A symbol is an image that comes to represent something else, a big idea or emotion or theme. For instance, the heart is often used as a symbol for love, or the dove as a symbol for peace, or green as the symbolic colour for envy.
In The Road,there are a few important symbols, that recur throughout the text. They have a literal meaning in the text but they also come to represent something much bigger. The symbols are not always as straightforward as the heart example above. They may have all kinds of meanings and connotations and be open to interpretation.
The Road as a Symbol
Probably the most important symbol in the novel is the road. It functions literally and symbolically, as well as structuring the narrative.
Use the approach below to explore the importance of the road in the book.
1. Read these ideas about how the road figures in literature more generally, to put McCarthy’s use of it into a cultural and literary context. Then think about how McCarthy’s use of the road connects with this tradition.
In The Road,there are a few important symbols, that recur throughout the text. They have a literal meaning in the text but they also come to represent something much bigger. The symbols are not always as straightforward as the heart example above. They may have all kinds of meanings and connotations and be open to interpretation.
The Road as a Symbol
Probably the most important symbol in the novel is the road. It functions literally and symbolically, as well as structuring the narrative.
Use the approach below to explore the importance of the road in the book.
1. Read these ideas about how the road figures in literature more generally, to put McCarthy’s use of it into a cultural and literary context. Then think about how McCarthy’s use of the road connects with this tradition.
- The road or journey has often been used as a metaphor for life itself – the journey from birth to death.
- In American culture, the road is an important symbol. America is a large country and crossing the continent has been seen symbolically as representing a pioneering spirit – striking out into the unknown – or searching for oneself. Many classic American novels (and films) make a journey by road the focus for the narrative, for instance John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, Jack Kerouac’s On The Road or the film Thelma and Louise.
- The epic journey has a much longer literary and cultural history. Going back to Greek literature, in Homer’s The Odyssey, Ulysses goes on a long journey and encounters many tests and trials, both physical and mental, before returning to his homeland. The epic work The Divine Comedy by the Italian medieval poet Dante shows the poet on a journey in the afterlife, to Hell, Purgatory and Heaven. John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress, shows the pilgrim Christian leaving his home in this world and travelling to the ‘Celestial City’. Gulliver’s Travels is a fantastical journey to other worlds, in which the main character discovers more about his own world by contrast with the societies he encounters.
- The journey as a structure for a novel implies a particular kind of pattern, where there are episodes along the way. The journey involves meeting new challenges and dangers, the chance of luck to bring fortune or difficulties, and is often structured around a struggle for survival, away from the routine and security of a home environment.
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