A Look Back

   First off, I would like to apologize for the lateness of this post, and probably won't have very many readers for this final post. This post I would like to give my final thoughts on the The Road.

   The Road was one of the most unique and interesting novels I have read, and probably my favorite book I have read in school. Cormac McCarthy offers a fresh and depressing take on the post-apocalyptic genre, and creates an original piece out of a unoriginal genre. The type of book that any lover of the genre should read, in order to explore the spectrum of what kind of material the genre can create.

   The greatest aspect of the book is probably how underwhelming the book is. While that may bring about some negative connotations, it's what sets it apart. The characters are nameless and mysterious, they where their hearts on their sleeves. The world is gray and broken, not a colorful mutated wasteland. The underwhelming nature of the story creates a gruelingly realistic story. It makes all the hyper realistic problems that the Man and Boy run into feel that much more impactful and hard. 

   The story is sad from beginning to end. This is one thing that may turn some readers off, but again it makes the story feel that much more realistic. A broken world doesn't create hope or heros, but brings a need for survival and basic instinct, both of which the story offers plenty of. The death of the Man, and the abandonment of the boy is the crown jewel on the story and was a fitting ending in my eyes.

   The Road is a unique take on a very popular genre. It gives a hyper realistic spin to an unrealistic situation and plays it off perfectly. Each page paints a grey and grueling journey of two nameless travelers looking for a mysterious sense of hope. I greatly enjoyed the story and it's fresh perspective, and deemed it AP worthy, and highly recommend it to fellow readers. 

Sad Through and Through

   Having finished The Road, I can honestly say it is one of the most unique and sad books I have ever read. A truly different novel, not just for the apocalyptic genre, but generally as a piece of literature. It gave a fresh writing style that made the story that much more engaging and real.  A detailed and unflinching stream of descriptive consciousness that gave me a picture perfect description of the destroyed American landscape.

SPOILERS AHEAD

   It was also one of the saddest books I have read. The author never flinched away from making things harder and harder for the Man and Boy. Never giving them a break, injuring them, throwing evil their way, all one after the other. But did this make the story any less enjoyable? To put it simply, no. I can see how it may deter some readers, but it felt like the perfect way to write the story. The constant pain and trouble made the story of an apocalyptic world feel real, painfully real. I was able to empathise with the characters when they are sick, starving, or running from cannibals. And when  the Man dies, leaving the boy alone in a world where being alone means death, I felt the pain of his loss. The emptiness and sadness he must have felt, and the true feeling of helplessness were expressed perfectly by McCarthy.
 
 So a question that can be asked now is, was the book AP English worthy? And I would answer yes. The novel offers a fresh and original perspective on the post-apocalyptic genre. It isn't and outlandish and colorful action novel full of loud and impossible characters. It was a novel that gave an unflinching view at the downfall of mankind and the small flame of hope left in it.  Characters are minimal and perfectly impersonal. Nameless travelers that feel lost and unknown as much to the reader as to themselves. The lack of names, doesn't distract readers from their thoughts and actions and creates a sense of intense observation while reading. I have previously stated the author creates a uniques stream of consciousness that makes the story feel like it is in real time and everything that happens to them plausible and random.

  AP English students should read The Road to better understand different authors writing styles. A new analysis of character that doesn't use planted information and names but instead an observation of their actions and thoughts. It offers a fresh new piece to a somewhat stale selection of novels that seem all too familiar to each other. The brevity of the novel makes it a quick read, but also a new challenge to absorb the limited information that a longer novel would offer.

   I thoroughly enjoyed my time on The Road. The story and images it offered will stay in my head for a while and I will remember it as a truly different type of novel. Cormac Mccarthy dragged me on a grueling journey through a hellish America, and crushed my heart in the end. I appreciate the complex simplicity he created in his world and it stands as one the most eccentric, depressing, and beautiful novels I have read.

A Breath of Hope

   The beginning of the passage starts with a breath of hope in a hopeless world. The Man and the Boy discover a left over bunker, the bunker is full of rations and supplies. They spend days simply lazing around and eating. For once the two characters seem at peace and somewhat enjoy themselves. The boy is actually confused as to what is happening, he is not used to being able to sleep in, play checkers, or eat three meals a day. The Man simply enjoys watching the boy at peace, he bathes him, cuts his hair, and cooks for him. However, the Man knows they have to move on, the bunker is to dangerous, to good to keep. He knows at any time they could be discovered and killed and therefore his happiness is brief and brings sadness with it, a hurtful reminder of how good life was and could have been.
   They eventually leave the bunker clean and well fed and immediately the road begins to wear them down. The author again utilizes his ability to create a random and constant flow of events with immaculate description. The two stumble on an old man that feels more like a hallucination than anything. He is described as a pile of rags, filthy, and tiny. He is small and his dialogue is short any riddle like, answering many questions from the Man with questions of his own. He is a wanderer and is neither good nor bad, and therefore doesn't affect the Man and Boy greatly. However, it is an interesting as well as unlike the duo has experienced before. The wandering old man could serve as an image for the old world, still there but ruined and dying. Like the old world the old man is still trying to hold on, but has no real substance in the new and desolate world.
  As the rest of the passage continues the small breath of hope in the beginning of the reading begins to escape. The Man and Boy cross paths with a number of groups, all desperate, filthy, and trying to survive. The packs appearances create many short and stressful situations forcing the Man and Boy to stash their rations, and spend sleepless nights. In addition to them being on the run often the man is hit with a fever. Waves of diarrhea, cold sweats, coughs, and exhaustion crash on the man, making his already strenuous journey that much more difficult. The fever risks taking him away from his son and abandoning him in a unforgiving world. While the man overcomes the fever, the passage ends with a true sense of depravity and hopelessness.
   The Man and Boy notice a small group following and hide, waiting for them to pass he witnesses the groups members. Three gaunt men and a very pregnant woman. They wait and the group wanders down the road out of sight. The duo presses on and they notice a fire in the distance, they decide to investigate, and again there is a small amount of hope ingrained in their curiosity. What if the group is decent, holding onto the old ways, the "good guys"? The two stumble upon an abandoned fire and discover the charred and headless corpse of a newborn infant. While the author may be trying to create a ghastly and evil passage to make the reader rear back, I think he is showing how bad things are. Not that people are evil now, but the level they have stooped to in order to survive. It is a truly sad and heartbreaking passage in the book and makes what was a bittersweet beginning into a sad and deprived ending.
 

