I read "The Road" in a single sitting one night while my wife was working a late shift. I laid in bed staring at the ceiling all night.
I made it that far before becoming incredibly annoyed at the way literature critics were praising his new invention of post-apocalyptic stories which nobody had ever read before ever.
Also, if I remember correctly, he felt that the rules of punctuation didn't apply to him. Maybe that paid off if I'd read more than ten pages.
I don't doubt that he was a true giant. But even setting aside these purely meta-textual gripes, it's just not a story I want to hear. If I want to be depressed and angry, I'll read Hacker News.
Uplifting? There was nothing uplifting about The Road. It's a world without hope. From the description of the forests, seas, societies and families, cormac builds a truly hopeless apocalypse with no hope for redemption or salvation. A world where hope cannot exist.
> Amid the utter horror and hopeless bleakness a parent does everything they can to protect their child.
A father tries to do everything he can to save his son, but ultimately, he fails. It's a world without hope after all. The father dies and a bunch of cannibals "take in" the boy.
It's one of the rare books that I finished in one sitting and then read again a few days later.
Here are some people using the word uplift in their review on Amazon: [0]. There are some negations though ("this book is not uplifting").
[0]: https://www.amazon.com/Road-Vintage-International-Cormac-McC...
So what? Of course the love between a father and son persists. It's only natural. But that's not the point of the book. The book is about finding hope. The father is desperately trying to save his son. To find hope for his son. He thinks there is hope along the coast. That's why they are on "the road". When they reach the coast, they find a leaden sea holding no life. All marine life is dead. They find no hope. There, cannibals that were hunting the father and son shoot the father with an arrow and the father dies. The son buries his father and the cannibals find the boy and "take him in".
> [0]: https://www.amazon.com/Road-Vintage-International-Cormac-McC...
This is just reviews with the word "uplifting". Many of the comments with "uplifting" is just saying it is not uplifting.
"This is an unusual book. There is nothing uplifting here, so don't expect it."
"As uplifting as a charred word void of virtually all-living species. As uplifting as a dead land shrouded in night, blanketed with ash and gray snow, legions of charcoaled corpses ornamenting the highways and hallways. As uplifting as the vicious gangs who prowl the countryside surviving on the last food source - other humans. As uplifting as the Halocaust, Idi Amin's Uganda, or Pol Pot's Cambodia."
Read the book. There is nothing uplifting about it. The only thing uplifting about it is that we don't live in such a world. It's as hopeless a world as you can possibly create. It's a world where the wife and mother of the protagonists goes off into the woods to kill herself rather than face the horrors that await her and her husband and her son. That's how bleak and hopeless the world is. It's a world where the father carries a gun to take out his son and himself in case the cannibals get them. It's a world where the father fails to keep his promise to his son and dies, leaving him to a pack of cannibals. And that isn't even the worst of it. What exactly is uplifting here?
I noted that when I posted the link. But at least half are saying it is uplifting.
I obviously can't argue further as I haven't read it. I will remark that different people will react to the same material variously uplifted or beaten-down, and neither reaction is less valid (unless they just misunderstood the plot). Personally, I tend to find depictions of nobility and perseverance in the face of imminent doom interesting and moving if not uplifting.
You should. It's the best of its kind in my opinion.
> I will remark that different people will react to the same material variously uplifted or beaten-down, and neither reaction is less valid (unless they just misunderstood the plot).
I'm open to people having subjective feelings - like whether they enjoyed it, they found it too graphic, not graphic enough, etc. But uplifting is different. There has to be something concrete to back up the feeling of being uplifted.
> Personally, I tend to find depictions of nobility and perseverance in the face of imminent doom interesting and moving if not uplifting.
But that's the point. It isn't nobility and perseverance in the face of imminent doom. The mother thought it was inevitable doom. The father had hope. It's perseverance in false hope. Nonexistent hope. It's like you seeing a person jump 100 stories from the twin towers and flapping his arms in the hopes of flying and saving himself. Would you say that is uplifting? Of course not. Unless you were being edgy or silly.
Instead of reading silly amazon reviews, go read the book and see for yourself.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36316079#36325708
I have read the book, and it is about sticking to your morals no matter how evil the world will become. That is the message of the book.
