The Crossing - McCarthy
For as much as I enjoyed All the Pretty Horses, The Crossing left me puzzled and searching. I'll first note, that all but the setting, there is no relation to the first novel, and I disappointingly suspect the same of the third in the trilogy. I must also note that while much of the time the context will help the reader along, there are times in the novel when I think it would be of great service to actually know Spanish.
The Crossing depicts three journeys of a boy from New Mexico to Mexico. In the first, the reader is a captive audience as McCarthy tells the tale of a young boy spontaneously deciding to return a wolf to the mountains in Mexico from which he believes the wolf came. The second and third crossings were not nearly as interesting to me, nor could I find the rationale behind theboy's decision to return to Mexico. Even his original decision, though honorable, makes the reader wonder what he was fleeing from, as it seems unlikely that a simple wish to restore nature would provoke such a long journey away from home without warning or preparation.
McCarthy can certainly write like few I have read. It is not for his story-telling ability, or choice of words, or poetic descriptions that I am left with a restless sense of unfulfillment, but for the actual plot, and character development.
Perhaps I am just not studying the meaning enough, perhaps I am not dissecting the novel to its core to truly understand the point. Perhaps this is a novel that I have simply taken too lightly to completely appreciate, but I have little interest now in reading the third in the trilogy. Maybe down the road, when this novel has had time to sit and simmer in the back of my mind, perhaps I will find some deeper lesson, some core value that might give it purpose. Until then, I think Cities of the Plain will just have to wait.
The Crossing depicts three journeys of a boy from New Mexico to Mexico. In the first, the reader is a captive audience as McCarthy tells the tale of a young boy spontaneously deciding to return a wolf to the mountains in Mexico from which he believes the wolf came. The second and third crossings were not nearly as interesting to me, nor could I find the rationale behind theboy's decision to return to Mexico. Even his original decision, though honorable, makes the reader wonder what he was fleeing from, as it seems unlikely that a simple wish to restore nature would provoke such a long journey away from home without warning or preparation.
McCarthy can certainly write like few I have read. It is not for his story-telling ability, or choice of words, or poetic descriptions that I am left with a restless sense of unfulfillment, but for the actual plot, and character development.
Perhaps I am just not studying the meaning enough, perhaps I am not dissecting the novel to its core to truly understand the point. Perhaps this is a novel that I have simply taken too lightly to completely appreciate, but I have little interest now in reading the third in the trilogy. Maybe down the road, when this novel has had time to sit and simmer in the back of my mind, perhaps I will find some deeper lesson, some core value that might give it purpose. Until then, I think Cities of the Plain will just have to wait.
Comments
Just finished The Crossing. McCarthy's liberal use of Spanish, his extended narratives rendered by the characters who populate his novel, his wonderful but sometimes self-concious metaphors, and his metaphysics are,frankly, at times beyond my comprehension. But he never fails to move me. My "impression" is that he sees the world as a work of God, and evil as a gratutious imposition of man. I find the wanton slaughter of innocent animals to be quite jarring. I'm still bothered on some level by the death of the trained bear in Blood Meridian, and the demise of the she wolf in this book, pregnant no less, was equally distrubing. The just-for-the-hell-of-it stabbing of Nino was yet another example. And certainly Billy proved to be contaminated by this infection of the human spirit when he so badly mistreated the misfortunated dog who had already been so badly brutalized during its life. Billy did not make the three crossings and come back untouched.
I struggle with McCarthy, but he never fails to move me. He moves me so deeply that at times his characters invade my dreams. He has to be one of only a handful of great American writers.
By the way, I found out the the Spanish translations of the Crossing and his other works can be found on McCarthy's web page.