The Road
Studying the Novel
As we read...
1. Keep a glossary
2. Remember to focus on the key themes:
– The past as a different world to the present
– The significance and meaning of the ending
• Tragedy and despair vs hope (especially at the end of the
novel)
– ‘Goodness’ and evil: the ethical nature of the
individual (what is good in this landscape?)
– The setting of the novel and its importance (setting =
time and place)
The Road: Context
http://pinterest.com/vakeswick/cormac-mccarthy-s-the-road/
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The Great Depression
World War II
The Cold War
9/11
Global Warming
McCarthy’s Writing Style
Look again at the opening few pages of the novel. What do
you notice about McCarthy’s style of writing?
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Lack of punctuation, including apostrophes and commas
Simple sentences, sometimes ‘run-on’
No semi-colons; few colons
No speech marks
In 2007, McCarthy appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show.
He spoke about his writing style, including his use of
punctuation.
“weird little marks”: http://www.oprah.com/oprahsbookclub/Cormac-McCarthyon-James-Joyce-and-Punctuation-Video
Narrative Style: More Thoughts...
• Is the opening section written in the first/third
person?
• What do we learn about the narrator from the
opening pages?
• Past/present or future tense? Why?
• Does anything interest you about the language in
this section?
• Looking at your terminology sheets, try and find
terms which (a) define the narrator and (b)style
of writing in the novel.
Omniscient narrator (third person)
• A narrator who is assumed to know
everything connected with the story narrated
BUT...
...this is a third person omniscient narrator
who shifts into the head of one character: the
man. It often sounds like the man is narrating
the novel. Whole passages describe his
thoughts and memories.
Omniscient narrator (third person)
Describing the man waking up
“He woke in the morning and turned over in the blanket and looked down the
road through the trees the way they'd come in time to see the marchers four
abreast. Dressed in clothing of every description, all wearing red scarves at
their necks. Red or orange, as close to red as they could find. He put his hand on
the boy's head. Shh, he said.”
Describing what he is seeing and thinking.
Compare with “He saw them dressed in
clothing of every description...”
This type of description is more immediate.
We see the scene through his eyes.
Omniscient narrator (third person)
This style of narration means that we do not know
what the boy does when left alone, or what he
dreams of. Sometimes, however, the narrator
describes events from the boy’s point of view and
these take on a special significance.
1. What is the effect of the third person narrative?
2. How would the story be different if told from a
first person point of view?
Free indirect style
Third person narration in which a character’s thoughts and feelings seem to be
directly expressed, freely taking on the views and often the language of that
character.
McCarthy uses free indirect discourse, a voice that blends the points of view of a close
omniscient third person narrator and the character's first person speech.
“With the first gray light he rose and left the boy sleeping and walked out to the road
and squatted and studied the country to the south. Barren, silent, godless. He thought
the month was October but he wasn't sure. He hadnt kept a calendar for years. They
were moving south. There'd be no surviving another winter here.”
Direct discourse: He thought, “there’s no surviving another winter here.”
Indirect discourse: He thought to himself that there’d be no surviving another winter here.
Free indirect discourse: There’d be no surviving another winter here.
1. Why do you think McCarthy uses this (technically very difficult) style of writing?
2. How does this style fit with the landscape/setting of the novel?
Narrative Structure
• ‘In media res’ – in the middle of things. We do not see
the events which cause the apocalypse
• Questions and answers between the man and the boy
• Chronological account of the journey on ‘the road’
south, towards the ocean
• Broken up by dreams, flashbacks and memories
• No conventional chapters
1. What is the effect of this structure? How does it fit with the other observations
we’ve made about McCarthy’s narrative style?
Other things to note...
• Use of compound nouns (two nouns joined together, e.g.
‘foldingtable ‘ or ‘eyesockets’) = no room for unnecessary spaces in
their world?
• Vocabulary: basic dialogue between the man and the boy; more
poetic, archaic vocabulary used in memories and dreams. A
powerful simplicity, e.g. “He rose and stood tottering in that cold autistic dark
with his arms outheld for balance while the vestibular calculations in his skull
cranked out their reckonings. An old chronicle. To seek out the upright. No fall but
preceded by a declination.”
• Short sentences, especially to describe horrific scenes, often
followed by long sentences which reflect on what has been seen.
• Unusual or coined words. A new world requires a new language?
• Polysyndeton: the use of several conjunctions, usually ‘and’, in
succession, e.g. “He pushed away the plastic tarpaulin and raised himself in the
stinking robes and blankets and looked toward the east for any light but there was
none.” This stresses the amount of effort the actions take.
Read the opening section of the novel. How many literary
techniques can you find? Annotate your copy.
When he woke in the woods in the dark and the cold of the night he'd reach out to touch
the child sleeping beside him. Nights dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each
one than what had gone before. Like the onset of some cold glaucoma dimming away the
world. His hand rose and fell softly with each precious breath. He pushed away the plastic
tarpaulin and raised himself in the stinking robes and blankets and looked toward the east
for any light but there was none. In the dream from which he'd wakened he had wandered
in a cave where the child led him by the hand. Their light playing over the wet flowstone
walls. Like pilgrims in a fable swallowed up and lost among the inward parts of some granitic
beast. Deep stone flues where the water dripped and sang. Tolling in the silence the minutes
of the earth and the hours and the days of it and the years without cease. Until they stood in
a great stone room where lay a black and ancient lake. And on the far shore a creature that
raised its dripping mouth from the rimstone pool and stared into the light with eyes dead
white and sightless as the eggs of spiders. It swung its head low over the water as if to take
the scent of what it could not see. Crouching there pale and naked and translucent, its
alabaster bones cast up in shadow on the rocks behind it. Its bowels, its beating heart. The
brain that pulsed in a dull glass bell. It swung its head from side to side and then gave out a
low moan and turned and lurched away and loped soundlessly into the dark.
alliteration
polysyndeton
metaphor
simile
personification
When he woke in the woods in the dark and the cold of the night he'd reach out to touch the child sleeping
beside him. Nights dark beyond darkness and the days more gray each one than what had gone before. Like the
onset of some cold glaucoma dimming away the world. His hand rose and fell softly with each precious breath.
He pushed away the plastic tarpaulin and raised himself in the stinking robes and blankets and looked toward the
east for any light but there was none. In the dream from which he'd wakened he had wandered in a cave where
the child led him by the hand. Their light playing over the wet flowstone walls. Like pilgrims in a fable swallowed
up and lost among the inward parts of some granitic beast. Deep stone flues where the water dripped and sang.
Tolling in the silence the minutes of the earth and the hours and the days of it and the years without cease. Until
they stood in a great stone room where lay a black and ancient lake. And on the far shore a creature that raised
its dripping mouth from the rimstone pool and stared into the light with eyes dead white and sightless as the
eggs of spiders. It swung its head low over the water as if to take the scent of what it could not see. Crouching
there pale and naked and translucent, its alabaster bones cast up in shadow on the rocks behind it. Its bowels, its
beating heart. The brain that pulsed in a dull glass bell. It swung its head from side to side and then gave out a
low moan and turned and lurched away and loped soundlessly into the dark.
sibilance
‘crafted
simplicity’
assonance
ambiguity
sense imagery
colour imagery