Dehumanization- The Road

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-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.

Carrying The Fire- The Road

Towards the end of the book, as the man is dying and his son accompanies him, they have a conversation that caught my attention. 

"You have to carry the fire.

I don't know how to.

Yes you do.

Is it real? The fire?

Yes it is.

Where is it? I dont know where it is.

Yes you do. It's inside you. It was always there. I can see it."

234

The fire the man talks about, so passionately, is a symbol of hope, purity and enlightenment. He strongly believes the boy has the fire inside of him, meaning that he is the hope of humanity. The boy who carries the fire represents what is left of good nature, innocence, humbleness and purity. Throughout the novel we see cases where the boy feels the need to help others and is constantly asking for assurance of whether they're still the good guys. The enlightenment theory is derived from greek mythology that represent fire as enlightenment or knowledge. What his father is trying to tell him by "you have to carry the fire... It's inside you", is that he must never give up on his morality, because it's people like him who can save the world, save humanity (McCarthy, 234).

McCarthy meets Darwin- The Road

Social darwinism is understood as the theory of social selection that attempts to justify the success of some social groups over others. This laissez faire based theory is also called 'survival of the fittest', meaning that only the best adapted survive in times of conflict. In McCarthy's The Road, there is a constant reminder of this theory. A clear example of this is the division between good guys and bad guys.

He (The Boy) sat there cowled in the blanket. After a while he looked up. Are we still the good guys? he said.

[The Man:] Yes. We're still the good guys.

[The Boy:] And we always will be.

[The Man:] Yes. We always will be.


[The Boy:] Okay. (McCarthy, 120)

This conversation between the boy and his father occurs after the conflict experienced with a man (road-rat), in which the father ends up killing him. The conversation above demonstrates the different kinds of groups living in the same environment. The bad guys portray a negative, yet dominating image of people, while the father and his son represent humbleness. In a devastated world such as the one they live in, it is only logical that this 'survival of the fittest' will emerge. In this case, the fittest is the one that can obtain more food supply. In order to do this, you have to become selfish. Only care about your survival, what you are going to eat. Take the cannibals for example, their life revolves around the saying “the end justifies the means”. This is exactly what separates the social groups in The Road. There are the ones who don't mind killing and eating humans as long as they get fed, and there are the ones who won't let go of their beliefs and will not even consider hurting an innocent one. The problem is, when it comes down to the end of the world, which one is more useful?

21st Century- The Road

So, I was searching for new music on youtube and I stumbled upon this music video. The Goddess Willow Smith does an incredible job portraying dangers in such an artistic and original manner. In order to honor this multitalented girl, I decided to make a comparative analysis with , The Road having in mind the scenario and the lyrics. So lets begin! 


The video commences with a lady, rather old and mysterious, straying through a desert like path. She finds a bone resting in the lifeless sand and, surprised by her finding, quickly begins a ritual resulting in the reviving of Willow Smith. The desert, as well as the road in The Road, represent a remaining path that humans created by engendering destruction. Until this point, we only see a lifeless and abandoned world. Further on in the video, Smith begins to rise skyscrapers and roads that were underground, covered by the desert sand. As she does this, she sings "21st Century Girl, I do what i like" and "21st Century Girl, yeah, I'm gonna live it up, just live it up". Clearly, this is the most important message the viewer has to absorb. She is telling us we are in the 21st century, we only do what we like and live it up. Now, I'm sure this sounds exciting and completely harmless but, when you incorporate the video scenes where she's trying to build up the world again, you understand this is actually a wake up call. McCarthy also uses his novel as a wake up call to humans, encouraging us to preserve what we have and not "live it up". 


She continues the song as follows. "I set the boundaries The rules don't own me I'm living life on the edge, I choose my path". What she is trying to tell us with these powerful words is that us humans tend to believe the rules don't apply to us and that we are invincible. Specially adolescents believe this, and as her song title states, we are living in the 21st century. The future of the world are presently teenagers. If we continue with the mentality of acknowledging we are "on the edge" but do nothing about it, we are doomed. But she doesn't let this mentality take over her, for she ends the song with a heroic phrase: "It's that new girl thinking and this song is just the start!". Again, she is telling us that this generation, the new kids, have to take action and responsibility for the future of our earth. She is taking action by communicating the message through her song. That is the first step. The rest is up to us if we don't want to end up striving for our survival in the road.

