A+summary+of+'The+Road'

= ﻿ A Summary of "﻿The Road" = Excellent study notes by Sir Themes and language features are highlighted in ** green **. Page references are given so you can look them up in the novel. Before the exam, print off these notes and re-read the novel (skim read through it) in conjunction with these notes.

Pages 1-75 The story begins with a dream. The man has a disturbing dream full of powerful **imagery** that sets the **tone** of the whole novel. The boy and the man have already started their journey but are only at the start. We are thrown immediately into a foriegn world that is unfamiliar and terrifying to us; //"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"// (p1). The dream is a trip into a dark cave where a massive mysterious creature dwells and is the first of many dreams described by the man.

The man leaves the sleeping boy and looks out over the landscape and we are introduced to the scene that is the **setting** for much of the novel. //"Everything paling away into the murk. The soft ash blowing in loose swirls over the blacktop... The segments of road down there among the dead trees. Looking for anything of colour. Any movement. Any trace of standing smoke"// (pp2-3).

There are some important things to note about the opening 3 pages which are often asked in an exam. The opening few pages introduces the reader into the setting and the tone. Look at the first prezi and examine the language use, especially how McCarthy uses colour to set the **tone.** (Words to describe the tone at this point would be:gray, cold, hard, dangerous). The prevailing colour (which extends throughout the whole novel is gray. It is the colour of ash and it is the colour of the snow and it reminds us that the world they live in is cold and unforgiving. It also will provide nothing as everything is burned, there is no plant or animal life which means survival is very limited. The other colour that has negative connotation is black which is the other colour of the burned landscape. You could talk about many words with **negative connotations** from the first few pages, such as, ashen, dead white, dead, bowels, dull, dark, barren, silent, godless.

The opening also introduces us to the **characters.** In this case they are known only as the man and the boy. We find out that they are travelling south because //"there'd be no surviving another winter here"// (p2), and that what little they have in the way of possessions. The **effect** of this is that it raises questions in the mind of the reader such as, what has happened to the world, what dangers are they scared of, and will they make it to their destination? Some things are implied about how long ago it was. When the boy asks his father what he is doing at the gas station (he picks up the phone and dials his old home (p5)) we realise that he has never seen or used a phone and is therefore been born into this world. This is all he knows. Also at the gas station, the man scavenges through looking for things he can use which shows us he is resourceful. On page 9 we read their first conversation about death and this reveals more about the relationship between the man and his son. The boys asks many questions which shows us he is curious. The depth of his questions show he is not your average 10 year-old. He asks about death and asks what his father would do if he died. This exchange shows that he has seen death and knows that they are trying to avoid it in order to survive. It also shows the deep connection between father and son, and the father's commitment to his son.

McCarthy's **language** throughout the novel could be described as bleak, sparse, beautiful and poetic. The **effect** is powerful on the reader. we can only imagine the sort of world where //"the blackness he woke to on those nights was sightless and impenetrable. A blackness to hurt your ears with listening"// (p14). The **intended effect** of this sort of language is to make the reader feel their vulnerability, to feel the hoplessness and fear the father must have, the heaviness of the man's task and the dangers they must face. The **effect** of this sentence and many others in the novel is to show us his fear of the unknown, all the dangers that hide in the vast, immeasurable darkness. We are yet to meet these dangers and, as in a good horror movie, we are kept in suspense until we come across the truck people.

Before we meet the truck people, the journey passes through a city, through a dam and into a supermarket. It is here that McCarthy starts using words with **positive connotations** **.** These words help lift the **tone** to something like optimistic and cheerful. On page 22-23, the man finds a can of coke and gives it to his son. Some of the words are //treat, fizz, bubbly, really good.// This is the first of very few moments in the book where they are happy. It is an example of a moment of normalcy, where the father can show his son something of the comfortable world that has now gone.

