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They left you here, didn’t they?

I left myself here.

He turned and went limping down the stairs and opened the front door and went out into the street backward watching the house. When he got to the cart he pulled it upright and piled their things back in. Stay close, he whispered. Stay close.

Are you sure you are really ok poppa

Yes, I'm fine

Ok

The two stood there for a brief moment. Standing in the cold of the harsh winter. For just a moment, he wished that he could die. This was not an option though, he was no longer living for himself. These thoughts running through his head seemed to leave a remnant of bitterness in his heart. But he knew it was not the fault of the boy so he tried not to take his anger out on him. The man could see that the boy did not understand life yet. He thought the only way he would feel better is if the boy understood his actions.

Did you notice how I never asked for his name?

Whoose?

The robber

Yes poppa

That's just in case I had to use the pistol

But poppa we’re the good guys, and the good guys don’t hurt people

The man knew he had done nothing wrong, but wished the boy could see that too. They began to walk, slowly down the road not knowing what the future had in store. The boy was not settled, he seemed to be preparing for the worse.

They put up in a store building at the end of the town. He wheeled the cart through and into a room at the rear and shut the door and pushed the cart against it sideways. He dug out the burner and the tank of gas and lit the burner and set it in the floor and then he unbuckled his belt and took off his bloodstained trousers.

CREATIVE PIECE

The boy could tell that his father was nervous. They had experience road rats before, but there was something around them that seemed to be communicating with the boy. Was there someone else around? Not yet. The boy already ruled that out. What was it? The boy soon began to hear the sounds of heavy footsteps coming from the tunnel. Footsteps coming from multiple people. The boy didn’t have to read his father’s expression to know that the road rats were getting closer. But something else was catching the boy’s attention: Everything around him began changing. The leftover leaves in the trees began to dance in the wind. The wind began moaning and groaning. The leaves on the ground began to shiver with fear. Everything around him was sounding like it was dying a second time. The boy still didn’t think the trees were afraid of the road rats. He looked at his father. Somehow, the boy knew when to look. He glanced at the man’s pocket, even though he was extremely tire from the traveling. The silver gun was now visible. He wouldn’t do that, the boy thought. Why would he kill them? The army of footsteps began more distinct. The man never broke eye contact with the tunnel entrance. The boy knew that they would be getting out of the car soon, but all he could watch was the gun slowly making its way out of the ripped pocket. He wouldn’t actually kill, would he?

RATIONALE

The piece that I have written would be inserted into page 61, when the man and the boy first encounter road rats at the entrance to the tunnel. This piece is essentially supposed to represent a couple of small things. I wanted to write from the boy’s perspective since in the book, we hear a lot from the man’s perspective. The boy is probably from eight to ten years old, so I wanted to take a closer look at how he would react to surprising elements in a broken environment like this. The boy, in my piece, is very curious about what his father is capable of doing, and if he’s actually going to try to kill the road rats. The boy has just been following the man’s path in the journey, and audiences never really get to read about the boy’s thoughts, opinions, questions, or fears. The boy is a very important character, and that’s why I think McCarthy Another element I wanted to add was sound. I have read enough of the visual aids in The Road probably by the end of the first few pages. I wanted to take the story and tell it an another, interesting way. I wanted to describe now only what the environment looks like, but also what it sounds like. The trees creaking and cracking, the leaves rustling and shivering, the wind “moaning and groaning.” A theme that I think should be considered is the idea of murder. Even though the boy is in a state where anything could die, he’s never actually seen somebody get killed. When the boy finds out that his father has a gun, he automatically guesses that he is planning on killing the road rats. I wanted to explore this topic, especially since murder would be soon witness by a small child. I also wanted to tackle the idea of knowing the difference between a good guy and a bad guy. When the man and the boy hear the road rats coming, the man is already getting ready to jump out of the car and later pull out his pistol. The boy is trying to understand that the road rats are bad guys, but that is only because of how the father is reacting to only the sound of footsteps. In a world like this, it would be automatic for someone to not trust anybody, as they are afraid of being backstabbed. However, I wanted to use my piece and describe the boy’s confusion as to how the man knows that the road rats are, in fact, bad guys.

