All the Pretty Horses

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Summary: All the Pretty Horses
Review: Since the early 1900's, America has greatly progressed industrially and technologically, thus causing the early 1990's publication of the western novel, All the Pretty Horses, to seem out of place. This untimliness, however, is no indication to the quality of the book. Cormac McCarthy demonstrates all the characteristics of a traditional Western: adventure, love, damsels, murder, horses, and a hero, while still maintaining the elegant language and style of writing he has created. Set along the Texas-Mexican border in the late 1940's, All the Pretty Horses relates young John Grady Cole's discoveries about religion, love, and life as he runs away from home and becomes a man. The idealistic Cole embodies the desires of all young adults, freedom and understanding, and sets out to satisfy them. Through several experiences that an average teenager would not have encountered, he realizes that reality can be cruel but maintains his amazing determination to live his life without the burdens of society.

McCarthy's magnificent wording and motifs demonstrate the many themes of hospitality, religion, freedom, and the quest for knowledge. The language appears to be deterring because of the author's choice to delete the majority of punctuation marks, however, if he had left the words in proper English format, the novel would have lost its realism and power. Unlike Charles Dickens, who is infamous for his lengthy, soporific descriptions, McCarthy utilizes his language to depict the Mexican landscape in a way that appeals to the reader. Not everything in the novel is pretty; as an adventure story, the book still enbodies the basic blood, guts, and gore; it simply describes them more completely than an average fiction novel. This quest for realism can become overused at times (i.e. entire dialogues written Spanish where occasionally a character may offer some form of explanation but usually leave the reader wondering). McCarthy's realism also extends to his multiple color motifs. Almost every pigment in the color wheel represents a quality in the novel, and because the author describes everything accurately, at least one of these recurring motifs appears on every other page. This does make analysis of the the novel fairly simple, but the overwhelming amount of color can become repetitive. McCarthy has mastered a wonderful command of language and exemplifies creativity well, but by stating the themes outright, he removes the opportunity for the reader to demonstrate his own ability to understand.

All the Pretty Horses embodies all the requirements of an interesting, adventurous novel that anyone could appreciate for its exciting plot and insightful discoveries of human nature. Whether searching for a wonderful book to read purely for entertainment or attempting to discover a piece of literature that is relatively simple to analyze, one should seriously consider All the Pretty Horses as an appropriate choice.

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Summary: a book that is better-written than even this review!
Review: Cormac McCarthy's "All the Pretty Horses" was critically acclaimed as one of the better works of modern American fiction. After reading the book, I can't help but agree with the reviewers. McCarthy has created a classic, a must-read for anyone, regardless of personal taste. For one thing, there is a little bit of everything - a heartbreaking love story, violent action sequences, realistic portrayal of mid-20th century plains life, and inclusion of even the most minute details of setting. The careful attention to detail can get tedious (it's almost reminiscent of Dickens -- "oh no!") but the landscapes McCarthy creates are beautiful enough to make the descriptions worth your while. The violent scenes are created so bluntly, as if McCarthy is talking about the weather as of late, that they seem all the more shocking to the reader. And the love story - wow. I've never read anything that seemed more real; McCarthy took some of the most trite and often-used ideas of romantic stories (the girl being the most beautiful thing the man had ever seen, the man being out of breath when he saw her) and created a tragically beautiful story that was startlingly realistic. His descriptions of the ordinary events that transpired in the novel were anything but trite or commonplace; McCarthy used fresh, thought-provoking similes and metaphors alongside deep psychological character analysis to pursue the realistic aspects of his character and plot. In short, I highly recommend this book to anyone, even those who don't particularly like "westerns", because to call it a western would be to shortchange this novel. It is a profoundly emotional yet soft-spoken tale, highly entertaining and edifying.

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Summary: this is good
Review: If you like westerns and good ol' boy characters then this book is for you. In many ways this book resembles a western style DANTE'S INFERNO. ALL THE PRETTY HORSES was assigned to me in an English class and I finished the book way ahead of schedule. I found it very interesting, especialy the romantic aspect. The book is broken into four sections. The first section could be characterized as a withering garden. The second section is the new garden, while the third section is excile from the new garden into a sort of hell. The fourth section is purgatory, or a cleansing of the main characters soul. I recomend this book to anyone.

