The Road Reading #3: Pages 121-180

Howdy!

My name is Charlie DeCurtis and welcome back to another entry in my blog post series where I analyze Cormac McCarthy’s The Road. In this blog post, we will be going over what is now the third reading section of the novel. This section is comprised of the next 60 pages in pages 121-180. One tool McCarthy uses to do a variety of things in this novel is his style of writing. In this blog post, I plan on analyzing McCarthy’s style through the third section of the novel. Without further ado, let’s dive in.

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As is tradition in this blog series so far, I would like to first discuss my personal thoughts on the section before I get too deep in analyzing it. Before saying anything else, I have to say that this book has become incredibly easy to pick up and read for an hour without even realizing. The story is incredibly engaging and keeps us as the reader on our toes out of suspense through it all. However, McCarthy managed to surprise me once again. In this section, he actually provides our protagonists with good fortune for once in contrast to the terrible things they have endured up to this point in the novel. It certainly caught me off guard, but I know I cannot get too comfortable with the duo having good luck. I have a feeling McCarthy intentionally did it to throw us off from some horror that approaches. In any case, I am ecstatic to finish the novel in the next section and see how what has so far been one of my favorite books ends. 

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As stated before, I would like to discuss McCarthy’s style as a writer in this blog. In order to do so, I will be analyzing it through this most recent section of reading as it provides plenty of examples of McCarthy’s unique writing style. By far the most noticeable and consistent stylistic choices used by McCarthy in this novel is neglecting to use punctuation. McCarthy consistently refrains from utilizing all punctuation throughout this novel. Out of the few ways he neglects punctuation, the most common example is that there are no quotation marks. Period. As a result, we as the readers get passages like this:

“I found everything. Everything. Wait till you see. He led him down the stairs and picked up the bottle and held the flame aloft. Can you see? he said. Can you see?” (McCarthy 139).

Passages similar to this one riddle the novel as a whole. However, despite going against every English class I have ever taken, the lack of punctuation is far from the expected confusing and actually flows incredibly well. As you read, you can tell who is saying which line easily. The fact that there are only two characters likely contributes to it as well. His vocabulary, wording and sentence structure allows the reader to continue reading without missing or becoming confused by the quotation marks.

Another obvious and important stylistic choice made by McCarthy is the novel’s complete lack of chapters. No, you did not read that wrong. Cormac McCarthy wrote The Road to have no chapters whatsoever. Simply 280 pages of straight story. At first glance, the lack of chapters dividing the novel seems intimidating. However, once again, the constant action in the boy and man’s life despite being a dragging story bolster the fluidity of the story and allows the reader to continue to read without really needing to break.

Both these two specific examples of the intentional removal of key aspects to most books are done by McCarthy for the same reason: to continue the flow of the story without break and make it feel like a long, exasperating journey. The overall tone of the novel and feeling of the story is partially portrayed by the length of the intense journey taken by the two main characters. So, by removing quotation marks, the story seems to never take a break, even when dialogue is occurring. Furthermore, the lack of chapters clearly does not break up any sections of the book and the story continues to push forward without jumping in time to the future or anything of the sort.

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One unique stylistic element of McCarthy’s writing I touched on slightly earlier is his sentence structure. A blatant example of McCarthy changing up his sentence structure is continuously seen through extended dialogue between the son and the father. Whether it is arguing, or simple casual conversation, McCarthy’s structure of dialogue certainly catches the eye with the sentences being very short and to the point. When walking down the road, the son and father’s conversation consists of:

“What happened to your flute?

I threw it away.

You threw it away?

Yes.

Okay.

Okay.” (McCarthy 159).

Not the most talkative father and son in the world. However, McCarthy utilizes this style of sentence structure for the dialogue between the father and son to further demonstrate their relationship and how they differ. I won’t go too deep into that as I went into their relationship in last week’s blog. However, it is very difficult to not comment on the fact that McCarthy certainly utilizes this short sentence structure to show the clash and almost awkward tension between the two. The son is youthful and curious while the father is wise and short, leading them to not have the most incredible relationship as the man takes his role in caring for his son more seriously than anything curiosity could provide him. And this is perfectly supported through McCarthy’s sentence structure throughout the novel in dialogue between the two as the man responds to most of the son’s questions with short, blunt answers that lead to the son being blunt and short back.

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McCarthy’s variety of different, incredibly unique stylistic ideas are spread throughout The Road and greatly help to contribute to how we as the reader understand the story and experience it. While this section in particular had plenty of examples of his style, McCarthy wrote his entire novel with those stylistic choices, demonstrating just how incredible of an author he is. I have continued to find new and unique pieces to McCarthy’s writing that I did not realize before, and it truly has impacted how the story has affected my emotions towards the characters and story as whole. His writing style and the tools he uses to implement that are alone enough reason to make me so desperate to finish the novel. Until next time,

-Charlie