No Country For Old Men Foreshadowing Analysis

Words: 1080
Pages: 5

“To live alone is the fate of all great souls.” --Arthur Schopenhauer. Maybe being alone or being an introvert is a good thing; maybe it’s good for the soul. The reader can determine their personal belief with these ideas. Multiple rhetorical devices are depicted throughout No Country for Old Men which follows the aloneness of the desert and the people. Cormac McCarthy uses foreshadowing, casual diction and symbolism in No Country for Old Men which follows three main characters: Llewelyn Moss, Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, and Anton Chigurh. The story’s setting which takes place on the Texas-Mexico border represents the isolation each character feels from society, creating a desolate tone.
To begin, McCarthy uses foreshadowing to give the reader an idea of what may happen farther along in the plot and to each of the characters. Llewelyn Moss, a Vietnam veteran, comes across a drug deal gone wrong in the desert of southern Texas, near the border of Mexico and the United States. There aren’t any survivors at the scene, but he does find a satchel with millions of dollars. Moss decides to take the money, but quickly starts to be chased by unknown men later on. He is
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The setting of the story is in the desert, making it apparent that it represents the isolated feeling that each character feels from their environment and society. This is shown through three rhetorical devices: foreshadowing, casual diction, and symbolism, which also lead to the relevance of the text in today’s society. Many can relate to the feeling of aloneness and the selfishness of people in our day. It is important for people to know that being alone may or may not be a harmful notion, depending on the choices they make while they are alone. We see this occur with the outlying characters in No Country for Old Men, who many could relate to in today’s