What a delight to have Larry McMurty, one of my favorite authors, write a piece about "No Country for Old Men" by Cormac McCarthy, now a film (eagerly awaited), by the Coen brothers. I read incessantly; I would call it an addiction. I have read all of both McMurty and McCarthy. I love both of their works, and McMurtry can, at times, give us indelible characters and insights into human nature. McCarthy, however, transcends genre, and "No Country for Old Men" is my single favorite book EVER. I have read it many times. It is rich in observations on human nature, and is as much a book of philosophy as a novel.
All that being said, I wish to point out what I see as an error in Larry McCurtry's piece. He talks about the south Texas country of the Rio Grande, in which NCFOM is set, and says that McCarthy's character, Ed Tom, draws the conclusion that this "county" is the country that is no country for old men. This is clearly NOT Ed Tom's, nor McCarthy's, conclusion. The country referred to in the title is not the South Texas Rio Grande country, but the United States. This is made clear during Ed Tom's discussion, late in the book, with his uncle, and in his last 3 journal entries (the parts of the book that are printed in italics). He is not talking about how tough South Texas is, but about the changes in the country (this story is set in the early 80's).
Sorry to pick at this, but I think it is an important distinction to make. Mr. McCarthy is addressing something much larger than the rough country and rough life on the South Texas border, and it applies to our country today, more even than 1981, the year in which the story is set. Mr. McMurtry is right in saying that Ed Tom's main feeling is one of disappointment and failure, but these feelings of Ed Tom's are magnified throughout our entire society into a sense of futility that any of us can ever do anything about the way things are going and how fast they are changing. That is why it is no country for old men. It may be no country fo any of us before long..
A River Runs Through It
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It would be difficult to say it better, and the Coen brothers, at the top of their game, use it. If there's one word for what Sheriff Ed Tom Bell's face reflects during this movie, the word would be Disappointment. He had thought it would be better; he had thought he would be better: "It's a life's work to see yourself for what you are, and even then you might be wrong." Sheriff Ed Tom knows that Chigurh, "a true and living prophet of destruction," as he calls him, is out there still. The sheriff doesn't want to confront him, either. Would it be worth it for a county where people no longer say "Sir" and "Ma'am"?
As for Chigurh, he kills for convenience—it's the best way to get the job done. Unlike Hannibal Lecter, he doesn't kill for ego. He has no reason to brace Sheriff Ed Tom, though he has no fear of him, either. The film, not so much a thriller as a morality play, ends with a sort of equilibrium—as if the Lawman and the Killer both subscribe to that old cowboy maxim: "There ain't a horse that can't be rode, there ain't a man that can't be throw'd."
© 2007
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