"The Road"

Paper Summary:

This paper examines how the Pulitzer Prize-winning 2006 novel "The Road", by Cormac McCarthy, centers itself around the long and unhappy journey of a nameless man and his young son in search of a safe place to live in a post-apocalyptic America where any kind of food, shelter or friendly community is scarce to non-existent. It looks at how along the way the man struggles with desperation to try to teach his son the skills he will need to survive in this harsh landscape after he himself dies, for the father suffers from an illness which, in this world, he realizes will be fatal for him.

From the Paper:

"The section of the journey that makes up pages 53 through 58 is interesting in several ways. It is the first time in the novel when the protagonists actually encounter another human being, and it does not turn out well. (We did meet the man's wife early on, but only in a flashback taking place in his memory.) The man they encounter, also unnamed like themselves, is a straggler or scout from a passing group of roving bandits / cannibals. The dialogue that takes place between the father and this man is one of the few long sections of dialogue in the novel (one of the only other ones is much later when they meet the old man who calls himself "Ely"), and so it is one of the few places where the reader can learn something of the father's personality and character. "

Sample of Sources Used:

• McCarthy, Cormac. The Road. New York: Alfred A. Knopf 2006.

More papers on "The Road":

• Book Review # 93447 : "Robert Frost and "The Road not Taken"
• Analytical Essay # 133873 : "Analysis of "The Road"
• Book Review # 69122 : "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost"
• Poem Review # 88969 : "'The Road Not Taken' by Robert Frost"

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