This piece of writing is a personal interpretation of what would have been from Cormac McCarthy’s The Road had it not been edited:

Creative Piece:

The fire continues to pierce the dense night even as the boy sleeps. It's soft glow surrounds his head casting a shadow onto the man. Yet he still feels its warmth. The gun lies in the dirt between the two. One real bullet remaining. The man lays staring at the golden reflection of the fire die down through its silver barrel. He feels a pounding on the back of his eyes as they climb up to the boy’s face. A soft quiver jolts through his hands and gets more sporadic as he reaches for the gun. He holds it loosely by its bloodfelt grip. The gun tumbles its way to the boy’s forehead. He takes aim. The gun drifts from position to position across the boy’s forehead. Powerless to hold a single target. He released his grip and droped his arm. He looked into the face of his sleeping son. A lone tear drifts down the man’s cheek. He shifted himself to look at the ever present void above him. The glow of the fire sits in the corner of his eye. You’ve taken my son from me, the man croaked. Or maybe you’ve always had him. The man looks to the yellow glow. I guess we have to thank you for the bunker and the boat, he says. At least I know you’ll be safe. The man closes his eyes. He feels the soft glow of the fire from the direction of his son. It soothes him to sleep.

Below is an explanation of the different factors that make up the piece above and how it would fit into the overall story:

The Rationale:

The passage above is meant to round off the world of the book The Road, by Cormac McCarthy. I chose to add to the end of page 277. This moment is the perfect opportunity to insert more information on the father’s acceptance of his inability to kill his own child in the name of protection. On the page itself the father is dying and he notes how his son is an honor to all prophets. I feel this to be the moment that the father is most understanding of the implications of his son’s value as an important figure. The page overall sets up a great contrast between the son’s importance and the man’s fleeting life, helping to expand on the conflict. Should the man kill the boy to protect him, or allow him to live to spread his hope to the wasteland?

I began by drawing a connection between the boy and the fire, mentioning how fire keeps going even as the boy sleeps. The fire itself is a symbol of hope and positivity, and throughout the story we see how this boy spreads this through his kind actions. The man also believed the the boy has something special in him as well, but he often alludes it to be in a more spiritual manner. The fire is portrayed respectively as a light in the dark, alluding to the boy being a hope in the dreadful world. Even the lifeline of the boy is shown to be connected to the fire. As the man looks at the gun, to kill the boy, and  the fire is seen dying in its reflection.

The story then moves into developing the character of the man,  justifying his later acceptance towards the predicament. He attempts to shoot the boy. Every step the man took from picking the gun up to aiming it is dreadful for him, to reflect the father's feelings towards attempting this action. Even when he has the gun aimed, his sickness makes it hard to aim. This man comes to the conclusion that God is protecting the boy from his death, of course this is kept open to interpretation as to why he could not kill him. The man believes since his son will be protected from anything, including his own father, he no longer fears for his safety.

The scene shows the hopelessness of the situation and how the man must accept his son’s responsibility to carry the fire. This rounds out the character more and explains his latter actions to accept his son’s survival even after his son wants to die with him. In the end he sleeps sure his son will be safe.

In the final version of The Road, much of the boy’s dialogue has been cut out, that is until now. This is his story.

There’s fog covering the road, blocking the view. A figure catches his eye, standing behind the tree staring at him. Coldly. A rush of wind behind him, there’s another figure. The last thing he feels is the cold metal of the barrel against his head and the sweet release of worries. Papa, I’m coming, he says. Silent. If there is anything that can describe this moment it would be...barren. This world is devoid of life, of love, of purpose. This world is barren. Beside the resting boy is his papa. The man died yesterday, but the boy couldn’t bring himself to leave his side. Papa I can’t go on like this, said the boy. He sat up and stared at the fire crackling in the dark. The dreams have taken over, clouding his vision of any hope. His hand slides over to check inventory. Pistol, water, gas, he says softly. He picks up the gun and looks into the chamber staring at the round. Cold, smooth, instant. A frigid wind blew through the site, but the boy sat unbothered.

