Inverting the ‘Gracelorn’ Father: Augustinian Notions of Evil and Goodness in Cormac McCarthy’s Outer Dark and The Road

IF 0.2 4区 哲学 0 LITERARY THEORY & CRITICISM Literature and Theology Pub Date : 2022-01-08 DOI:10.1093/litthe/frac001
Rachel B Griffis
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Abstract

Cormac McCarthy’s novels Outer Dark (1968) and The Road (2006) project different visions of fatherhood, yet both focus on men who travel dark, unnamed roads as they grapple with their responsibility to their children. The relation between the two novels indicates the possibility that fatherhood is the primary vehicle through which McCarthy explores good and evil. By drawing on Saint Augustine’s privative theory, this article suggests that evil in Outer Dark signifies an absence or perversion of virtue while The Road presents goodness as active submission to a moral authority. Reading the two novels together consequently affirms Augustine’s suggestion that ‘in vice there lurks a counterfeit beauty’. The portrayal of fatherhood in The Road elucidates the ‘counterfeit beauty’ of Outer Dark, which extends and deepens the theological dimensions of both works.
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颠倒“格蕾丝隆”父亲:奥古斯丁的恶与善观念在科马克·麦卡锡的外部黑暗和道路
科马克·麦卡锡的小说《外面的黑暗》(1968)和《路》(2006)展现了不同的父亲视角,但都聚焦于那些在黑暗、无名的道路上行走的男人,他们努力承担对孩子的责任。这两部小说之间的关系表明,父亲身份可能是麦卡锡探索善与恶的主要载体。通过借鉴圣奥古斯丁的剥夺性理论,这篇文章认为,《外层黑暗》中的邪恶意味着美德的缺失或扭曲,而《道路》则将善良表现为对道德权威的主动服从。把这两部小说放在一起读,结果肯定了奥古斯丁的建议,“在罪恶中潜伏着一种虚假的美”。《路》中对父权的刻画阐发了《外黑》的“伪美”,延伸并深化了两部作品的神学维度。
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来源期刊
CiteScore
0.30
自引率
0.00%
发文量
27
期刊介绍: Literature and Theology, a quarterly peer-review journal, provides a critical non-confessional forum for both textual analysis and theoretical speculation, encouraging explorations of how religion is embedded in culture. Contributions should address questions pertinent to both literary study and theology broadly understood, and be consistent with the Journal"s overall aim: to engage with and reshape traditional discourses within the studies of literature and religion, and their cognate fields - biblical criticism, literary criticism, philosophy, politics, culture studies, gender studies, artistic theory/practice, and contemporary critical theory/practice.
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