"No Country for Old Men" by Cormac McCarthy

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Read: 3/2/09

5/5 stars

So, I figured I better sneak in a lot of reading the beginning of this month because I have a feeling I won't be able to do much starting the middle of the month. This is the second book I finished today, which I also started today. And though I've read some negative reviews about No Country for Old Men, I found it a gripping read.

Only up to a certain point, that is. Which I cannot reveal here. Or else I will be giving a spoiler. Aaaargh! <-- (this is me wanting to rant). One of the comments I've read about McCarthy is that he does not use proper punctuation. Now, I am sort of a grammar stickler because it comes with the job, but my stickler-ness does not extend to literature of this kind. So, for those who are thinking of reading it but are afraid to be turned off by the flouting of grammatical and punctuation rules, I say throw the traditional stuff out the window. The novel form has evolved and continues to evolve. This is not to say that language rules can be ignored. Rather, the choice of certain authors to mimic the registers of their characters, including the ungrammaticality and the phonological based spelling, allows for greater appreciation of the sound of the characters and the social stratum to which they belong. The lack of punctuation, e.g., quotation marks to indicate when a character is speaking dialogue, is a bit more discomfiting, but for a reason. Speech and thought seem to run off into each other, and perhaps that is what the writer is trying to achieve. In the case of No Country for Old Men, a disturbing enough book as it is, the lack of delineation in the dialogue actually heightens the effect of being disturbed. That, plus the form emphasizes of the lack of rules exemplified in the actions of the characters, the movement of the plot, and the general morality of the events.

The whole book questions the idea of an order in the world. So, sure, it's set in the borders of Texas and Mexico, and one would think that, "Hey, that only happens in that kind of place." But the characters created by McCarthy are not just found in that kind of place. Some of them are easy to relate to, easy to find in other places because of their ordinariness. So, if there is no kind of moral gratification in their corner of the universe, might it not extend to the other corners as well? I believe good literature does that--makes one capable of imagining the experiences in other settings, other contexts.

And that is what I found so disturbing. No moral gratification. Or there might have been a teensy weensy bit, but it was more like, "Let's just take what we can get, because everything else is all shot to hell anyway." Currently, I have not been able to get over this yet, but I give myself a few days. Strangely, though, I liked the characters, even Chigurh. (At this point, it might bear mentioning that I have never seen the film, so I lack that perspective.) I do not say I like them for what they did. I like them for the creations they are--round and well-drawn, which is a testament to McCarthy's skill. Chigurh says the most fascinating things and seems to have a greater understanding of the way things work than do the other characters. Again, though, disturbing. The psycopath without a heart, but closest to the meaning of life.

If you want a novel to relax with, this isn't it. If you want something that sparks thought and shakes your foundations a bit (which is healthy once in a while), then grab this book and read.

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