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Summary: Faulkner it Ain't
Review: What it is is a pretty good novelization of George Miller's great movie The Man from Snowy River (based on a poem by Banjo Paterson). McCarthy hasn't WF's metaphysics, these are replaced by truly brilliant descriptions of the southerwestern landscape that you need a Baedecker's to decipher. He's good at describing Marlboro Men doing Marlboro Men type things, but couldn't write a decent woman character if it meant five miles of downed fenceline. That McCarthy is so popular is less a reflection of his brilliance than the dearth of good literature out there. Then again, better read him than say, Colin Harrison. Or read Blood Meridian -- a truly brilliant work of genius., nothing like it in American Lit.

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Summary: Cormac McCarthy's All The Pretty Horses
Review: It is 1949, every family owns at least one car and society is used to many modern conveniences such as dishwashers and vacuum's. For a third generation rancher, these so called conveniences foreshadow the end of an era when a simpler lifestyle had value. After loosing his grandfather and his land, John Grady, the main character, flees from an industrial America. He tries to travel back in time by escaping to a primitive Mexico. This novel is commonly viewed as a coming of age story in which John Grady Cole matures into a man. However, the main purpose of this book, is to inform the reader of mans struggle to cope with his losses. Cole faces many losses throughout the novel. John Grady is forced to cope with the loss of his grandfather, his innocence, his first love, and his pride. These losses all foreshadow John Grady's ultimate loss of hope and contentment. The other two major characters of the novel offset Cole because of their ridiculous and often amusing actions. The novel is divided into three parts: John Grady's life in his home town in west Texas, John Grady's life in Mexico, and John Grady's life after he returns to Texas. McCarthy does a great job of revealing Coles feelings of alienation in the first part of the novel. During the bulk of the novel (while John Grady is in Mexico), McCarthy superbly identifies the fallacies of all of Coles fantasies. He accomplishes this task by harshly eliminating each one of Grady's hopes and

desires. This book is very well written and often depicts the characters emotions through the landscape. It's overall plot is not difficult however, the reader may experience difficulty discerning some dialogue because McCarthy does not use quotation marks. Initially, the reader may also struggle with extremely long sentences. While reading this book I quickly grew attached to the characters and I was eager to learn more about their daily adventures. However, the first fifty pages are rather uneventful. The reader should prevail because the plot gains momentum and the ending is rewarding. I would recommend this novel to anyone who has ever experienced loss because they will identify with the thoughts and feelings of the characters of this novel.

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Summary: Shame on McCarthy
Review: The themes are important and well played out: religion, free will v. predestination, love, patriarchy, initiation, violence, Latin American history, language, and culture, sex, bravery. I am not annoyed with the Spanish. I am not annoyed by the vacillation between terse dialogue and lengthy prose. I am not annoyed by the excessive use of conjunctions, the lack of punctuation, or the tediousness of working through the syntax and recongnizing the underlying messages. I have been studying literature long enough to have learned patience and appreciation, even if I don't particularly enjoy a novel.

But what I can't stand is when a novelist is a blatant thief. McCarthy shamelessly and directly plagiarizes phrases from Faulkner, the untouchable Southern writer-- not just in style, as some have recognized, but in actual phrases, especially from "The Sound and the Fury." Further, he is "influenced" a bit too much by Hemingway's read-between-the-lines dialogue for me.

I give McCarthy kudos for reviving a much satirized genre of the mythic American cowboy, and for addressing important issues such as the aforementioned. But when he steals from established and revered authors such as Hemingway and Faulkner, I can't give him more than a tepid pat on the back.

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Summary: Well written is an understatement
Review: I have heard a lot about this book and finally got around to reading it (actually I listened to it on audio- the unabridged version, kudos to Frank Muller who did the reading). McCarthy's writing is absolutely amazing. Through much of the book, not a lot happens action-wise, but the writing is so fantastic that you are enthralled nonetheless. The dialogue in the book is unparalleled, I found myself wondering if McCarthy had studied philosophy at some point. Every character in the book has their own philosophical outlook, that through amazing dialogue, McCarthy is able to justify as a valid perspective on human nature. It is no surprise that this is a National Book Award Winner.

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Summary: lack of romance, my foot!
Review: I was skimming through the 100+ reviews of this fantastic novel when I stumbled across one from a reader in San Diego who claimed that the book lacked romantic detail. I have to say that this is one my of my favorite aspects of the book. Had the author delved too far into the romance, he would have effectively ruined it. Yes, I wanted to know more, but in true modernist/minimalist style, every word was chosen with care and the dialog was electric. This is one of my favorite books of all time, but it is also my favorite love story. It is absolutely heart-wrenching and has some of the most beautiful (not gratuitous) expressions of love between two characters that I've ever read. Romance can easily ruin a great story by becoming the focal point of the novel. In many ways, this love story was the focal point for me, but only for the feeling it evoked. John Grady Cole was the center of this story and had this romance been over done, it would not have meshed with the rest of McCarthy's style. I honestly would not have wanted it any other way.