Their journey is following a path that is familiar to the man and the clues are everywhere that he knows where he is going. The man takes a detour that the boy doesn't fancy. He heads to the house where he grew up. There is no point of the man visiting his old house but I think it is something we would all do in a situation like this. He visits there to remember happiness in his past but instead he gains a sense that nothing can bring the past back, nothing will ever be the same. We can also tell from the condition of the house that it has been uninhabited for a long time. There is a moment of **contrast** in this scene (p28) where the man begin reading some old newspapers and is affected by what used to be considered important //"the curious news//", and he looks over at the boy and considers if he would be able to kill his son if he had to. The boy gets the willies about the house and they are forced onwards.

The first big challenge that our **protagonists** face is to get over the mountain. It is here we see the man's connundrum. They have little food and are low on energy and have seemingly insurmountable odds against them. They do, however, make it over the mountain and they come to a waterfall where they swim and bathe and rest. The boy goes on to remark, //"this is a good place Papa"// (p41) as they camp out and eat beans and mushrooms.

The next event is the when they find the truck. They are forced to look inside to search for resources. Another example of McCarthy's use of language that could be described as terrifyingly beautiful. "Human Bodies. Sprawled in every attitude. Dried and shrunken in their rotted clothes. The small wad of burning paper drew down a wisp of flame and then died out leaving a faint pattern for just a moment in the incadescence like the shape of a flower, a molten rose. Then it was dark again."

(p48). Things to note in this passage: **Short sentences and incomplete sentences (sentences without a verb)** that create an impact on the reader to emphasis the shock of the images of dead people and how long they had been there. There is also the impact on the man who has to see scenes like this everyday in his quest for survival. It also raises the question of what they were doing in the back of a truck, and what they were trying to do. Also note the contrast of the imagery: The ** simile contrasts ** the pile of dead bodies with the peaceful and beautiful image of the falling paper that burns itself into an ember that reminds him of a rose. The effect of these contrasting images is to perhaps show that there is still beauty in the world, that he can still see it, that it is still possible despite the surroundings. On page 50-51 we see the first person they encounter on the road. It is the man who looks as if he's been struck by lightening. This is the first example of the differing attitudes towards the theme of survival. The father continues cautiously past him. The boy asks if they can help him and the father refuses. On page 53 we see the problem is still bothering the boy and the father expalins the very practical reasons why they could not help him. This demonstrates that the man thinks rationally (logically) about survival whereas the boy in his youth makes judgements based on emotions.

There are a few references to what has happened to the world though this is never made clear at any stage in the novel. (pages 32-33, 54 and 57). Ultimately it is unimportant what actually happened. This **novel's purpose** is not to entertain the masses like some glamourised Hollywood blockbuster armaggedeon movie about how incredibly over-dramatic and spectacular the end of the world will be. We, however, demand much more intellectual stimulation from our texts. The ** purpose ** of this novel is to make us think deep and hard about our fragile existance on this earth. It is a survival story, a road trip story about a man and what lengths he would go to, as a real human being, with a genuine moral code that most of us can relate to, to protect his son. It is gritty and it is set in a world that is incredibly believable, a definite possibility if you interpret this to be an environmental novel. And there is no obligitory love interest. Thankfully we do not have to sit through another cliched storyline about whether he's going to save the world and get the girl.

The most interesting thing about the ** backstory ** is what happened to the mother. There is a bit of time spent on this as it was obviously harrowing what the man went through. It is ultimately a sad story of suicide, an unwillingness to contemplate such a bleak future where the likelihood of getting raped and eaten is high, and the chances of survival are low. Part of this novel's purpose is to set these scenarios in our own head, what __//would//__ you do? What would __//you//__ do? Pages 57-60 are the most telling and this part is interpreted in the movie quite faithfully to the book.

The final event in this section of the novel is the encounter with the roadrats. Everything about them is terrifying, including the fact that they have a fortified vehicle. The scene where the father kills the roadrat is a clear demonstration of the man's protectiveness for his son. The father does not trust him and does not take up his offer to feed the boy. When the roadrat takes the hostage with a knife the father has only one option: to shoot him in the head.