anonymous

The Road
Multi- paragraph Character Essay
In the Novel, The Road, Cormac McCarthy depicts a boy that displays affectionate, respectful and thoughtful traits which contrast sharply with those of other characters in the novel. During the boy’s journey south with his father, they come across many scenarios in which the boy develops these traits.
The boy displays affectionate traits when they come across people that need help. The boy wants to help them in any way he can even if that means giving away their scarce food supply. The father does not fully support the boy’s view because he is more mature and is able to see that they really cannot afford to help the people they come across and that most of the people they come across would not benefit from their help anyway. On the other hand, the other people in the book would not even consider helping those they come across. They would most likely see them as something to eat. On their journey through a small town the boy spots a little boy. He tells his father that “we could get him and take him with us” but the father says “we can’t” (85). The boy is not old enough yet to understand why they cannot take care of everybody in the world although the father tries to explain.
The boy is also very respectful towards those that have died, whether it is due to other people or the environment. The father and son refer to themselves as “the good guys” repeatedly in the book. When they find supplies they look for clues that the people it belonged to have not been there recently or could not come back to it and need the supplies. One of the major things that set them apart from many of the others in the book is that the two of them have not resorted to cannibalism unlike many of the other people they encounter in the book.
Another one of the boy’s traits that becomes evident in the book is that he