“Ravens were locals, indigenous, and moving to town, the same as people, addicted to later stages of the same junk, but without free health care”.
There’s more knowledge in Seth Kantner than you’re likely to come across in a hundred other writers. The Arctic shines in all its everyday life in this book.
“How long have you been on the road?
I was always on the road. You cant stay in one place.
How do you live?
I just keep going. I knew this was coming.
You knew it was coming?
Yeah. This or something like it. I always believed in it.
Did you try to get ready for it?
No. What would you do?
I dont know.
People were always getting ready for tomorrow. I didnt believe in that. Tomorrow wasnt getting ready for them. It didnt even know they were there.
I guess not.”
Why did I wait this long to read The Road? I guess I know now. This is no book for whatevers and laters. It’s a book way beyond the scope of what I can stomach and probably the best book I have read in years. I am totally shaken.
Having begun my McCarthy readings with Blood Meridian I thought I had myself well protected and coated in teflon after the brutality of that book, but where Blood Meridian shines in its non-human humans The Road shivers in its lack of humans almost whatsoever. Page after page of fragmented narrative elements. Literary shrapnel from a world exploded.
And the now well known tale of a father and son struggling down an eternal road through a post-ragnarok world is not pure evil as Blood Meridian. Rather, The Road is devoid of humanity and any human emotion. Ashes to ashes never felt more as a curse than it does here.
This is the first book in a loooong time that I read cover to cover in one sitting. I just had to get it over with. Only trouble is: Memory.
The horror.
A friend reminded me that Charles Yu’s book is such a great read.
Stuff like this:
“The base model TM-31 runs on state-of-of-the-art chronodiegetical technology: a six-cylinder grammar drive built on a quad core physics engine, which features an applied temporalinguistics architechture allowing for free-form navigation within a rendered environment, such as, fo instance, a story space and, in particular, a science fictional universe. Or, as mom used to say: it’s a box.”
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Actually got inspired to read this book by a mighty fine list over here: http://bit.ly/ksEDrO
Same place that ultimately convinced me to start reading Paul Theroux
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Joel 11:38 pm on June 17, 2011 Permalink
Hi Mads,
Your review of The Road mirrors in many ways my feelings toward Blood Meridian (one of my more recent reads) which read like a nightmare but ranks up there as one of my favorites – can’t wait to read The Road!
I was recently in Argentina where I had the chance to visit with a mutual acquaintance, Natasha. Some how we ended up talking about literature blogs and, interestingly enough, I was familiar with yours.
Anyways, just thought I’d introduce myself. I plan to visit Greenland the beginning of August (can’t wait!) and if you’re around at that time it might be fun to meet up – possibly talk books….
Joel
joel.duthie@gmail.com