Road trip

New moon on April 8, 2024

Today begins the Pink Moon. Also, in many parts of North America, there will be a total solar eclipse. Celestial events and strange sightings might make a great theme one of these days, but we’ve declined the offer in order to take a different approach this month. As we say good-bye to winter and see Spring stretching before us, we thought the Road Trip might make the better Theme to ground our prompts.

Road trips are a sub-genre of the mythic quest. Imagine Jason and his Argonauts setting out for Colchis to fetch the golden fleece or Odysseus and his men boarding their ships for home after the Trojan war. Reach further back, and mark Gilgamesh setting out for the underworld to rescue his companion Enkidu from the land of death.

Now ground that in modernity. Major symbols of the road trip are the very road itself, cars, roadside attractions, motels, and strangers. The road trip can work across genres. It’s fun to explore the boundaries of the trope. In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and in Deliverance, the road is a river. In Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, the usual symbols are twisted askew: the automobiles are engines of destruction, the motel is a personal fallout shelter.

Despite its grand origins, the road trip works in virtually any genre. The more I looked for them, the more I found them. As they’re ubiquitous, it’s almost silly to list any, but here are a few to get the wheels turning.

Among thrillers there’s the Hitcher and Breakdown; horror brings us the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Night of the Living Dead; psychological dramas have Psycho; in comedy there’s Vacation, Little Miss Sunshine, and Sideways; drama brings The Remains of the Day, Rain Man, Two-Lane Blacktop, and Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia.

One thing that trips up a lot of stories using this trope is its tendency toward meandering episodic plotting. John Truby’s advice is to pack as many of your conflicting characters into the same vehicle as you can. The films and books that resonate with me certainly have that in common.

If you viewed the Bayeux Tapestry in just the right light, could you spot a road trip? I think so. More food for thought for the visual artists among us.

Wherever your medium of choice takes you, we hope this month’s prompts inspire you in your work!