play in a hardcore band, and it is allergy season...

Heh…heh…heh…Mad made a funny.

Mad: Does the boy even have a theology? Based on the last several passages, it sounds as though he's more comfortable with his parental relationship than he is with the concept of God.

I don’t have my book with me, but the scene with Ely also has a discussion both about the father and the boy’s religious beliefs. If memory serves, I think the father states that he doesn’t know what the boy believes. I am fairly certain the father believes in no after life, and I think it unlikely he believes in a supreme being.

Dissident: I think there are interesting trinitarian processes at work here...the Father, Son, and Holy Fire...Where the father is willing to sacrifice himself for the son, the son is willing to sacrifice himself for the stranger on the road.

I think the references to both the Old and New Testament representations of god are fairly clear. The father, with his eye for an eye mentality, threat of killing his son, actually sacrificing his son to his dream for the world’s future; the son with his generous and sympathetic spirit to the least of the travelers they meet, his trust in others, his understanding of others’ sins.

Dissident Heart · Posted: Sat May 12, 2007 4:55 pm Post subject: Re: The Road

Mad: Based on the last several passages, it sounds as though he's more comfortable with his parental relationship than he is with the concept of God.

I don't think comfort is the right word. He is actually quite unsure, uncertain, insecure, and frankly terrified regarding his relationship to his father, and everything else for that matter. What he is most secure about is an idea: keeping the fire alive...and he is hardly certain about this seemingly holy endeavor. Tied to this idea is the promise of a new home somehwere down the road...which, again, is less than sure. What is present in the son thruout all of this is his visceral, gut instinct to care and show sympathy for fellow tragedies along the road. Perhaps this is what it means to believe in God?

Irishrose: I think the references to both the Old and New Testament representations of god are fairly clear.

When I mentioned trinitarian, I didn't mean a distinction between Old and New Testament representations of God. I don't think the distinctions hold up entirely with the text, in that I don't think God in the Hebrew Bible is completely violent, nor is God in the New Testament entirely generous and sympathetic. I think Christians have far too long accentuated the dark side of God in their "Old Testament" while white washing the violence of God in their "New Testament".

The Father is Moses, the Son is Israel and the Fire is Torah and the Road represents 40 years in the desert on the way to the Promised Land, post-Slavery in Pharaoh's Egypt....

Edited by: Dissident Heart at: 5/17/07 11:32 am

MadArchitect · Posted: Thu May 17, 2007 2:05 pm Post subject: Re: The Road

Dissident Heart: The Father is Moses, the Son is Israel and the Fire is Torah and the Road represents 40 years in the desert on the way to the Promised Land, post-Slavery in Pharaoh's Egypt....

It doesn't strike me that McCarthy intended to write allegory, and I doubt that the associations are as form as you present them here.

Dissident Heart · Posted: Fri May 18, 2007 3:01 pm Post subject: Re: The Road

Mad: It doesn't strike me that McCarthy intended to write allegory

His intention is a mystery as far as I can tell. Why write about the end of the world, filled with terror and despair and heartbreaking loneliness...highlighting the very worst of human folly and brutality...providing short, brilliant glimpses of beauty, dignity...fantastic dreams of impossible futures...crushing despair, unexplainable courage...what is intended here? Allegory is certainly a possible, perhaps probable intention.

But we haven't really determined the actual relation between authorial intention and literary outcome. He may not have intended an allegorical tale, but he produced one nonetheless. I happen to think the Mosaic allegory I've suggested is present in the story. I think its obvious enough that the author probably intended it as such.

It may also be that the cultural/historical influence of the Mosaic narrative is so pervasive that our author could not escape its grip: stories about the end and beginning of the world, defining what is good and evil, will undoubtedly carry an intractable Mosaic flavor.

Edited by: Dissident Heart at: 5/18/07 4:01 pm

Chris OConnor · Posted: Mon May 21, 2007 1:53 pm Post subject: Re: The Road

Please let me know when you guys feel this book discussion should be removed as a Sticky Topic and replaced with another one. Thanks. ::80

MadArchitect · Posted: Tue May 22, 2007 11:54 am Post subject: Re: The Road

It's probably safe to unstick it now, Chris. As for a replacement, we haven't really discussed that yet...

irishrosem · Doctorate Joined: 19 Oct 2006 Posts: 536 Gender:

I had meant to write up something about the mother's role, but never got a chance. Since the book is totally out of my head at this point I think it would be more trouble than it is worth.

For an ad hoc discussion of only a few people this turned out rather well. I don't have a ton of time, as is apparently true of everyone else who contributes here. But I would be able to contribute at least as much as I did for this book. Is there any interest in doing another ad hoc discussion? Or do we want to just let this go?

BTW, D.H. since we did your choice first, you’re automatically conscripted into participating if we decide to continue on. ::10

Dissident Heart · Posted: Wed May 30, 2007 11:57 am Post subject: Re: The Road

I had hoped to spend some more time exploring McCormac's utilization of simile in the story...I remember when beginning the book how well he captured an impossible scene with an astutely crafted comparison. Uggh. Not enough time. Kind of like the book....end of time. The End.

irishrose: BTW, D.H. since we did your choice first, you’re automatically conscripted into participating if we decide to continue on.

Say when.

irishrosem · Doctorate Joined: 19 Oct 2006 Posts: 536 Gender:

Actually, I had said when we started this that I would be willing to read Chris's suggestion, Alas, Babylon, after we finished with The Road. I, however, think Chris might be too busy to get involved right now. If Chris is reading and thinks otherwise, let us know.

In the meantime, Mad, Mr.P., anyone else interested in doing another ficition book with D.H. and me. If so, any suggestions?


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