Cormac Mccarthy Figurative Language In The Road
“If you fall behind, run faster. Never give up, never surrender, and rise up against the odds.” (Jesse Jackson). Cormac McCarthy wrote The Road in 2006 and has thought his readers about true dedication through the worst situations. The Road is a gothic fiction that explores the elements of death and suffering in a dark and empty world which has met a terrible fate. The protagonist, a man, and his son live in this post-apocalyptic world and meet many gruesome conflicts along their journey. Throughout its pages, figurative language and literary techniques are found densely, helping the reader connect to the story and to develop specific moods and tones. The struggle that is faced throughout the novel is one that Time describes as, “Wildly powerful
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The setting is revealed as the novel opens with the man waking in the dark woods. He provides a description of the world around him with vivid imagery, shown in this quote: “Everything paling away into the murk. The soft ash blowing in loose swirls over blacktop . . . segments of road down there among the dead trees.” (McCarthy 4). Along with the setting, the characters, the man and the boy, who remain nameless, are introduced as well. An unusual element that McCarthy uses is the lack of names or physical descriptions of the man and boy. The only description given is when McCarthy says, “He held the boy close to him. So thin.” (McCarthy 34). A possible reason for this could be as to not limit the readers and let them imagine the story as they truly feel right. The exposition ends as the conflict is introduced, that the man and boy are trying to survive in a desolate …show more content…
By this time in the story, the man is showing signs of death and is coughing up blood. As foreshadowed, the narrator says, “...he knew he could go no further and that this was the place where he would die.” (McCarthy 277), showing that it is the man’s time to pass. In his final words, the man tells the boy that he mustn’t give up and that he has to carry the “fire” inside of him. This idiom references one of the major symbols in the book: The fire. It symbolizes the determination they had to overcome their never-ending hardships, and hope that the boy must have in order to survive. The climax ends in an emotional exchange of words and the boy waking up with his father’s cold arms around
The setting is revealed as the novel opens with the man waking in the dark woods. He provides a description of the world around him with vivid imagery, shown in this quote: “Everything paling away into the murk. The soft ash blowing in loose swirls over blacktop . . . segments of road down there among the dead trees.” (McCarthy 4). Along with the setting, the characters, the man and the boy, who remain nameless, are introduced as well. An unusual element that McCarthy uses is the lack of names or physical descriptions of the man and boy. The only description given is when McCarthy says, “He held the boy close to him. So thin.” (McCarthy 34). A possible reason for this could be as to not limit the readers and let them imagine the story as they truly feel right. The exposition ends as the conflict is introduced, that the man and boy are trying to survive in a desolate …show more content…
By this time in the story, the man is showing signs of death and is coughing up blood. As foreshadowed, the narrator says, “...he knew he could go no further and that this was the place where he would die.” (McCarthy 277), showing that it is the man’s time to pass. In his final words, the man tells the boy that he mustn’t give up and that he has to carry the “fire” inside of him. This idiom references one of the major symbols in the book: The fire. It symbolizes the determination they had to overcome their never-ending hardships, and hope that the boy must have in order to survive. The climax ends in an emotional exchange of words and the boy waking up with his father’s cold arms around