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Summary: Friendship, advdenture, hope; this book has it.
Review: "...his grandfather looked up from his plate at the painting as if he'd never seen it before and he said those are picture book horses and went on eating." (16) Horses are one of the main focuses in All the Pretty Horses. They are held as sacred and an object of affection for the characters in the book. They are what life is based around and an intense topic of discussion. John Grady Cole and his cousin Lacey Rawlings are the main characters in the book. Hardened by their tough life in the rugged area of southern Texas and northern Mexico, they set off on a perilous journey. Driven by the desire of a better and more fulfilling life, All the Pretty Horses reports a detailed account of their adventures. John Grady Cole is sixteen years old and like all of the other characters in the book, has a fascination and love of horses. There has been a recent death in his family and his mother left his father and him on the family's Texas ranch and went to the city. John Grady is a dynamic or round character. At the beginning of the novel, he is a little naive and unaware of the brutal harshness of life. He has been toughened by hard ranch life, but he does not fully understand the ways of the world. He shows compassion towards other characters in the novel. Although in a sense he has lost his mother, he does not know the true sadness of a lost loved one. By the end of his journey he understands the brutality of life and no longer enjoys the innocence of childhood. Rawlings is a static or flat character. He is seventeen and lives on a ranch as well. Little is revealed about Rawlings' past or home life in the novel. He is tougher than John Grady is and does not come across as being naive. He uses strong language throughout the novel and shows little sympathy towards other characters excluding John Grady. He is the definition of a true cowboy. His experiences throughout the novel do not have the same life altering effect on him as they do on John Grady. These two cousins and best friends yearn for something more. They want a better life and future. With hopes of achieving this, they set off for Mexico. They meet a young boy named Blevins who rides with them for awhile. Rawlings and John Grady share different emotions about Blevins, which reveals their characters more clearly. Blevins eventually gets them into serious trouble and the situation they arrive in forever alters their lives. The most remarkable aspect of this novel is the way it is written. Characters are often referred to as he or she. Dialogue never has quotation marks around it and the phrase he said or she said or something similar to that seldom is at the end of a statement of dialogue. Often times the reader must guess who is speaking. The novel is littered with foul language, however that helps to show characterization and the setting more clearly. Spanish is used quite frequently with no translation guide. Often times important parts of the book are written in Spanish. Studying three years of Spanish will be helpful in reading this book or a Spanish-English dictionary will be sufficient. There are a few things to consider when reading this novel. Be sure to read dialogue carefully and pay special attention to what is said because often times dialogue hints at who is speaking and more about the characters or their situations. Make sure you have a Spanish dictionary because entire conversations are done in Spanish frequently. At first the novel will seem slow and redundant. Do not give up. The novel is divided into three parts and the second half of part two and all of part three is extremely good. You will find it hard to put it down and become lost in the story. This novel is in a way a coming of age story. John Grady and Rawlings learn about themselves as well as the world. Teenagers will especially relate to this story and realize that they are not alone in the emotions that they feel. By reading this story, the reader will gain an understanding of what life was like at the beginning of the nineteen hundreds and become aware of the lawlessness and poverty stricken regions of southern Texas and northern Mexico. The reader will understand their dependency and relationships with their horses better and realize why the novel was titled All the Pretty Horses. There are many themes in this book and all of them are important. If taken seriously, the reader can be changed by the message in this book, however I will leave it up to you to discover what those themes are.

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Summary: Dante
Review: This Book is a modern-day western full of excitment about cowboys and horses. It deals with a fictional 16-year-old character named John Gragy Cole, who is the last of a long line of cowboys. He is feed up with texas and all of his family problems there, so he decides to run away with his cousin to Mexico. Their adventure is both dangerous and idyllic, but they have sworn to tough it out through thick and thin. Many of times the book is comical at how it deals with situatios and characters abroad. The energy of the author (Cormac McCarthy) can be felt through the whole book by his passion and knowledge al horses and the northern cowboy life. The rhythem of the book captures the bad lands of northern Mexico and its culture with characters and plots ideal for every situational stage of the John Grade adventures. The first quarter of the book sets up the rest of the story in a dramatic way. Although the beginning I found slightly boring, it pays to stick with the story because it builds up and pays off later as you read. Overall, this beek is well written because it is more broadly based than the title implies. I recommend this book for anyone who is looking for a book with a little bit of everything in it.