Editor's Choice
Why doesn't Cormac McCarthy name his characters in The Road? How do "boy" and "man" labels impact reader relation?
Quick answer:
Cormac McCarthy omits names for the characters in The Road to emphasize their universality and the bleakness of their world. By using "boy" and "man," McCarthy makes them symbols of humanity, stripped of individuality by a post-apocalyptic setting. This choice enhances the themes of survival and moral struggle, allowing readers to relate more directly to the characters and experience the narrative as a broader commentary on human endurance and goodness amidst devastation.
This is most likely an artistic decision, done primarily for aesthetic effect and narrative reinforcement. The world of McCarthy's The Road is a bleak and barren wasteland. When we read McCarthy's prose, we almost imagine the entire world in black and white. Besides pockets of chaos that contain the most absolutely wretched levels of humanity, the narrative journey of the road is a somber and arduous trudge that is not nearly as tragic as it is simply numbing. The characters are not on a traditional journey, because in this world, there is not a significant amount to gain.
The characters go unnamed to give them a flat effect, even though they both go through huge dynamic changes. They have no grand destiny or special skills that you would expect from typical protagonists; both the man and the boy are nobodies. While that sounds harsh, it is also what makes both...
Unlock This Answer Now
Start your 48-hour free trial and get ahead in class. Boost your grades with access to expert answers and top-tier study guides. Thousands of students are already mastering their assignments—don't miss out. Cancel anytime.
Already a member? Log in here.
characters so extraordinary. They could be absolutely anyone. McCarthy shows that anyone could be capable of surviving miserable circumstances and making surreal choices if faced with such a grueling journey. The nameless characters are that much easier to apply to all of humanity. They are a symbol of all that is good in mankind struggling to fight for its life as the darkness of savagery threatens to consume it.
Cormac McCarthy uses the terms "boy" and "man" to describe his main characters because it makes it easier for readers to relate to them.
When someone reading a book reads about a named character, they're able to create an image of that character in their mind. The character is someone separate and someone who isn't in their life. A name goes a long way toward creating this standalone character in a person's head.
When McCarthy talks about what happens to the boy and the man, he makes them universal by not giving them names. It's easier for readers to imagine the events of the novel happening to someone they know. This kind of relationship to the characters makes the events even more startling and tragic.
When the man meets Ely, he says that he could be anyone. His name doesn't matter. When you get down to it, that's why McCarthy doesn't use names. The man and the boy could be anyone.
In The Road by Cormac McCarthy, the man and the boy have been reduced to their basic existential states.
Since there are no longer friends and family and no real society, the identification of the man and the boy is only important to them as they are on the most basic level of living. For this same reason, in certain editions of the novel there are no designated chapters as the search for food and shelter is a continuum without a new beginning or a new phase.
It is only the sustaining net of love that holds these two beings together. Otherwise, they are isolated in a post-apocalyptic environment that is reduced to a struggle to survive:
They plodded on, thin and filthy as street addicts. Cowled in their blankets against the cold and their breath smoking, shuffling through the black and silky drifts. . . . He held the boy against him, cold to the bone. Don't lose heart, he said. We'll be all right (p.177).
The man represents all that remains of goodness in a demolished civilization. He desperately clings to life as he hopes that his son will survive and not be corrupted as have so many others. When the man dies, he goes with the hope that "goodness will find the little boy."
In "The Road" the author does not provide names for his characters because it makes the story's theme of the violent indifference that has stricken the world more intense, it conveys how this devastation has stripped us of our individuality, now those who have survived wander in a rugged, raw new wilderness, fighting to stay alive.
The bleakness, coldness and indifference that is conveyed through the impersonal nature in this story helps to support the author's message of the total destruction of everything that we love and appreciate about our lives.
"The boy and his father hope to avoid the marauders, reach a milder climate, and perhaps locate some remnants of civilization still worthy of that name. They possess only what they can scavenge to eat, and the rags they wear and the heat of their own bodies are all the shelter they have. A pistol with only a few bullets is their only defense besides flight."
By not giving his characters names, McCarthy makes them more universal, more representative of humankind. As readers, we can identify more directly with this father and son, and we see the two as people who have survived the apocalyptic events that precede the opening of the novel. This man and his son are good people who struggle against enormous odds and against other people who have chosen evil ways to cope with the aftermath of the tragedy. The man and the boy are truly the "good guys" whom we want to survive. In every encounter they have with others, in every struggle, and in every predicament, we yearn for their success. Although you may be frustrated by their lack of names, McCarthy has deliberately left them nameless to make them symbolic of all of the people who are like them and left bereft by the horrific events of the novel.