Juxtaposition of Characters: The Father, The Boy and Equality
I’d like to contradict Matt’s comment about the son being the good-hearted innocent child while the father is the cold and somewhat cruel adult. In my (not so humble) opinion, McCarthy juxtaposes the father and son simply to display how naive youth can be. The father is the realistic, thoughtful and caring individual looking out for his son, as seen in his frequent unequal dividing of rations. It is essential for both protagonists’ survival that their few rations and commodities be spared for themselves. While the father is immature not to kill his son, especially when his son voices his wish for death (pg. 114), if their journey and survival is to be explored, the father remains the stern and realistic adult, while the underdeveloped child has yet to learn the realities of the world. McCarthy displays the degeneration of both characters, as at one point the father grants his son’s desire to give food to an old man they find. McCarthy here displays how two seemingly different characters can degenerate to the same level, and the reader has no sympathy for the protagonists when they are starving soon after.
Many parallels can be drawn to the young boy in The Road and Equality in Anthem. Just as the boy in McCarthy’ novel appears underdeveloped and unrealistic, so Equality appears immature in his wanderings and explorations. Equality seems even more immature than McCarthy’s protagonist as he tells of how, “We know that we are evil, but there is no will in us and no power to resist it. (3)”, (he refers to himself as ‘we’ ”). Equality’s underdevelopment is further displayed in his dismissal of society’s general rules;
“We are one in all and all in one.
There are no men but only the great WE,
One, indivisible and forever.”
A more mature individual than Equality should have realized that what benefits society is all that matters, just as the father in The Road realized that in helping an already condemned individual all three of them may die.
- Daniel Wisnicki
Are you saying that when the father and son gave the old man some food, they were becoming “weak”. You said that they would not recieve any sympathy because they were starving soon after. They are more like people in today’s society, selfless. People do not care how hard off they are, they always want to help some who is worse off than them. People have a heart unlike you, just kinding… and they want to save a life even if it jeopardizes their own.
Okay, Daniel, are you sitting down? You are not going to believe this, but I agree with what you are saying. The father must do the things he does given the harsh realities of the situation.
I definitely have to take Anthem home one night this week after I get all of the anthologies marked.
My question is: have you ever examined Rand’s philosophies?
I unfortunately have to say that i PARTLY! agree with Daniel. The father does have to be the harsh realist in this situation. The only way to survive is to be selfish. I think killing his son is taking it a little far personally, but i do see your point. I will disagrree that just because the boy is too young to have experienced as much of the world as his father it makes him weak. He may be nieve but matt has commented that he is not as nieve as he appears in many cases.
Thank you Mrs. Dejong and Margie. I’d like to point out that there is a fine line between cynicism and realism, and I maintain myself on the former side. While helping others, if possible, is generally good, one must question who is more valuable in some situations. The father has to ask himself if he and his son are more valuable than the stranger, and if he answers ‘no’, then yes, he is weak.
Referring back to your original post you argue that Equality is immature perhaps even more immature than the boy in The Road. What about later in the piece after the climactic moment he discovers I and renames himself Prometheus?