Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road

Comprehensive Research & Study Guides Bloom's guides

by Harold Bloom

148 pages

English language

Published Aug. 13, 2011 by Bloom's Literary Criticism.

ISBN:: 978-1-61753-002-9
OCLC Number:: 679924684

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(21 reviews)

1 edition

georgewhatup reviewed Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road by Harold Bloom (Bloom's guides)

Review of "Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road" on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

I'll be honest, I thought the book was pretty good - the simplistic prose with occasional glimmers of beauty used to capture the bleak emptiness of the world - but then I saw a negative review and was a little won over by it. Maybe I was just fooled by McCartney. Tricked by sparse prose into thinking the book was better than it really was. Hoodwinked into thinking the repetitive plot was very clever even though I didn't get it.

It's definitely possible and I can't shake that feeling, so I have to call this book average.

I'll tackle Blood Meridian one day, from some glances at it I think that one is much more undeniable in its brilliance.

Jero reviewed Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road by Harold Bloom (Bloom's guides)

Review of "Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road" on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

I bought this book maybe 10 years ago and started reading it, but then I stopped not very far into it, and didn’t try again. Not because I hated it, but I guess it was just too dense and a little too slow for young, impatient me at the time. I picked it up again after reading somewhere how this book was a “love story between father and son”, and as a father myself, I immediately wanted to read it. I did and I can say that statement is true. I felt the frustration and desperation of the world the man and the boy were living. I was able to relate to the emotions the man felt for his boy, and I shed a tear at the end. In my opinion, a book that is able to stir emotions in you is a good book. And this was one of …

Derek Caelin reviewed Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road by Harold Bloom (Bloom's guides)

Review of "Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road" on 'Storygraph'

4 stars

I read this book on vacation and now all I want to do is find and hold my son.

Michael @ Knowledge Lost reviewed Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road by Harold Bloom (Bloom's guides)

Review of "Bloom's Guides: Cormac McCarthy's The Road" on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

When it comes to books, I try to read the book before seeing the movie. There have been many occasions where I saw the movie first; often it does make it harder to enjoy the book (American Psycho and Psycho) but I try not to let that effect my rating. When it came to The Road things were a little different; sure the story is almost exactly like the movie, but we book was far more superior. The writing was splendid, full of darkness and making this wonderfully bleak and even brutal.

The Road is a story of a Father and Son travelling south in order to survive the winter in a post-apocalyptic world of ash. It’s a beautiful tale of survival; no just from the gangs or “Bad Guys” but also from constantly starving or freezing. While I’m not sure what happened to the world, all it says is “The clocks stopped at 1:17. A long shear of light and then a series of low concussions.” I suspect it was a nuclear holocaust.

The Road is a wonderful read, but be forward this isn’t a fast paced, action packed Post- apocalyptic book, this is a story of a survival. My only main problem with this book is the fact that the father is never seems to get angry with his son, even if he loses the gun or leaves the gas on, he never seemed to get upset about the situation. I just feel that a normal human would react to a situation like that