The Howling Void and The Fire: A Study of Darkness, Light, and the Presence of God in The Sunset Limited and The Road Jordan Willis College

American author Cormac McCarthy is well-known for unflinchingly examining the moral state of humanity within his writing. His works seldom offer any justification or redemption, leaving readers to equally ponder the sense and senselessness, the proverbial light and darkness within his works. Though McCarthy has frequently challenged human morality throughout his corpus, The Sunset Limited and The Road – a play and a novel, respectively, both published in the same year – concentrate on the imagery of light and darkness. In the former, it is literally a Black and White debate. In the latter, the ideas of black and white are more figuratively presented. By examining the themes of contrasting humanity, hope, and the presence of God within The Road, one can have a better understanding of the same themes presented in The Sunset Limited.

White believes that the world is consumed by darkness. In Understanding Cormac McCarthy, Steven Frye states that “[d]arkness, desolation, isolation, and the brute reality of an indifferent world” are the “patterns of experience Cormac McCarthy forces upon those who choose to read him” (179). This is the pattern of existence that White experiences. He believes that in history, “[t]he darker picture is...