What morals? They stole other peoples stuff. They abandoned the poor people in the basement to die at the hands of the cannibals. They "helped" the guy they met on the road but that was due to childish naivety of the son. It was superficial and meaningless help. The book was entirely about amoral animalistic survival than morality. Notice how it was mostly the son who wanted to be "moral". If anything, the book is saying being moral is childish in an amoral world.
If anything, it showed the inability to stick morals. The most important "moral" of the story was the father's promise to the son and his wife, not to let the son fall into the hands of the cannibals. Throughout the book the father promises to kill them both if it came to that. In the end, the father couldn't bring himself to kill the son and left him to the cannibals who were hunting him.
In your response, you say we don't know whether the "good guys" got him or the "bad guys" did. It's obvious the "bad guys" got him. On your first reading, it isn't clear, but after subsequent readings, it is obvious there are no good guys left and the cannibals who were hunting ( or possibly other cannibals ) them got him.
> That is the message of the book.
If that was the message, the book showed how stupid and pointless it was. Not that it was a good thing. If there was a "message", it was that the mother was right and the father was wrong. But that isn't the message either.
Rather than taking the book for it is, people are trying to find a positive message to make themselves feel better. That's a childish notion. Not everything is a disney movie. Not everything has to have a happy ending or a positive message. You don't have to be uplifted or find morality in a book.
It is not. The man that found the child had a shotgun. He was trying to convince the kid that he had his own wife and child. If he was one of the cannibals, he could have just shot him and got it over with...this is like a six year old we are talking about. Overpowering him, kidnapping him, or just shooting him would be more easy. It doesn't make sense for him to try and convince the kid to join him.
>If anything, the book is saying being moral is childish in an amoral world.
I highly disagree. the man had problems trusting others, for good reason. But the child was a reminder to him WHY it is important to stay good. It ties in with Plato's concept of Eudemonia. Helping others must come with a sense of self-preservation. To save others with abandon is not moral...it is recklessness. On the other side of the coin, having nothing BUT self preservation is cowardess. They represent both sides of the same coin...the boy tugs at the fathers heartstrings to keep him in touch with his morality, and the father has the common sense to keep them alive.
>Rather than taking the book for it is, people are trying to find a positive message to make themselves feel better. That's a childish notion.
Making your interpretation the "one and only interpretation" and dismissing others as "making themselves feel better" is closed minded, myopic, and also childish. While I disagree with your interpretation of the book, I respect it. However the point of art is to attach personal meaning to it. That is not childish...that is human.
Your interpretation is that there is no meaning, and that morality is pointless. Mine is that it is important to do your best in a world that is evil, even if you mess up and don't live up to your own standards sometimes. "carrying the fire" seems like obvious symbolism to me for morality. They don't always carry it...they are sometimes bad themselves. When that happens, the kid gets upset at the dad and there are consequences. The dad develops as a character and decides that giving up and killing them both is the wrong thing to do. Is he right? Honestly probably not. But that is the thing about morality, it is not always black and white.
I think it is. I gave my reasons in another comment.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36326924
> If he was one of the cannibals, he could have just shot him and got it over with
In the book, the cannibals like to keep their "herd" alive in the basement. Remember? Why did they keep their humans alive?
> Overpowering him, kidnapping him, or just shooting him would be more easy.
No. It would be easier to convince him to follow them willingly. Would you rather drag a corpse 10 miles or have the the corpse follow you 10 miles. I can't tell if you are trolling or not? Throughout book, exhaustion and the physical toll play a prominent role - of just pushing a cart, father carrying the boy, etc.
It's getting exhausting repeating the obvious. The conclusion of the book is the father dead and the orphaned boy ending up with cannibals. Exactly what they wanted to avoid and breaking the promise that the father made to his wife. If that is uplifting to you and you find moral value in that fine. I guess if you keep looking for something, you'll eventually find it. Even if it is not there.
>No. It would be easier to convince him to follow them willingly. Would you rather drag a corpse 10 miles or have the the corpse follow you 10 miles. I can't tell if you are trolling or not?
I am not trolling. Have you ever picked up a six year old? They weigh practically nothing. The cannibals are not shown to be as exhausted or weak as the father so it would not be as much of a problem. Perhaps if he gets off to the idea of betrayal, or if he really does think that having a kid follow him for 10 miles would be easier convincing him would be easier, but I have a hard time believing that.
