SIGforum
Cormac McCarthy has died.

This topic can be found at:
https://sigforum.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/320601935/m/9190073105

June 13, 2023, 03:39 PM
maxdog
Cormac McCarthy has died.
Sorry if this has already been posted.
In my view he could be the best American living novelist prior to his death. His descriptions of the landscape and night skies of West Texas in “ All the Pretty Horses” were stunning along with his characters.
I was hooked.

His use of language was masterful. I have read many of his books.

I look forward to reading his most recent ones.

Some of his novels are: Border Trilogy, The Road, No Country For Old Men. Blood Meridian.

RIP
June 13, 2023, 03:54 PM
oddball
I have read only two of his books, but they were excellent reads. Rest In Peace Mr. McCarthy.



"I’m not going to read Time Magazine, I’m not going to read Newsweek, I’m not going to read any of these magazines; I mean, because they have too much to lose by printing the truth"- Bob Dylan, 1965
June 13, 2023, 04:00 PM
CoolRich59
Sorry to hear this. I've recently been reading his stuff.

I was not too crazy about The Orchard Keeper, but thought The Road and No Country for Old Men were excellent. I'm just about to start Blood Meridian.


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“One of the common failings among honorable people is a failure to appreciate how thoroughly dishonorable some other people can be, and how dangerous it is to trust them.” – Thomas Sowell
June 13, 2023, 04:27 PM
parabellum
Well, he was almost 90. That's a fine run.

Once again, his Blood Meridian defies being brought to the screen: https://sigforum.com/eve/forum...0091105?r=5230091105

I'm not glad he's dead but I'm glad Hollywood won't be butchering this unfilmable masterpiece of writing, one of the greatest of American novels- not just of the modern era, but ever, and I think this is in no way an exaggeration.
June 13, 2023, 04:44 PM
TMats
quote:
Originally posted by maxdog:
Sorry if this has already been posted.
In my view he could be the best American living novelist prior to his death. His descriptions of the landscape and night skies of West Texas in “ All the Pretty Horses” were stunning along with his characters.
I was hooked.

His use of language was masterful. I have read many of his books.

I look forward to reading his most recent ones.

Some of his novels are: Border Trilogy, The Road, No Country For Old Men. Blood Meridian.

RIP

I appreciate you posting about his death, and giving him a tribute; I’ll make one correction. “The Border Trilogy” is not one of his novels. The Border Trilogy refers to three novels that follow two central characters, John Grady Cole and Billy Parham. The books that comprise the trilogy are “All the Pretty Horses,” “The Crossing,” and “Cities of the Plain.”


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despite them
June 13, 2023, 05:49 PM
gearhounds
The Road was both the most enthralling and depressing book I ever navigated. McCarthy really captured the horror and despair of a hopeless post apocalyptic earth.




“Remember to get vaccinated or a vaccinated person might get sick from a virus they got vaccinated against because you’re not vaccinated.” - author unknown
June 13, 2023, 08:01 PM
Belwolf
He was one of the great masters of literature ranked amongst the best in History. Godspeed sir, I appreciated and enjoyed many of your works.



“Posterity! You will never know how much it cost the present Generation to preserve your Freedom! I hope you will make good use of it. If you do not, I shall repent in Heaven, that I ever took half the Pains to preserve it.”
― John Adams

"Fire can be our friend; whether it's toasting marshmallows, or raining down on Charlie."
- Principal Skinner.


June 13, 2023, 08:18 PM
equivet
I had a quote from All The Pretty Horses, "between the wish and the thing the world lies waiting" embossed on the sweatband of a hat I had made. The world has lost a master of the written word.
June 13, 2023, 10:42 PM
TMats
Nadie sabe lo que le espera en este mundo.
- Cormac McCarthy, "The Crossing"
“No one knows what awaits him in this world”

He told the boy that although he was huérfano still he must cease his wanderings and make for himself some place in the world because to wander in this way would become for him a passion and by this passion he would become estranged from men and so ultimately from himself.
- Cormac McCarthy, “All the Pretty Horses”
huérfano, orphan


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despite them
June 14, 2023, 06:51 AM
Batty67
RIP. Watching The Road was an exhausting experience. My brother Stephen, with whom I've watched scores of movies, after the movie said "That was the worst movie I've ever seen." I immediately asked how could that be given the story, production, acting, etc. He agreed the production (etc.) was outsanding, but concluded: "I mean that's the worst I ever felt watching a movie." Talk about one and done. Fair point.

I tried, and failed, to read the book, alas.
June 14, 2023, 09:49 AM
bdylan
Death is what the living carry with them, like some uncanny foretaste of a bitter memory.
June 14, 2023, 12:02 PM
wishfull thinker
90 or not this is a sad day. I've read many of his books and just finished reading "Outer Dark" a week ago. As usual it was indescribable but wonderful.


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June 14, 2023, 12:16 PM
jhe888
quote:
Originally posted by CoolRich59:
Sorry to hear this. I've recently been reading his stuff.

I was not too crazy about The Orchard Keeper, but thought The Road and No Country for Old Men were excellent. I'm just about to start Blood Meridian.


I liked The Orchard Keeper, but Blood Meridian is the ne plus ultra.

I am sorry we will have no more from him.




The fish is mute, expressionless. The fish doesn't think because the fish knows everything.
June 14, 2023, 12:27 PM
parabellum
He had two new novels released last Fall- The Passenger and Stella Marris


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"I am your retribution." - Donald Trump, speech at CPAC, March 4, 2023
June 14, 2023, 12:48 PM
Balzé Halzé
I picked this up on the back of Para's recent thread on the subject as I happened to be in Barnes & Noble with the wife a little while ago and there it was. Figured I had to buy it. Haven't started it yet, but soon will.




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Acta Non Verba
NRA Life Member (Patron)
God, Family, Guns, Country

Men will fight and die to protect women... because women protect everything else. ~Andrew Klavan

June 14, 2023, 06:35 PM
stkfox
I got the audible book yesterday because of this thread. Started it this morning and I’m a little over half way through. Supposed to be about a 12 hour listen, can’t hardly put it down. Damn, does it draw you into life in that era. Bloody, violent, uncompromising, and immoral men. A hellava novel from a great writer.
July 05, 2023, 08:08 AM
TMats
I ran across a Rolling Stone Magazine article this morning that detailed the influence McCarthy had on American songwriters. It mentions several singer-songwriters, but in particular, Jason Isbell, Robert Earl Keen, and Ben Nichols.

“How many of us did he influence? Immeasurable. I could go onstage and say ‘this next one was influenced by Cormac McCarthy’ and literally sing any song I’ve ever written.”
- Jason Isbell

This REK song takes “The Kid” from Blood Meridian, and puts him in present time.



Ben Nichols: “I wasn’t always a big poetry fan, but I’ve come around some in my older age. But Blood Meridian always sounded like poetry to me and the way I wish more poems sounded. It has that lyrical quality and it’s in the cadences and the rhythm of the language. For the last 20 years Cormac McCarthy has functioned as my go-to poet, even though he’s writing prose.”

But it wasn’t just the language that appealed to Nichols. It’s also the truths embedded in the poetry, and the sheer daring of this singular artist. “Blood Meridian still my favorite novel,” he says. “I respect McCarthy for tackling such a soaring epic that was really reaching for the stars and dealing with some really fundamental human concepts, and doing it not ironically at all.”



Rolling Stone—Cormac McCarthy Influence


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despite them