The Carriers of Fire

Throughout the novel, there was something that strongly caught my eye. I realized that several times in the book, the symbol of fire was oftenly repeated. At first, I didn't pay much attention to it but after I saw it so many times, I began to notice it more. Through the book, the father is always describing the world as a gray and dark place. This description, reveals that in The Road's world, the Earth has become hopeless and depressing. Everytime they see something that is supposed to be beautiful, such as the ocean and the horizon, they depict it as: "Out there was the gray beach...Beyond that the ocean vast and cold...and then the gray squall line of ash" (McCarthy 215). They portray the sea as "Cold. Desolate. Birdless" (McCarthy 215). All of these descriptions of things that are usually seen as beautiful and colorful, show that in the novel's world, things have become completely different.

Because of the darkness of the book, whenever I saw light or fire, I began to associate it with hope. The first time I gave importance to fire in the novel was in a converstaion between the father and son: "We are going to be okay, aren't we Papa?/ Yes. We are. / And nothing bad is going to happen to us./ That's right./ Because we're carrying the fire./ Yes. Because we're carrying the fire" (McCarthy 83). According to this section, the father and son portray the fire as something very important. In the dark world they live in, they use the fire to show that there is still hope for humans in their world.

At the end of the novel, when the father is saying his last words to his son, he says to him: "You have to carry the fire./ I don't know how to./ Yes you do./ Is it real? The fire?/ Yes it is./ Where is it? I don't know where it is./ Yes you do. It's inside you. It was always there" (McCarthy 279). This last conversation between them depicts that the fire is being used to symbolize hope. For the father, his son represents the last hope for human kind. That's why he tells him that in a world were darkness pervades, it is his responsibility to show hope through the light of fire.