“The clocks stopped at 1:17. A long shear of light and then a series of low concussions. He got up and went to the window. What is it? she said. He didn’t answer. He went into the bathroom and threw the lightswitch but the power was already gone. A dull rose glow in the windowglass. He dropped to one knee and raised the lever to stop the tub and then turned on both taps as far as they would go. She was standing in the doorway in her nightwear, clutching the jamb, cradling her belly in one hand.
What is it? she said.
What is happening?
I don’t know.
Why are you taking a bath?
I’m not.”
– The Road, p. 53-54
And that’s it. After the hyperbolic, mythical, drama-filled Apocalypses of Revelation and Glorious Appearing, it appears that in the 21st literary vision of the End of Days, a paragraph will suffice. The conciseness of The Road’s doomsday is a fascinating characteristic in a novel that has been hailed by literary critics, mass-market audiences, and even Oprah herself. The novel is an intriguing entry into the apocalyptic lexicon, and one that derives much of its universal acceptance not from a lack of meaningful content, but from a uniquely objective take on a fundamentally divisive central concept.
I’ve felt a deep affinity for Cormac McCarthy ever since I read The Road for the first time, and like many, it was my first time wading through his distinctive prose. Out of his work, I’ve found The Road easiest to digest, at least from a stylistic perspective – his other novels are far more dense (imagine the seamless dialogue, but in a six-person conversation). I like his writing style more and more – what seems to be a gimmick is really an effective way to strip writing of pretentious affectation and unnecessary restraint for the sake of restraint. Syntactical and structural choices aside, The Road’s power isn’t weakened by a second read through.
Despite its ability to engage, there are relatively few memorable sequences in The Road – a trait that is obviously intentional, in light of McCarthy’s choice of repetitive, lumbering settings that create a palpable dreariness that is at times, unbearably bleak. The novel is magnetic, and McCarthy’s deglammed, anti-Hollywood apocalypse speaks to a contemporary unease with precise judgments about the End of the World. Truly, the book is post-apocalyptic, but in its brief inclusion of the paragraph and following dialogue that sheds light on the “event” itself, McCarthy focuses on the human impact of such an occurrence and vilifies no entity in his damnation of all humanity.
McCarthy’s body of work speaks to his tendency for restraint in painting a complete picture, and through the three lines of dialogue that follow the passage, he evokes a distinct post-Y2K sense of paranoia and fear about the apocalypse, conjuring up notions of canned food, flashlights, powdered Gatorade, and heat blankets rather than the Biblical bloodbath favored in the Left Behind series. His treatment of the apocalypse reserves an appreciation for the reader, and in some way, the concept itself. The fictional world in The Road is far more horrifying and numbingly perplexing than most popular depictions, and its memorable moments stir up a more powerful reaction within me than most of its contemporary brethren.
One of the passages Jon brings up in his post struck me as well – “Make a list. Recite a litany. Remember,” on page 31. Like Jon, I found this passage incredibly effective in its succinctness. However, it troubles me. Is this how McCarthy views human nature? As a simple list of to do’s to remember and check off? Perhaps it holds truth, and maybe our humanity can be bulleted and listicized like everything else, particularly in the face of the apocalypse. There is a fine line between what we decide on as a culture to define us as moral beings, and many of our own species are cast out of that narrow definition for countless reasons. After the world is over, it seems there is little room for the frivolous semantic divide between good and evil.
