In this thesis, I argue that the question of ethics, despite claims to the contrary, is a central concern in Cormac McCarthy’s fiction. My principal contention, in this regard, is that an approach that is not reliant on conventional systems of meaning is needed if one is to engage effectively with the moral value of this writer’s oeuvre. In devising such an approach, I draw heavily on the ‘immoralist’ writings of Friedrich Nietzsche. The first chapter of the study contends that good and evil, terms central to conventional morality, do not occupy easily definable positions in McCarthy’s work. In the second chapter, the emphasis falls on the way in which language and myth’s mediation of reality informs choice. The final chapter focuses on the post-apocalyptic setting of The Road, in which normative systems of value are completely absent. It argues that, despite this absence, McCarthy presents a compassionate ethic that is able to find purchase in the harsh world depicted in the novel. Finally, then, this study argues that McCarthy’s latest novel, The Road, requires a reconsideration of the critical claim that his work is nihilistic and that it negates moral value.

Magister Artium - MA / Through a literary analysis of two contemporary novels, J.M. Coetzee's Life & Times of Michael K (1983) and Cormac McCarthy's The Road (2006), in which a common concern seems to be an exploration of what it means to be human, the thesis seeks to explore the relationship between human consciousness and language. This dissertation considers the development of a conception of the human based on rationality, and which begins in the Italian Renaissance and gains momentum in the Enlightenment. This conception models the human as a stable knowable self. This is drawn in contrast to the novels, which figure the absence of a stable knowable self in the representation of their protagonists. The thesis thus interrogates language's capacity to provide definitional meanings of the ''human.'' On the other hand, although language's capacity to provide essential meanings is questioned, its abundant expressive forms give voice to the experience of human being. Drawing on a range of fields of enquiry, both philosophical, linguistic, and bio-ethical, this thesis seeks to explore the connection between human consciousness and the medium of language. It considers how the two novels in question play with the concept of language to produce or imagine other ways of thinking about human existence, and other ways of creating meaning to human existence through the representation of their novels.