>I guess if you keep looking for something, you'll eventually find it. Even if it is not there.
I could say the same thing about your interpretation of events. I do wish you would be more open minded and less cynical...the way you so easily dismiss people and feel that your interpretation is the only correct one is extremely offputting. Productive conversation cannot happen if you keep dismissing everyone else as "missing the obvious."
What? Now you are just desperately grasping at straws.
> The father says that "there are no other kids his age", yes, but remember...most of the book is told through the father's eyes.
And? So what? The kid also says so, not that it matters.
> There is no information technology anymore...
That's right. Before the internet and IT, nobody saw any children. This comment is the dumbest thing I've read in a long while.
> all he knows is that he has not seen any kids and that he hasn't heard of any kids. He is an unreliable narrator.
The kid also said so. And I don't think you know what "unreliable narrator" is. There has to be clues within the story to imply that he is unreliable ( psychologically, memorywise, etc ). Not that he doesn't have access to a smartphone.
> Have you ever picked up a six year old? They weigh practically nothing.
Yes. Not only that, I was six year old once. Long before I was 6 years old, my parents stopped carrying me around. And you are being intentionally sneaky here. Who said anything about picking up a 6 year old. I said carry a 6 year old how many miles they had to go.
> Perhaps if he gets off to the idea of betrayal, or if he really does think that having a kid follow him for 10 miles would be easier convincing him would be easier, but I have a hard time believing that.
Yes. It's easier to believe that in a starving world, a random kind couple is willing to take in someone else's child to feed. Something his own father struggled immensely to do. That is easier to believe.
It's obvious what happened. It's why you ignored every one of my points except the absolutely nonsense about "no more information technology..."
Let me guess, you are the type of person who watched the movie No Country for Old Men and believe that chigurh didn't kill the wife. Or that the girl in the red dress in schindler's list wasn't dead but playing dead because she was saved by some magical good nazis. At this point I hope you at pretending to be trolling to save yourself some embarrassment.
I'm so dumb. I forgot that before information technology, kids were invisible. Thank you.
>What? Now you are just desperately grasping at straws.
Explain. Am I incorrect?
>And? So what? The kid also says so, not that it matters.
Because he has not seen any. Just because they didn't see any kids doesn't mean they don't exist. The fact that the kid himself exists suggests that this is not entirely correct.
>That's right. Before the internet and IT, nobody saw any children. This comment is the dumbest thing I've read in a long while.
I would appreciate it if you could make a point without resorting to insults. For one suggesting that others are childish for their interpretations, you are resorting to childish actions.
As for my point, perhaps I was not clear in my meaning. I meant that there was no way to verify that there are no kids...no newspapers saying that "all kids are dead," or any other way for him to verify that information. He is just saying what he has seen, which is no kids.
>There has to be clues within the story to imply that he is unreliable ( psychologically, memorywise, etc ). Not that he doesn't have access to a smartphone.
Again, you misinterpret my point. The father is not omniscient. He does not know for certain.
>Yes. Not only that, I as six year old once. Long before I was 6 years old, my parents stopped carrying me around. And you are being intentionally sneaky here. Who said anything about picking up a 6 year old. I said carry a 6 year old how many miles they had to go.
At this point, I am starting to think you are not actually reading my comments. A well fed cannibal with a stomach full of people is not going to have trouble carrying a six year old the same way a starving father on the brink of death would be.
>Let me guess, you are the type of person who watched the movie No Country for Old Men and believe that chigurh didn't kill the wife. Or that the girl in the red dress in schindler's list wasn't dead but playing dead because she was saved by some magical good nazis. At this point I hope you at pretend to be trolling to save yourself some embarrassment.
Now you are resorting to ad hominem and assuming things about my character. No, I am sure Chigurh killed the wife. I have not seen Shindler's List so I cannot say one way or the other.
>At this point I hope you at pretend to be trolling to save yourself some embarrassment
The only person embarrassed here is you. You have shown great immaturity during this conversation, and immediately assume the worst in everyone. That says a lot more about you than me. I will not be continuing this conversation, because it is obvious any further discussion with you will be fruitless. Have a blessed day.
But if you take them at their word, they're "carrying the fire", so the story gets a hopeful ending.