Continuing a Demoralizing Journey

   The Road continues and the story only grows harder and more depressing, as well as draw me deeper into the depraved world. The second quarter focuses a lot on the Man, and who he is as a father. The text shows what lengths and hardships he is willing to endure for his son's life.
   Their journey becomes exhausting with the introduction of a snowstorm. Heavy, thick, dirty snow cascades down on the weary pair as they try to push on. As if the environment was harsh enough, the snow soaks and freezes them, sucking the energy from them. They have to abandon their cart, their only worldly possessions in order to press on. This creates a new mental hardship to go along with the new physical one. They wander aimlessly, trying to  avoid packs of scavengers and slavers along the road. They find themselves without food, without water, so tired the man begins questioning if they can go on. But this hardship shows his true character, he puts all his effort into the boy. He carries him when he is tired, uses all his available resources to keep him dry and moving, even though it only makes things harder for them. The battle is endless and the reader witnesses their hardships in annoying graphic detail. I could feel the cold wet soaking into my skin, the frigid winds fighting my every step, and I only felt the pain and hoped something good would happen to them.
   The house is a huge part in the book, not only to show the depravity the world has turned to but also show the true character of the Man. Again the author creates this "live feed" of events as we witness the Man discover the naked degenerates being harvested for meat, the terror and adrenaline are felt as they run. The exhaustion is felt with every heavy step they take away from the house, they stumble aimlessly in the dark, hopeless and lost. I felt the pure exhaustion and the confusion the characters felt. In the heat of the escape the Boy is handed the revolver, but instead of a moment of bravery where the father says to be brave and fight back, we are shown a much darker and real scenario. The Man says to his son "You know how to do it. You put it in your mouth and point it up. Do it quick and hard"(113) This moment shows a dark truth of the world, that a boy can't fight back, that he can't defend himself, that killing himself is the way to fend off the evil. The passage also implies that the two have had the conversation before, that the act of killing ones self is a conversation needed in this new world, to escape the constant hardships and evil of the world.
   A very real moment is felt when the father holds his child in the dark and dirt, waiting for something sick and twisted to come out of the woods for them. His thoughts are played out, his thoughts about what he would do if they came. We see the man think about killing his son "Can you do it? When the time comes? When the time comes there will be no time. Now is the time. Curse God and die. What if it doesn't fire? Could you crush that beloved skull with a rock?...Pull him towards you. Kiss him. Quickly"(114). This moment is gritty and very real. It shows what the Man is willing to do to protect his son, even if protecting his son means killing him.
   That part of the reading really showed what Cormac McCarthy is trying to portray in the novel. A true feeling of hopelessness. He starves his character, deprives them of sleep, and puts them in a horrific situation. Again, it all feels sickeningly real, the father isn't a hero. He doesn't fight of the cannibals with a sword and gun, his son doesn't become brave and overcome the evil. They run, exhausted, hungry, lost and scared. Neither of them overcome the evil, because the evil is to great, and that feeling of hopelessness in the face of something to great and hard to fight is felt.
   Another demoralizing and poetic section of reading. The harsh world is expanded and felt in full force. The true nature and pain of the characters is expressed in painfully real detail. I don't know where the duo will do, face, or fight in the second half of the book, but I am excited and wary to find out.

Starting the Journey

   The road is a depressing, grueling, and beautiful novel. It follows two nameless travelers, a father and son, on their journey South in post-apocalyptic America. They are cold and miserable just like the setting, and they are all either of them have. The father's only goal is to keep his child alive, and the child follows him full of hope for a better life.

   Cormac McCarthy's writing style is what sets the apocalyptic novel apart from the thousands of others. The novel has no chapter breaks and drags out every grueling moment. This accentuates the man and son's' journey as an endless and grueling journey. McCarthy doesn't give a break or leave the characters ever, as a reader the endless hardship and misery are felt. They wander in a depressing gray and broken word, brought to life with McCarthy's description of the setting. The wet and dirt are felt as the two hold onto each other day after grueling day. The flow of writing creates a slow pace, the characters are never transported from one landmark to another. The reader never misses a tedious and painful step the characters take. When the characters are awake the reader is viewing their actions and follow them through they day until they finally sleep. 

   The flow of writing also makes all the situations the father and son find themselves in feel random, as if watching a live stream of their travels. A segment could be comprised only of the characters setting up camp, walking, looking, eating. But the next line they could run into a group of a Blood Clan members (cannibalistic and violent groups of survivors) and barely fight them off/run away with the few resources they have. The reader witnesses the aftermath, the emotional pain, all in vivid unrelenting detail.

   While the story can sometimes be slow, at the same time feels very real. The story isn't a brave hero battling super mutants and conquering the wasteland. It is a frightened father trying to be brave for his son, trying to survive in a grueling and unforgiving landscape. The characters are trying to find hope in a place without hope, and the reader never misses a moment.