You’re stronger than this.

Papa, I want to be with you and mama.

Mama and I are on a journey.

Can I come?

Who’s going to stop the bad guys?

I don’t know.

You. You carry the fire, the way into the light. I believe in you.

The voice was gone. He placed the gun down and stared out to the road. I carry the fire, Papa, for you.

Sofia and I created a dramatic and humorous take on Macbeth, as an amateur puppet. Our puppet show simplifies and adds a comical aspect to the play Macbeth. We modernized and combined all of the extensively-worded Shakespearean text to make it understandable material for any age group. This project was designed to create a unique understanding and perspective of the play Macbeth. We used our ¨vaulting ambition¨ to create an interpretive puppet show like no other project.

In interpreting the whole material for our script, we deliberately left out some scenes to minimize distractions from the meaning and basic plot. We deleted scenes like the comic relief from porter character to really bring out the lies of the Macbeths. Our version instead goes straight from them plotting to be sad to them pretending to be sad right away. We also cut the murder of Macduff’s family because it is dramatically discussed later, and start late in scene 4.3 because Malcolm and Macduff’s droning on distracts from Macduff’s reaction to the murder of his family.

Our production consists of many sound effects and background noises. We utilize these to create a setting because the background image cannot be changed. In 1.6, there are birds chirping softly to add to Duncan’s announced comfort and also portray that they are outside. Later, crickets can be heard to symbolize nighttime. In addition to setting, dramatic music can also be heard beneath many of the soliloquies to amplify the mood. We feel drama should be ever-present in our show as it is in the play, so suspenseful sound effects are also used.

When working with puppets, one cannot change their facial expression easily. To fix that issue, we often change the tone and style of our voices. In one scene at the end of Act 3, we describe our scene when practicing as “thane gossip”, so we changed the usual dull voices of our thanes to those of gossiping teenage girls, because gossiping is what is occurring in that scene. We also make the character Macduff very sassy sounding, because in the play he clearly “throws shade” at Macbeth and disses him on multiple occasions. Lady Macbeth was portrayed as a loud and over the top drama queen, because that's exactly what she was. Shakespeare wrote in very dramatic speeches for her such as “unsex me here” as well as her dramatic actions, like fainting at the sight of Duncan (on purpose).

Overall, we thought this project choice would be great for group work and equal collaboration. We worked outside of class making puppets and filming for many days, even weeks. For us, making a hand/finger puppet show was a very smart choice. Our minimal artistic skills were used to make funny puppets that acted out our strength, our well written modern script. We painstakingly translated almost every line of the play, and are extremely proud with the outcome. While our show may be long, the drama and comical aspects draw the audience back in.

McCarthy Unabridged

By: Ameer Forte

Being Human - Giknis

2016

• PLACEMENT: My excerpt will be inserted into McCarthy’s “The Road” on the very first page. Right before the very first paragraph.

• The passage below is what I have imagined was cut from Cormac McCarthy’s The Road before the final edition was released-

Creative Piece:

The unforgiving blows to the surface landed like that of an astrobleme sinking itself into the atmosphere. He would pray to God most nights. He would ask him to protect his family to keep them alive. And if that wasnt possible to at least let the child inside the womans womb live. The woman resented that the man did this. She believed that God was only a barmecide part of life humans made up to make the bad in the world easier to cope with. She said to him:

Why do you bother? There is no God.

Yes there is.

How do you know?

I just do.

What God would let this happen to us? I’ll curse his name and die before I ask him for anything.

Dont say that.

What has he done for us?

Hes given us faith. Hope.

In what?

He gave me that child. That child is a gift from God. That is how I know. That child is my hope. My faith.

When the man was sure the bombs had stopped falling he opened the cellar door to find that the remains of his house were just rubble. When he opened the door he was climbing outside for the first time in so long he had forgotten what the sunlight looked like only to find color had been vacuumed from the sky. When the woman made her way out of the bunker the man saw the darkness in the world corrupting her. Dimming her fire. But when he looked at her stomach he saw the light. He almost thought he saw God himself.