Perhaps that's what people find uplifting about it.
It isn't explicitly stated, but it is heavily implied. I gave my reasons to another comment.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36326924
> That could be one interpretation, I suppose, if depression is your goal.
It's a work of fiction. Nobody died. Nobody starved. Nothing to get depressed about.
What family? You really believe the man and woman who took in the boy had a "family"? A world where boy's own mother abandoned him and his father to kill herself because there was no hope. A world where there are no plants, animals, fish, etc left. A world where a a woman gives birth and then she and her friends cook the fetus over a campfire. You think in a world where there is no food, no possibility of food, where everyone is either starving to death or cannibalizing, that there is a happy family? It's a world where everyone is starving to death. You think "a family" is going to take in an extra mouth to feed?
Did you miss the parts in the book where they explicitly mention how there is no children the boy's age left? The boy desperately wants a friend but there are no children his age left. Except for that one "imaginary" kid he ran into that disappeared. Why do you think that is?
Also, the father and son were being hunted by a pack of cannibals who mortally wound the father. What are the odds that the cannibal hunters caught up to him. What are the odds that a magical good samaritan family stumbled upon him?
When I first read the book, I thought the kid was saved. Then I reread it and boy cormac really made it crystal clear how hopeless that world was.
Talking about odds in a fictional story is misguided. The odds are 100% whatever the writer intended.
Yes and the nice cannibal they killed offered to give them food and shelter. Remember how nice that cannibal was? The pistol was worthless and if I remember correctly, it didn't even have a bullet left. Of course he let him keep it. It's no threat.
> Talking about odds in a fictional story is misguided.
No. It's a matter of determining what is most likely.
> The odds are 100% whatever the writer intended.
Yes. The author wrote everything that led up to the meeting for a reason. Everything the author wrote leads to the man and woman being cannibals. It's pretty obvious. It isn't a children's book. For children, the author explains everything clearly and spoonfeeds you. But for adult books you have to think about what the author is trying to say. Did that world seem like it had any good samaritans that you envision. No it did not. For a reason.
What the author intended is 100% obvious. You don't like it because you childishly want a happy ending. Cormac wasn't writing disney books or children books. If you are still confused and you seem to be, go read his other books. You'll understand what kind of writer he was.
I get the punctuation issue, but I think his writing is proof that you don't always need to follow the rules from elementary school. He was so meticulous that, even without commas, all his sentences remained clear, and the effect it had was—for most readers anyway—to make the meaning somehow clearer, and certainly more powerful.
That's strange. The book grabs your attention from the get go. It starts strong. Stays strong. Ends strong.
> I made it that far before becoming incredibly annoyed at the way literature critics were praising his new invention of post-apocalyptic stories which nobody had ever read before ever.
This makes absolutely no sense. Were you reading the book and reading reviews at the same time?
> Also, if I remember correctly, he felt that the rules of punctuation didn't apply to him. Maybe that paid off if I'd read more than ten pages.
His punctuation was fine. The book reads well. His words and sentences flow. I found it easily one of the most accessible.
> it's just not a story I want to hear. If I want to be depressed and angry Hacker News.
Ah there it is. People with petty gripes always have an agenda. So your "gripes" above are just because you want don't like apocalytic stories and want to warn people off it? Why not just say so instead of making up silly criticisms? Also, it's a work of fiction. It isn't real. Really nothing to get depressed or angry about. If anything, it should make you happy since we don't like in such a hopeless world. But really, like all great literature, it should make you think.
No, this is a fair criticism.
It's true this is done for literary effect, but it does make it harder to read.
To quote McCarthy himself:
> James Joyce is a good model for punctuation. He keeps it to an absolute minimum. There’s no reason to blot the page up with weird little marks. I mean, if you write properly you shouldn’t have to punctuate.[1]
Whilst this might be true, his punctuation style is non-conventional and that does break our expectations making it harder to follow.
[1] https://www.openculture.com/2013/08/cormac-mccarthys-punctua...
What literary effect? I didn't even notice there were punctuation issues until I read the guy's comment. Maybe since it was basically a book where most of the dialogue is between two people? It was one of the easiest and most straightforward reads of my life.
