Another World Entire: the Posthumanism of Cormac Mccarthy
type: CreativeWork
description: Cormac McCarthy's novels are thought experiments in what it might mean to write posthuman works of fiction. In a close reading of three of his novels, Child of God, The Crossing, and The Road , this project reveals how McCarthy's stories paradoxically unravel the dangerous human desire to make of our world a story. His characters, Lester Ballard, Billy Parham, and the boy, become posthuman as they live increasingly outside of narrative. Their existences extend beyond the page, in a radical intimacy with the world, evident in the haunting and elusive presences, and absences, of wolves, hawks, trout, and even the itself in these novels. McCarthy demonstrates how the reality of the world is "another world entire" from the written page and the humanist project. At the end of his novels, McCarthy would point us to an existence beyond the novel.
abstract: Cormac McCarthy's novels are thought experiments in what it might mean to write posthuman works of fiction. In a close reading of three of his novels, Child of God, The Crossing, and The Road , this project reveals how McCarthy's stories paradoxically unravel the dangerous human desire to make of our world a story. His characters, Lester Ballard, Billy Parham, and the boy, become posthuman as they live increasingly outside of narrative. Their existences extend beyond the page, in a radical intimacy with the world, evident in the haunting and elusive presences, and absences, of wolves, hawks, trout, and even the itself in these novels. McCarthy demonstrates how the reality of the world is "another world entire" from the written page and the humanist project. At the end of his novels, McCarthy would point us to an existence beyond the novel.
author: Pless, Margaret Henson
keywords: Child Of God, Cormac Mccarthy, Posthumanism, The Crossing, The Road, American Literature
date published: 2012-01-01T08:00:00Z
date modified: 2026-07-24T03:05:22Z
provider: University of Mississippi
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Mississippi