NUNES, Francisco Romário. The Road: o tema da violência da escrita para as telas. 2015. 150f. – Dissertação (Mestrado) – Universidade Federal do Ceará, Programa de Pós-graduação em Letras, Fortaleza (CE), 2015. / Submitted by Márcia Araújo (marcia_m_bezerra@yahoo.com.br) on 2015-06-05T17:30:27Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2015_dis_frnunes.pdf: 1763515 bytes, checksum: 26e4f72fd2473493106e1461b45eba59 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Márcia Araújo(marcia_m_bezerra@yahoo.com.br) on 2015-06-08T12:54:35Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2015_dis_frnunes.pdf: 1763515 bytes, checksum: 26e4f72fd2473493106e1461b45eba59 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-06-08T12:54:35Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2015_dis_frnunes.pdf: 1763515 bytes, checksum: 26e4f72fd2473493106e1461b45eba59 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015 / This paper analyzes the translation of the book The Road (2006), by Cormac McCarthy, to cinema, focusing on the theme of violence and the way it was translated to film. The Road tells the story of a father and his son; both are survivors of a disaster on Earth. They walk towards the south coast of the United States. During this journey, the characters remake the American History, a country that obtained its territorial expansion from north to south. Nevertheless, there is nothing to be conquered because the West lives post-apocalyptic days. On this regard, the characters wander among corpses seeking protection from the groups that practice cannibalism. Having this plot, the novel achieved popularity in its home country, as well as it obtained academic prestige, which culminated with the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. Three years after its release, The Road was adapted to a film with the same tittle, directed by John Hillcoat. Our main aim, then, is to investigate which strategies the director used to translate the theme of violence in cinema. We assume that the film translated violence according to the patterns of Hollywood melodrama, through a narrative construction that intends to make the spectator have affection for the characters. For this purpose, we based our research on some authors of Translation Studies: Lefevere (1992), Toury (1995) and Even-Zohar (1990). Thereafter, we studied some theories concerning adaptation from literature to screen according to Cattrysse (1992), Stam (2008) and Hutcheon (2013). Related to cinema theory, we studied Machado (2011), Xavier (2003, 2012) and Bordwell (1985). We also investigated the depiction of violence in literature and in the film, according to the authors Leenhardt (1990), Lins (1990), Ginzburg (2012), Abel (2007), Hikiji (2012) and Mongin (1999). Finally, we discussed some critical essays on McCarthy, pointing out Cant (2009), Ellis (2006), Walsh (2009), and Hage (2010), among others. The results showed that the adaptation translated violence in a way it reinforced the melodrama, highlighting the characters’ hazardous condition in both the time and the space of this narrative film, and incorporating narrative strategies which could make the spectator identify with the father and his son. / Este trabalho analisa a tradução da obra The Road (2006), de Cormac McCarthy, para o cinema, com foco na temática da violência e a forma como foi traduzida na narrativa fílmica. The Road narra a história de um pai e seu filho, ambos sobreviventes de uma catástrofe ocorrida na terra. Juntos caminham em direção à costa sul dos Estados Unidos. Durante a jornada, os personagens reescrevem a História americana, país que obteve sua expansão territorial do norte para o sul. No entanto, não há nada para conquistar, pois o Oeste vive dias pós-apocalípticos. Dessa forma, os personagens vagueiam entre cadáveres e buscam protegerse de grupos que praticam canibalismo. O romance, com esse enredo, alcançou popularidade no seu país de origem, assim como obteve prestígio da academia, que culminou com o prêmio Pulitzer de ficção. Três anos depois de seu lançamento, The Road foi adaptado para o cinema com o título homônimo, dirigido por John Hillcoat. Nosso principal objetivo, portanto, é investigar quais as estratégias usadas pelo diretor para traduzir o tema da violência no cinema. Partimos da hipótese de que o filme traduziu a violência, seguindo parâmetros do melodrama hollywoodiano, por meio de uma construção narrativa que busca fazer com que o espectador crie identificação com os personagens. Para tal, recorremos à leitura das obras dos seguintes teóricos dos Estudos da Tradução: Lefevere (1992), Toury (1995) e Even-Zohar (1990). Por conseguinte, realizamos a leitura de teóricos que discutem a respeito de adaptações literárias para o cinema como: Cattrysse (1992), Stam (2008) e Hutcheon (2013). Embasamonos ainda nos críticos de cinema: Machado (2011), Xavier (2003, 2012) e Bordwell (1985). Sobre a representação da violência na literatura e no cinema, optamos por Leenhardt (1990), Lins (1990), Ginzburg (2012), Abel (2007), Hikiji (2012), e Mongin (1999). Por fim, acerca da fortuna crítica de McCarthy, destacamos Cant (2009), Ellis (2006), Walsh (2009) e Hage (2010), entre outros. Os resultados mostraram que a adaptação fílmica traduziu a violência de modo que ela acentuasse o melodrama, reforçando a condição precária dos personagens no tempo-espaço da narrativa e incorporando estratégias narrativas que reproduzissem no espectador certa identificação com os personagens pai e filho.

With its focus on the relationship between dreamscape and death, this study examines the possibility of indirectly experiencing – through writing and dreaming – that which cannot be directly experienced, namely death. In considering this possibility, the thesis engages at length with Maurice Blanchot's argument that death, being irrevocably absent and therefore unknowable, is not open to presentation or representation. After explicating certain of this thinker's theories on the ambiguous nature of literary and oneiric representation, and on the forfeiture of subjective agency that occurs in the moments of writing and dreaming, the study turns to an examination of the manner in which such issues are dealt with in selected dreamscapes. With reference to David Malouf's An Imaginary Life, Alan Warner's These Demented Lands, Cormac McCarthy's The Road, and Richard Linklater's Waking Life, the thesis explores the literary and cinematic representation of human attempts to define, resist, or control death through dreaming and writing about it. Ultimately, the study concludes that such attempts are necessarily inconclusive, and that it is only ever possible to represent death as a (mis)representation.