> > James Joyce is a good model for punctuation. He keeps it to an absolute minimum. There’s no reason to blot the page up with weird little marks. I mean, if you write properly you shouldn’t have to punctuate.[1]
...“to make it easier, not to make it harder” to decipher his prose. He wrote that way to make it easier to read. And I agree with him. His prose just flowed. Also, the problem with joyce isn't the punctation. Even with proper punctuation, joyce would be difficult.
But if people have issues with it, then so be it. Are there any examples where his punctuation caused issues for readers?
I completely understand. For me, I see it as a story about clinging to hope despite impossible odds. The theming reminds me of the manga Berserk, but way more grounded in reality and somehow even more depressing. Spoilers:
The main character is dying, and will leave his son to fend for himself when he does. The son doesn't really stand a chance, but it is his responsibility to teach him to "carry the fire." It ends a bit vague...the father dies and the kid refuses to leave the body.
Eventually a man comes by and offers to take care of him. Whether or not he is actually a good guy, or yet another disgusting person, is not really known. But its a glimmer of hope, and that is what is important to the message. As long as there is hope, carry the fire.
This article by Art of Manliness is what convinced me to read it despite how depressing it is. The book isn't for everyone, but it IS life changing in my opinion: https://www.artofmanliness.com/people/fatherhood/carry-the-f...
don't ever, ever read Riddley Walker
Now I have a daughter and am also wondering how different it may seem on this reading of the book…
Maybe I'd appreciate it more now.
Serious advice: think twice before reading The Road if you’re susceptible to doom and gloom about the human race.
(It Comes at Night is probably my #1 in that category for film, and I guess Watts' Blindsight in books—both messed me up for days after, the former with some depressive nihilism, the latter with days of fairly intense derealization that weren't too fun—and I'm not normally especially prone to either of those, I don't think)
Plus one of the more normal characters investigating the phenomenon just happens to be a vampire who--surprisingly enough--is neither formulaic nor boring.
The writing-guide-esque "OK, now write down ten wild elements or characters that certainly do not fit in your world... flip page ... and now add one of them, finding a way to connect it to some other element you've already established" was almost comically transparent, but also so damn effective that I've added it to the ol' toolbox.
(I mean, I don't know that Watts literally did that sort of exercise, exactly, and even doubt that he did, but in my head that's definitely how that part got in there)
Interestingly, (and apropos) McCarthy's last, Stella Maris, I think, did a much more eloquent job of exploring the same themes. Stella Maris is astounding, it's cosmic horror without the 'supernatural.' Instead there's only Gödel and Metzinger.
That said, I think Echopraxia is a better sequel than Maelstrom and a pretty good book on its own. He is working on a final book in the Blindopraxia trilogy and I expect it to move even further from the wonder of the original book, but now that my expectations are set I am looking forward to it all the same.
I suppose I was expecting peak Shyamalan, but A24.
I read the entire thing in HTML on my phone on the author's web site over a week or so. After the first few days of catching bits during breaks, I found myself sitting at home on the porch just reading from my phone - not typical for me. (I did later buy a copy.)
And compare it to The Road, whose environment would have you begging for a holiday to The Last of Us. Not just the lack of food, but the lack of ability to grow new food, to rest, to warm, to heal. The constant, dogged, thinking, scheming threats. And your kid isn't pushing ladders down to you nearly enough.
https://deadline.com/2023/04/new-regency-cormac-mccarthys-bl...
It's a good movie, and I'm sure a good book (consider it thrown on the backlog), but damn, so effectively bleak.
The best adaption of McCarthy's work to the screen is No Country For Old Men. The Coen brothers seem to "get" McCarthy better than others.
Coen brothers still make movies with real people and brought this world to life in an authentic way.
[Anton vs the "We can't give out no information" lady](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_WLA81q9ok0) I love Coen movies with regular people like this. The lady is hilarious and it is one of the only people that Anton didn't take out.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cormac_McCarthy#/media/File:Co...
[2] https://www.slashfilm.com/img/gallery/how-quentin-tarantino-...
My son is now a bit older than the boy would be. I feel like the book would either build your resolve or beat it down, so just go in forewarned.
In retrospect, I'm conflicted. In some way, it seems too straightforward ("The Road" title fits well) dystopia. Distilled, masterfully executed, but somehow ... trivial? Maybe it's the "Seinfeld is unfunny" trope where it can become obvious only after experiencing it.