An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

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For the Twilight Zone episode of the same name, see An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (The Twilight Zone).

"An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" is a short story by Ambrose Bierce originally written in 1886. It was first published in the 1891 collection Tales of Soldiers and Civilians.

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[edit] Plot

Set during the American Civil War, "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" is the story of Peyton Farquhar, a Confederate sympathizer sentenced to death by hanging at the Owl Creek Bridge of the title. The main character finds himself already bound at the bridge's edge at the beginning of the story. We later learn that a disguised Union Scout enlisted him to attempt to demolish the bridge, and subsequently he was caught in the act.

When he is hanged the rope breaks and the main character falls into the water, and journeys down the river to his home. During his journey, he starts to feel some strange physiological events that ultimately end with a searing pain in his neck.

It turns out that the man never escaped at all; he imagined the entire thing during the time between being pushed off the bridge and the noose finally breaking his neck. This surprising revelation is an example of an unreliable narrator.

[edit] Adaptations

At least three film adaptations of "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" have been produced.

  • Another version, directed by Brian James Egan, was released in 2005.
Wikisource has original text related to this article:

The 1962 film Carnival of Souls, the 1990 film Jacob's Ladder, and the 2005 film Stay were inspired by An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (the latter even took place on a bridge), along with countless others. Sir William Golding's novel Pincher Martin uses a similar artifice as Bierce's story, and Golding admits the similarity in an afterword to the novel. Richard Kelly, the director of Donnie Darko has said it was an inspiration for his film. Lucille Fletcher used a similar plot for her story "The Hitch-hiker", which was itself adapted as a memorable episode of television's The Twilight Zone.

The radio series Escape adapted the story for broadcast in 1947, and CBS Radio Mystery Theater did so in the 1970s.

Another literary work that can be thought of as an adumbration of the Owl Creek Bridge theme is the short story The Secret Miracle by Jorge Luis Borges.

Ambrose was a writer during the naturalist era.

[edit] References in popular culture

The 2003 episode of Futurama, Obsoletely Fabulous, is an adaptation of "Occurrence" in that the majority of the episode is imagined by the robot, Bender, during a brief "personality upgrade."

In 2005, Kurt Vonnegut referred to Occurrence in his book A Man Without a Country as one of the greatest works of American literature, and called anyone who hadn't read it a "twerp".

In 2006, Bierce's story was referenced on an episode of the ABC television series Lost entitled "The Long Con".

[edit] External links

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