Three Day Road Analysis

The Relation Between a Visual Art Product and Joseph Boyden’s Three Day Road

The two works presented will be a hand drawn media product by Darcy Hayden and Joseph Boyden’s international bestseller, Three Day Road. The two products have their differences yet they are vastly similar in methods of development, tone, character development, symbols, and overall thesis that unnatural consumption is the cause of character and setting destruction. This thesis, within the chosen artwork is explicitly shown by the featured obese colonial man with his large crushing presence on Canada’s land. To have a man seemingly taking everything in sight from a country and it’s people shows true unnatural consumption. The novel Three Day Road translates this same

Generalization is the most obvious method displayed to develop the artwork’s thesis. The artist has taken specific cases from the time period of which Canada was colonized and grouped these cases to support the larger idea of unnatural consumption. For example, the generic colonial man, who represents a much larger group of white colonials, is seen using morphine. This small addiction to the product leads the viewer to believe that many men of that time used morphine excessively, enough so to be addicted. Therefore supporting the major theme of unnatural consumption. Morphine flows through the novel Three Day Road. Many of the characters are seduced by the drug’s effects. Grey Eyes, the soldier responsible for swaying Elijah to try morphine for the first time, is an excellent example of how excessive to drug use had become during the great war. Xavier is first to comment on Grey Eye’s immoderate use of morphine: “When Grey Eyes takes a lot of it, he lies like he is dead until I worry that he has joined them [the dead soldiers]” (Boyden 80) This quote illustrates how incognizant many soldiers were to the harm the strong pain killer had on the body’s central nervous system like the character Grey Eyes as he misuses the drug until unconscious. Four needles of morphine hidden in the chosen artwork would undoubtedly cause comatose. Yet

There is an important lesson to be learnt, unnatural consumption is the cause of environmental and social destruction. The theme is displayed through various methods of development, primarily generalization of the colonial man projecting a whole society instilling greed in the communities of Canada, along with mise-en-scene to amplify the size of the colonial man to demonstrate his impact on Canada and finally examples to provide proof of unnatural consumption during the Great War and the colonization of Canada. Tone is equally important to the two products to portray to author and artist’s attitude of unnatural consumption as a sinister action. Lastly the character development of the novel Three Day Road and the symbolism behind the art piece Fat Colonial Man provide outstanding support to the common theme of unnatural consumption. In closing, the tragic events caused by unnatural consumption in both the novel and artwork might seem indifferent from the present day, however our society continues to be driven by the same greed and consumption that was instilled in the Canadian people so long