• Below is a rationale explaining the choices I made and why regarding this excerpt-

The Rationale:

My scene is meant to be placed on the very first page, right before the opening paragraph. It is set in the past as an opening prologue to the current timeline of the story. I chose this placement because I think that a small backstory on how The Road came to be should be in the beginning of the novel. I also chose to leave out apostrophes and commas at areas they would typically belong because I think Coric McCarthy would have written it this way, in his unique style.

I chose to create this scene in The Road because it includes two very important themes that also stay consistent throughout the novel. God. Is there one? Does it matter? And the light vs. the darkness. Throughout my excerpt the man and the woman grapple with their views of God. God is an important motif in the novel which is another reason I incorporated this theme in my excerpt. I chose to make the man a believer of God, although throughout the novel I don’t think that that is so clear. But I chose to do this because I do think that the man views the boy as holy and I interpret that as him viewing the boy as a gift from God. All through the novel he believes that God entrusted him to protect the boy. “He knew that the child was his warrant. He said: If he is not the word of God God never spoke.” (Pg. 5) Here is just one example of that.

This holy view of the boy the man has is also the reason I included the latter part of my scene, where the man looks at the woman's stomach (which is bearing the boy) and sees the light. As opposed to him looking at the woman and seeing the darkness. I believe the purpose of the light in this novel is to show hope within someone. When that hope is lost they become corrupted by darkness. The scene in the novel where the woman left the man and the boy to, we speculate, kill herself, is a scene where I feel the woman lost her hope. I chose to show a little of that beginning in my scene with the man seeing darkness.

The essential questions I addressed are, what is the role of God? What happened before this world? And what made it occur? The first question I answered when I brought out in my scene that the role God to the important characters in my scene (those being the man, the woman, and the boy) is the light and the provider of hope in a world otherwise dark and hopeless. The second and third questions I answered in my first sentence, which was describing a nuclear war going on. That’s what was happening before the current timeline and what caused The Road to come about.

Below you will find a passage that I imagine was cut from McCarthy's original manuscript. But first please enjoy some photography inspired by the book.

The passage below is something I believe should have been written in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road before the final edition was released.

•          •          •

The creature was watching their every move. A fearsome creature, from the certainty of there being that which was unknown. The cave was was dark. They could feel the very cold death creeping upon them. The black moonlight shined inward through a thick blanket of snow, slowly covering the entrance of the cave to the brim. The boy pulled the blankets over him. The man lie there, being the creature, and he was carrying the fire. The fire was the breath of the creature and it was a monochromatic grey, dying breath. A blanket of ice covered the cave. The breath was the only heat source for the creature and the boy and without it the boy would freeze. As the breath slowly withered away the creature’s heart beat slower and slower. A pitch black silence began to fill the room. The creature was dead. The boy held the creature in his arms and sat there crying for a long time. It was cold and dark. It was bright. A light shined from roof of the cave. Some misshapen creature, slimy, slick, uncertain fell through. It resembled the previous creature. It’s breath was fire and the fire lit the room.

The man woke up coughing. He didn’t check for the boy. He knew he was fine. He wiped the blood off of his mouth. The boy lie awake.

I had a dream

About what?

The boy didnt say anything.

I had a dream too it’s ok

ok.

Below is my rationale to explain the choices I made for my project .

My story includes the dad, the boy, and the man that comes after the dad dies. The boy in the dream is portrayed as the boy (naturally) and the two men are portrayed as the creature(s). I chose to portray these characters this way because throughout the book there are many “creatures”. The creatures are the things that bring uncertainty, which brings danger. These men are mortal, so they are nothing but unpredictable creatures placed upon this world. The boy however is not a creature, rather something closer to an angel. He is filled with motives that show nothing but compassion.

