Help!? The Road by Cormac Mccarthy

[Borntowin]

Help!

I'm so confused...can someone help me and explain to me:

1. How the book relates to the American Dream
2. How the book relates to Modernism or Post-Mondernism

thanks!!!

[Moe]

I suppose you could relate the father's need to keep going to the American Dream. All parents want better for their children; food, shelter, comfort, love etc. The father could not give up the dream and made the choice to keep the boy going when there really was no hope. I guess he thought through hard work, ingenuity and determination he could make a better life for the boy.

It seems that the dad found it impossible to give up on the idea of the American Dream. I think some parents would have chosen to kill the child rather than leave it alone on the Road.

I red the book a while ago. Did anyone see the movie?

[wiggicc]

This book is probably my favorite of all time. The father and son relationship is....i don't even have a word for it. i just hope i love my son(if i ever have on) the way he does.


I think Moe gave a good answer as to how it relates to the American Dream. I believe "hope" is the keystone of the american dream. That's all the man and his son had. Hope. When nothing is left, hope will be.


The Road also, in my opinion, shows a world where nothing is certain. Noone knows for certain what caused this post apocalyptic world or why it's the way it is. I think from this you can take our current political state in the world. With Iran and North Korea threatening to stuff nukes down our throats and all the turmoil in the mideast, noone knows exactly what will happen. The Road lets you see how precious life is.

[victorian.noire]

I had a really hard time with this book at first. i picked it up not really knowing what i was getting into, just that viggo was in the movie and he doesnt choose bad roles. so i was trying to reda it from the story aspect and getting frustrated as i wanted to know what happened that made the world like that, more back story etc.

than i realized that the apocalyptic setting was just a medium for portraying this father/son relationship....that made it slightly better, though i think its getting a lot of hype that it doesnt really deserve. it was well written, some really beautiful imagery, but i think it was trying to cover too big a concept for the format.

and i agree i would have killed the kid too. pretty hopeless situation.

[kjc]

I really liked this book. It is not an uplifting tale by any means, but, suggests what life might be like if all that is left is survival. It's like going back in time in a way to days when modern infrastructure wasn't around and people are forced into a very primitive way of life.

I haven't seen the movie and would love to know what others thought who read the book and then saw the movie.

kjc

[StephenKingman]

Did anyone see the movie?

Yes, i saw the movie last week and in my opinion it is just as good as the book which is no mean feat. It's not easy to match the dark and hopeless landscape evoked from the book but the movie does it in style, helped of course by excellent performances by Viggo Mortissen and Robert Duvall.

As for the two points raised by the OP, i guess the American Dream lives on in the hearts of father and son as they traverse the ravaged landscape towards a hopefully more comfortable existence. Despite their lack of food and shelter and danger around every corner, this hope, or 'fire' as the movie describes it, burns on in their hearts and it's a hope which, without spoiling the ending, ultimately proves rewarding.

As for modernism and post-modernism, the book carries a stark warning about global warming. The precise nature of the event which caused such destruction is not made specific and is left to your imagination but the message is clear: tackle the very real problem of climate change now before our future is destroyed and we revert to a cannibalistic and primordial state of humanity. Grim but not debatable.

[Fran]

I am not a fan of McCarthy but I read The Road mostly on the insistence of a workmate & because it was being discussed so much. I thought it was quite an uplifting read and I thought the father/son relationship was beautifully done. As to the American Dream I think it spoke to the drive in all peoples to keep going and hope for a better tomorrow. Reading the book while watching the reports coming from Haiti made it seem more realistic somehow and made me wonder if there are fathers & sons in Port-au-Prince today fighting from survival and going on when "there is nothing left except the will which says go on". It also make you ponder how thin the veneer of civilization is and how quickly humans can revert to what Thomas Hobbs called "a state of nature".
I have'nt had an opportunity to see the film version yet but hopefully I will soon and I expect it will feature in the Oscars

[pontalba]

I loved The Road, and agree with what has been posted above regarding the relationship between father and son. But seeking The American Dream...dunno. They were struggling to merely survive against the worst odds imaginable. I suppose part of the American Dream is never giving up, never quitting, no matter how terrible the odds are against us, so yes, that would fit.

I'd certainly classify The Road as modernist...although truthfully, the terms modernist and post modernist are, in a way, ambiguous.
Here is a quote from the Wiki article on Modernist Literature. [I'd post the link, but I don't have enough posts yet]

The general thematic concerns of Modernist literature are well-summarized by the sociologist Georg Simmel:

"The deepest problems of modern life derive from the claim of the individual to preserve the autonomy and individuality of his existence in the face of overwhelming social forces, of historical heritage, of external culture, and of the technique of life."[4]

[cwiley]

While I was reading The Road, I kept asking myself " why am I still reading this", but then I reached a point when I could not put it down and when I finished it I was speechless. The book is considered one of my best reads and to this day, I really do not know how to describe it.

[MrWright]

I found this article by Anthony Warde on The Road that might be of help regarding how the novel relates to postmodernism, particularly the role of the map in the narrative. According to Warde: "the map becomes a potent figure of the postmodern order of simulacra, images without depth, dimension or reference". It's worth reading the whole article