My 70-year-old neighbor said our book club's 'The Road' debate was missing the point because we were all arguing about the man's choices, not the boy's hope.

She told me, 'You're all so busy being grown-ups about the horror, you forgot the book is written for the child inside you,' which hit different coming from someone who raised three kids through the 70s oil crisis.

4 comments

4 Comments

wood.uma1mo ago

Did anyone cry for the soldier's dog?" That line actually made me stop reading for a second. I mean, it's so simple but it cuts right past all the noise. We really do overcomplicate stuff.

flores.emma1mo ago

Wow... my buddy had a similar thing happen with his film class. They spent a whole night debating the politics in a war movie, and his mom just said, "But did anyone cry for the soldier's dog?" It's easy to get lost in the big arguments and miss the simple heart of the story. Your neighbor is onto something.

robert_ross9521d ago

Hold on, I gotta push back a little. I get the whole "heart of the story" thing, but isn't that kind of a cop out sometimes? If you just focus on the soldier's dog, you're ignoring why the soldier was fighting in the first place. The politics of a war movie are the whole reason those soldiers are even over there. It's like saying, "Don't look at the big picture, just look at this one guy's personal life." That's how you end up missing the actual point of a story. The dog crying doesn't tell you anything about the war itself.

brianmurray1mo ago

Man, that reminds me of my old history teacher. We were breaking down some big battle, all tactics and dates, and he just shut the book and said, "But what about the guy who dropped his lucky coin in the mud that morning?" It flipped the whole thing for me. We get so wrapped up in the grand story we forget it's made of small, real people. Your neighbor and that teacher are seeing the same thing, I guess. It's about the person, not just the event.