Gray Days, Black Nights : Life, Death, and Color in Cormac McCarthy's The Road

Abstract

This thesis examines the themes of life and death in Cormac McCarthy’s post-apocalyptic novel The Road (2006). It expands upon an idea posited by Farnaz Hajeb, Mahsa Hashemi and Hossein Aliakbari Harehdahst that the novel serves as a rewriting of contraries. The focus is particularly on the dichotomy of life and death. By analyzing these themes in the novel, I demonstrate how their meanings are obfuscated, their positions as polar opposites made questionable, creating a complicated dichotomy of life and death. This dichotomy is made apparent through the plot of the novel, as well as through the dialogue and the actions of the characters, but also through McCarthy’s particular use of color descriptors. Both life and death are strongly color coded in the novel—death is represented by the colors black and gray, and life by more lively colors, such as blue and green— but the conventions of color symbolism are purposefully played with to reflect the contradictions in the novel’s most prominent themes. Thus, I also examine how color is used to accentuate the complicated dichotomy of life and death. Ultimately, I argue that the novel serves as a warning of the fragility of our society, which is predicated on the plentifulness of natural resources.