*Please note my love for Willow Smith and her video is purely sarcastic. 

The Sandman

Turns out the light and is gone.

Ever is a long time.

That ever is no time at all.   (McCarthy, 28)

                                       

This poem is a recollection of words and sentences found in McCarthy's novel The Road. I decided to analyze the sentences separately from their "true" meaning in the book. The first sentence contains the word 'light', possibly referring to a bright and good state. The poem begins stating that the light is turned off, linking it with the loss of knowledge experienced in the book. Knowledge being the good and bright factor. The end of the sentence continues the vanishing motion until it reaches a dead end, its 'gone'. The next two sentences serve as a paradox, one saying that "ever is a long time" while the others says "ever is no time at all." McCarthy emphasizes on time by using words such as "ever", "long" and "time". My guess is that it's referring to how people take so much for granted. we truly believe we will have it forever and then on day, in a split second we don't. In The Road, humans took mother earth for granted, believing she would be there forever, but as these thoughts grew stronger, mother earth grew weaker until one day she was gone (or at least most of her). 

Stumbling Upon McCarthy

In the interview with Cormac McCarthy on Oprah, themes like luck and money showed up. According to McCarthy, money was never a concern. When things were going badly, something usually happened that put him back on track. Just like in the road, as they face danger or hunger, the father finds a way to get passed it alieve. For example, McCarthy mentions a situation where he didn't have any money and was trying to live from babysitting. One day, the door bell rang and a man gave him a letter, stating that they were giving him twenty thousand dollars. In situations like this one would think McCarthy had a lot of luck. But he also disagrees on this. He says the world is not controlled by luck, only probability. Sometimes, you end on the right group and you 'get lucky', or at least believe so, until that time period passes.      In McCarthy's novel, The Road, luck is a well-desguised theme. Living in a world where the only thing left for you is to survive, being lucky or seeing and positive side in a situation is otiose. In this time, money is not important anymore, it's useless. Just like McCarthy feels money wasn't important in his life, he implies this feeing in his post apocalyptic novel. The most important thing for the characters in the road is family. As the father speaks of his son, the believe that "if he is not the word of God God never spoke" conquers his thoughts.(McCarthy, 5) The father's only concern is his son's well-being, luck or money don't really fit the equation.     There's something McCarthy mentioned in the interview that caught my attention. When Oprah asks him if he was concerned about money, he answers the following: "I was very naive. I always assumed I was going to be taken care of one way or the other. And i was." This made me think about how humans take so much for granted. In The Road, we see a perfect example of this. They are living in a world they helped create as they destroyed it. Humans took nature for granted, they didn't take care of it. As McCarthy describes, "he did not take care of her and she died alone somewhere in the dark and there is no other dream nor other waking world and there is no other tale to tell."(McCarthy, 32) McCarthy is trying to remind us that we can no longer presume we will be taken care of forever. If we keep up with this attitude, probability will chose our fate instead of ourselves earning it.

Remember- The Road

“The dog that he remembers followed us for two days. I tried to coax it to come but it would not. I made a noose of wire to catch it. There were three cartridges in the pistol. None to spare. She walked away down the road. The boy looked after her and then he looked at me and then he looked at the dog and began to cry and to beg for the dog's life and I promised I would not hurt the dog. A trellis of a dog with the hide stretched over it. The next day it was gone. This is the dog he remembers. He doesnt remember any little boys.” (McCarthy,87)

The paragraph caught my attention for two main reasons. One, it is written in first person, while the novel in general is in third person.This shifting in the narration automatically reaches the readers attention. McCarthy uses this technique to describe a personal, life reflecting experience. This is my second reason to write about this paragraph, the message behind the text. In life, sometimes the smallest things are the ones that impact you the most. For example, in literature, the most important things aren't always the most interesting. In this case, the dog had an impact on the father (assuming e is the one speaking). “The dog that he remembers” follows them down the road. The father talks about how he tried to coach him and take care of him, but that the dog was gone by the next day, and “he doesn't remember any little boys” (McCarthy, 87). As I see it, this passage talks about loss. When you're living you are remembered and you are able to remember, just like the son remembers the dog. But when you die, you are limited to only be remembered, like the dog when he leaves. We cannot hope to be remembered forever, specially in a situation similar to what the father and son are in. We have to be satisfied with just living the moment, regardless of what our memories will keep.