This section goes on page 260 of the book between where the boy said “but we did kill him” and where the book said “In the morning”. I feel like this is a great place to add a dream because it is evident that the man is dying more and more; further in the book we see the man slowly giving up until he reaches his death, and in the book dreams portray things that happen in the future. I wanted to make this the man’s dream (since the book is mainly through the perspective of the man), and a happy one because in the book happy dreams mean you are starting to give up (which the man is). The dream stylistically follows the general decrepit themes of the book, however for the man this is a very happy dream. This is because naturally the man is worried about what will become of the boy when he dies. This dream is reassuring him that everything is going to be alright (as far as the boy goes), and that his god will come through as he has many times throughout the book.  Presumably it is the god that will bring this miraculous coincidence of someone coming to carry the fire and protect the boy after the man dies. This explains some of the man’s actions later on in the book, and explains why he doesn’t check on the boy in this scene nor the scene after.

The conversation is also very important. It adds yet another scene where the boy is distancing himself from the man. It also hints that the boy knows the man will die soon (through this distance). The man is tried relating to the boy when he said that he had a dream too. Stylistically I’ve found the book to use single quotes, but mostly just not in the contractions, so I’ve tried to match that with the word “didnt” (as well as match a few other stylistic choices).

The following passage​ is what I have imagined was cut from Cormac McCarthy's The Road before the final edition was released. It takes place on page 143, in between, "There was no gun and there wasn't going to be one," and, "When he woke the gaslamp overhead was hissing softly."

As he sat on his bunk, he listened to the high winds that surely signaled the start of another storm. Minutes later the rain began. It created an odd noise. It sounded nothing like the familiar sound of rain on the roof of a house. It sounded more like footsteps on the soil above. Thousands of footsteps hitting the ground over their heads. The sound of thunder was muffled, a thunderhum. It was unsettling but also kind of calming. He liked it, so he sat and listened.

After a while it was difficult to keep his eyes open. He had just begun to drift off, but the repetitive nature of the thunderhum and the rainfeet was interrupted and it caught his attention. Actual footsteps? He walked over the the steps and put his head up to the ceiling. Footsteps. Against his better judgement, he swung open the door.

Is anyone there?

There was movement in the dark. He saw a shadow and a pale face. Their eyes met his. Her eyes met his. Her eyes met his. It was her.

He was drenched to the bone already and re-entered the bunker to grab a tarp and the battery lantern. He decided to wake the boy. He was shaking him.

Your mother.

Now the boy was shaking him.

Papa, wake up.

He jolted upright.

She’s out there. I need to see her.

Papa, there’s no one to see!

Realization struck. The man, embarrassed, said, Go back to bed.

The boy did.

(250 words) (McCarthy-esque words: thunderhum, rainfeet)

This is my rationale, explaining why I made these choices for this project.

In my passage, I wanted to focus on the boy's growth over time and how the man acts in contrast to him. I was really interested in the motif of dreams that McCarthy used and decided to give another peek into the man's dreams. The man is constantly dreaming about his wife so I definitely had to include her in it. This reminded me of the incident with the little boy, on page 85, where the man tried to convince the boy that he was imagining things. I thought it would be interesting to have the tables turned this time and make it so that the man is the one who is convinced there is someone there when he is only dreaming. The man is sleep-talking and his voice startles the boy out of his sleep, so he immediately wakes the man. Once the man realizes that the whole previous ordeal with his wife was a dream, he is embarrassed and tells the boy to go back to bed.

When the boy saw the other little boy the man said, “There’s no one to see,” so I made sure to have the boy say the same exact thing to the man. The man remembers that outburst and is not happy that now he is on the other side of the argument. What makes the man even more embarrassed is that in this case, he was most definitely having a dream whereas the boy very well may have actually seen someone else.

The boy springing right into action and knowing how to handle this situation shows his growth and maturity. This passage also highlights the man’s deteriorating mental state. He said that good dreams are bad news and he has been having so many dreams about his wife that it’s clear he isn’t doing so well. The man’s poor health and state of mind is dangerous to the boy since the man’s judgement is not very reliable.

I placed this passage in this location of the book because I wanted there to be no mention of it when they both wake up again. The man completely brushes that off his shoulder and hopes that the boy has forgotten it too. he doesn’t want the boy to be worried about him or realize how unsettled he was by the dream.