When I began to read Cormac McCarthy's novel The Road, I asked myself if it could be considered deumanization. As I continued reading, I reached to the conclusion that it defenitely was.
de·hu·man·ize (d
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-hym-nz)tr.v. de·hu·man·ized, de·hu·man·iz·ing, de·hu·man·iz·es
1. To deprive of human qualities such as individuality, compassion, or civility.
The lack of individuality is showen in the book in a very obvious example. McCarthy refuses to name his characters, leaving them as the man, the son, the boy and so on, for his readers. This clearly contributes to the lack of individuality. No names, No identity. It's like they even lost the right to be called by a name. Compassion, as well as civility, are lost in the novel. The bad guys mainly, are the ones who demonstrate it better, doing everything they can to survive, not minding about others well being. A combination of these make The Road a novel that deals with dehumanization, as result of the desperation the characters must face in their post-apocalipic world.
I completely agree, I read this book for class and we focused on the Dehumanization throughout reading the whole book.
ReplyDeleteI think this goes to show you that if you put people in a disaster or tragedy, that they are going to change. Whether you are keeping your morally goo self, like the boy, or you lose all sense of humanity like the cannibals.