April '13 / Cormac McCarthy Reading: All the Pretty Horses

[chrisvia]

The title has been something that I keep putting off, but I think I finally have a starting point for my pondering of it. Initially my wife laughed at me for reading a book called All the Pretty Horses. But then I told her this was the same author as Blood Meridian, The Road, and No Country for Old Men. She, like me, was taken aback by this. At first I just chalked the title up to irony: I knew that despite such a flowery title there would be bloodshed, terse dialogue, and merciless retribution. And, sure, there were many references to the passion for horses--but, still: why this title?

This morning something clicked. The title recalls the playful, childish, exclamation, "Look at all the pretty horses." Such as a parent would say to a child in order to console or otherwise draw their attention away from other things (or just simply because the parent knows the child will be thrilled). In this way it is almost as if John Grady is able to regress to this childlike state of enchantment when regarding the pretty horses, thus drawing his attention and worries away from the ills of life.

Just some thought fodder here.

[Paulclem]

Do you remember them referring to the painting of horses, and someone - I forget who - asks what kind of horses they are, and the response is something like - them's picture book horses - not real. This might be a reference to an ideal horse - a platonic view expressed in the painting. it seems to go along with the old Mexican's view of them that they are linked to the earth and a part of it. is this why John Grady survives and Blevins does not? Blevins wants the gun too.

[chrisvia]

Do you remember them referring to the painting of horses, and someone - I forget who - asks what kind of horses they are, and the response is something like - them's picture book horses - not real. This might be a reference to an ideal horse - a platonic view expressed in the painting. it seems to go along with the old Mexican's view of them that they are linked to the earth and a part of it. is this why John Grady survives and Blevins does not? Blevins wants the gun too.

You've also got me thinking about a recurring theme of "chasing the ghost," the ghost being an ideal that doesn't exist in reality.

[neilgee]

I was caught on the hop when I checked in last night and saw you had all finished the book, so I got a move on and finished it today. There's been some very interesting ideas, PaulC about why Blevins doesn't survive and Chrisvia with that phrase used for children "look at all the pretty horses".

I'm wondering if there's also a relationship from McCarthy's point of view between the unspoiled country they travel through and the innocence of the young men traveling out in the world for the first time, two kinds of innocence but the human kind of innocence is destroyed by the end of the book.

I like the character of Blevins, he is a bit strange but funny and now it seems the poor fellow is on the run.

I'm wondering what you thought of the way Blevins died, there isn't much preamble to it, he reappears in the novel in prison and then he's murdered, and he's the least substantial of the three main characters, sometimes it seems that his ghost is more powerful than his physical presence was in what his memory drives John Grady to do.

At least there's a real sense of justice in what happens to the Mexican "Captain" (and indeed in the appearance before an American judge near the end), it's been noted in the thread about Blood Meridian that you don't always get that in McCarthy novels.

I was bemused by what happens to the Captain ultimately. Who on earth are these men who appear in the night and take him away in handcuffs whilst leaving Grady to go free and make his way home?

[WyattGwyon]

The title has been something that I keep putting off, but I think I finally have a starting point for my pondering of it. Initially my wife laughed at me for reading a book called All the Pretty Horses. But then I told her this was the same author as Blood Meridian, The Road, and No Country for Old Men. She, like me, was taken aback by this. At first I just chalked the title up to irony: I knew that despite such a flowery title there would be bloodshed, terse dialogue, and merciless retribution. And, sure, there were many references to the passion for horses--but, still: why this title?

This morning something clicked. The title recalls the playful, childish, exclamation, "Look at all the pretty horses." Such as a parent would say to a child in order to console or otherwise draw their attention away from other things (or just simply because the parent knows the child will be thrilled). In this way it is almost as if John Grady is able to regress to this childlike state of enchantment when regarding the pretty horses, thus drawing his attention and worries away from the ills of life.

Just some thought fodder here.

Actually, Chris, you aren't far off. The novel shares its title with a well-known folk song, a lullaby of African American origin. The words—well, one of many versions—are as follows:

All the Pretty Horses

Hush-a-bye, don't you cry
Go to sleepy little baby
When you wake you'll have cake
And all the pretty little horses
Blacks and bays, dapples and grays
All the pretty little horses ("Coach and eight with plumes a dancing" is a common later variant)

Way down yonder in the meadow
There's a poor wee little lamby
Bees and flies sting its eyes
Poor thing crying for its mammy
Hush-a-bye, don't you cry
Go to sleepy little baby.

The subtext here is that the song is likely being sung by an African American house slave to her white charge, and that the poor lamby is the nurse's own child who, for obvious reasons, is receiving less of its mother's care. Here is the performance of a variant that makes the subtext explicit—what she might sing if only the baby could hear:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7QXidR_Aks

Aaron Copland did an orchestral setting of this song (with a later, expurgated version of the text) in a collection of American folk songs. I forget the exact title of the Copland opus but anyone interested will find it with ease. Here is a performance of a version with piano accompaniment:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8FYKWS_zn28

If I remember correctly, Meryl Streep sings a version of this tune (in 3/4 time; Copland's setting is in duple meter) in the movie Silkwood.

[Snowqueen]

I'm wondering what you thought of the way Blevins died, there isn't much preamble to it, he reappears in the novel in prison and then he's murdered, and he's the least substantial of the three main characters, sometimes it seems that his ghost is more powerful than his physical presence was in what his memory drives John Grady to do.

I agree, his death was very tragic. Rawlins and John Grady both can’t seem to get it out of their heads though John Grady didn’t openly express it like Rawlins but it leaves its marks on John Grady’s character.

I was bemused by what happens to the Captain ultimately. Who on earth are these men who appear in the night and take him away in handcuffs whilst leaving Grady to go free and make his way home?

I really have no idea who those men were. God bless them for taking that Captain away! He was nothing but a burden to Grady. Maybe Captain owed them some money as John Grady suggests when he realizes that they were being fallowed.

[WyattGwyon]

I've been thinking about the title since pointing out its connection to the eponymous lullaby and came up with something: In the song, the little (white) babies are told they will have "all the pretty little horses," as if it is their birthright. The same would have been true of people like John Grady, Rawlins, and Billy Parham (the main character in the The Crossing, the second book in the border trilogy), born as they were to Texas ranchers—except that their mode of life is dying out in the U.S.; And being denied their birthright in the States, they seek their fortune and that promised way of life in Mexico.

Okay, it's not much, but it's a start.