Cormacmccarthy

It’s finally done, I’ve read everything that Cormac ever published. What a year. I plan to write something about that elsewhere, but for now, Suttree. I think this is Cormac’s longest novel at nearly 500 pages. It is episodic in nature and the episodes are presented without a lot of scaffolding to let you know. Cormac provides you with the changing of the seasons and that is the major progressive force of the novel. There is little plot other than Suttree’s sort of underboiling search for self. I think you’d have to read it a few times to really mine it, and I think there is something there to mine. ...

Quotes Page 25 >White > There’s nothing to follow. It’s all right. The things that I loved were very frail. Very fragile. I didnt know that. I thought they were indestructible. They werent. Page 53 >Black >No. I didnt. I didnt know what I was. But I thought I was in charge. I never knowed what that burden weighed till I put it down. That might of been the sweetest thing of all. To just hand over the keys. ...

McCarthy’s third novel. The one I’ve enjoyed the least. It is very dark, about someone with a sad life who descends into depravity. I read in two sittings, last Sunday and today. It feels like McCarthy still finding his form. The story is more or less a character study, following Ballard throughout his life. It’s difficult to say why I leave so uninterested in Ballard. It it not an interesting thing to be sad and lonely. Maybe the things that happen to a person to render them this way can be interesting, but watching a person descend was not for me. Ballard is dealt a bad hand and makes no decision to help himself, or even to not hurt others. He demonstrates little care for anyone, and is cold and isolated to the point of being a figment of nature. ...