Hawks: Communicating Moral Decline in the Works of Jeffers and McCarthy Anonymous 12th Grade

In literature, hawks have evolved into a symbol for power and freedom. As they roam the great American landscape, writers have come to admire their strength and control. In Robinson Jeffers’ “Hurt Hawks,” the speaker comes across a wounded hawk and tries to take care of it, but ultimately has to kill it. In Cormac McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men, Sheriff Bell finds a dead hawk in the middle of the road and moves it so that it won’t be run over by oncoming traffic. Both of these scenes represent a loss of pride and freedom for the hawks, and depict the speakers trying, in vain, to restore that pride.

Throughout their lives, Jeffers and McCarthy both had pessimistic views of America’s future. This view is clear in No Country for Old Men and traces of it can be seen in “Hurt Hawks,” but are more obvious in some of Jeffers other works, such as “Shine Perishing Republic.” They saw America’s future, not as a bright shining utopia, but as a hellscape devoid of morality. These works reflect their views of America and what they see as its moral decline and loss of dignity. In both passages, the hawks represent America and its lack of pride. This is very obvious in Jeffers’ hawk whose “wing trails like a banner in defeat” (Jeffers 2)....