The Road Assignment # 2

Cormac McCarthy, author of the fictional story, The Road, writes this story based on a post-apocalyptic time period to illustrate the journey of a father and a son with a suspicious tone. The reader would not know what to expect next with so many upcoming events, however in the story both of the characters only wanted to survive and find safety, but in their journey they experience many obstacles. The demise of mostly the whole world had the two main characters terrified but united, but it all changed when they were encountered their first challenge. The father felt threatened when a guy saw them hiding and felt he had no other choice but to do what he thought was the best, kill him, “The man fell back instantly and lay with blood bubbling from the hole in his forehead.”(66) Trust was way gone since the whole world was destroyed, morality was no longer in existence and both the father and the son feared more than ever. They knew that from now on they had to watch each other because there could be someone wanting vengeance for the guy’s death. The father was willing to do anything to protect his son from this cruel new world, but the little boy was more traumatized than he was before, he could not believe his own father had become a murderer. The young boy started questioning their own principles, he asked his father if they were still good guys and the father said, “We’re still the good guys. And we always will be.”(77) Regardless of all the commotion happening and all the evil that was left in the world, the father still had his moralities, but the only difference now was that it was either their lives or someone else’s. He did whatever it took for them to be safe, but at times he had to risk it all or else they wouldn't survive, “We’ll have to take a risk.”(79) When it came to food, shelter and safety they didn't know what they would find when they crossed to a new place, the father wanted them to survive because he had hope that they would find a new safe world in the south. Even though the son saw the father differently ever since he killed a guy right in front of his eyes, the father never gave up on their lives, he loved his son and was the only person that kept him moving forward. The father would always go look for their necessities and left the boy hiding, he would only risk his own life. When wanting to survive principles become more difficult to obey but there’s always a limit to were you have to take action. Having someone to live for is what motivates someone to keep fighting.