Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West

First edition cover
Author	Cormac McCarthy
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre(s)	Western, Historical novel
Publisher	Random House
Publication date	February 1985
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages	327 pp (first edition, hardback)
ISBN	ISBN 0-394-54482-X (first edition, hardback)

Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West is a 1985 Western novel by American author Cormac McCarthy. It was McCarthy's fifth book, and was published by Random House. Blood Meridian is a Canadian alternative country band from Vancouver, British Columbia. ... Image File history File links CormacMcCarthy_BloodMeridian. ... Cormac McCarthy, born Charles McCarthy,[1] July 20th, 1933 in Providence, Rhode Island, is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist who has authored ten novels in the Southern Gothic, western, and post-apocalyptic genres. ... For other uses, see Country (disambiguation). ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... --70. ... A publisher is a person or entity which engages in the act of publishing. ... // Random House is a publishing house based in New York City. ... This article or section does not cite any references or sources. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ... “ISBN” redirects here. ... See also: 1984 in literature, other events of 1985, 1986 in literature, list of years in literature. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... This article is about the literary concept. ... Cormac McCarthy, born Charles McCarthy,[1] July 20th, 1933 in Providence, Rhode Island, is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American novelist who has authored ten novels in the Southern Gothic, western, and post-apocalyptic genres. ... // Random House is a publishing house based in New York City. ...

The narrative follows a teenage runaway referred to only as "the kid", with the bulk of the text devoted to his experiences with the Glanton gang, a historical group of scalp hunters who massacred Indians and others on the United States–Mexico borderlands in 1849 and 1850. The principal antagonist is the demonic Judge Holden, an extremely large and intelligent man who is utterly devoted to violence and conflict. Much of the book is based on Glanton gang member Samuel Chamberlain's My Confession, which has been criticized as unreliable, but Blood Meridian is historically accurate in general, and includes numerous references to contemporary occurrences. John Joel Glanton was a member of the US Army during the mid 1800s. ... Native American Big Mouth Spring with decorated scalp lock on right shoulder. ... The border between Mexico and the United States spans four U.S. states, six Mexican states, and has over twenty commercial crossings. ... 1849 was a common year starting on Monday (see link for calendar). ... For the game, see: 1850 (board game) 1850 (MDCCCL) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Sunday [1] of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar). ... Judge Holden is purportedly an historically accurate person, a killer who partnered with John Joel Glanton as a professional scalphunter in the mid 1800s. ... Samuel E. Chamberlain ( November 27, 1829-1908) was a soldier, painter, and author who travelled throughout the American Southwest and Mexico. ...

Though the novel initially earned a lukewarm critical and commercial reception, it has since become widely recognized not only as McCarthy's masterpiece, but as one of the greatest American novels of the 20th century.

Background and writing

McCarthy wrote Blood Meridian while supporting himself with money from his 1981 MacArthur Fellows grant. It is his first novel set in the American Southwest, making a move from the Appalachian settings of his earlier work. The MacArthur Fellows Program or MacArthur Fellowship (sometimes nicknamed the genius grant) is an award given by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation each year to typically 20 to 40 citizens or residents of the U.S., of any age and working in any field, who show exceptional... Regional definitions vary from source to source. ... It has been suggested that Poverty in Appalachia be merged into this article or section. ...

Awash with extreme violence, McCarthy's prose is sparse yet expansive, with an often biblical quality and frequent religious references. The book also features McCarthy's somewhat unusual writing style – there are, for example, many unusual or archaic words, no quotation marks for dialogue, and no apostrophes to note dropped letters (nothin’ is rendered as nothin; don't as dont). The notoriously publicity-shy McCarthy has not granted interviews regarding the novel, and the work is open to several interpretations. This Gutenberg Bible is displayed by the United States Library. ... Quotation marks or inverted commas (also called quotes and speech marks) are punctuation marks used in pairs to set off speech, a quotation, a phrase or a word. ... A dialogue (sometimes spelt dialog[1]) is a reciprocal conversation between two or more entities. ... For the prime symbol (′) used for feet and inches, see Prime (symbol). ...

McCarthy conducted a considerable amount of research in writing the book, and critics have repeatedly demonstrated that even brief, and seemingly inconsequential passages of Blood Meridian rely on enormous historical evidence. The Glanton gang segments are based on Samuel Chamberlain's account of the group in his book My Confession: The Recollections of a Rogue, which he wrote during the later part of his life. Chamberlain rode with John Joel Glanton and his company between 1849 and 1850, but his book has been criticized as embellished and historically unreliable. The novel's antagonist Judge Holden first appeared in Chamberlain's account, though his real identity remains a mystery. One curiosity, however, is that Chamberlain himself does not appear in fictionalized form. John Joel Glanton was a member of the US Army during the mid 1800s. ...

Plot summary

Three epigraphs open the book: quotes from French writer Paul Valéry, from German Christian mystic Jacob Boehme, and a 1982 news clipping from the Yuma Sun reporting the claim of the members of an Ethiopian archeological or anthropological expedition that a 300,000-year-old human skull had been scalped. In literature, an epigraph is a quotation that is placed at the start of a work or section that expresses in some succinct way an aspect or theme of what is to follow. ... For other people of the same name, see Valery. ... Idealized portrait of Böhmes from Theosophia Revelata (1730) Jakob Böhme (1575–1624) was a Christian mystic born in central Germany, near Görlitz. ...

The novel tells the story of a young runaway named only as "the kid", who was born during the famously active Leonids meteor shower of 1833. He leaves his home in Tennessee during his teen years. The kid first meets Judge Holden at a religious revival in Nacogdoches, Texas: the enormous, hairless Holden accuses the preacher, Reverend Green, of pedophilia and intercourse with a goat. The reverend denies the accusations and accuses Holden of being the devil. A riot then ensues, and the reverend is chased out of town. When later asked how he learned the damning facts about the preacher, Holden reveals he had never met the man before, an admission that inspires approving laughter from the mob. The most famous depiction of the 1833 meteor storm actually produced in 1889 for the Adventist book Bible Readings for the Home Circle based on a first-person account of the 1833 storm by a minister, Joseph Harvey Waggoner on his way from Florida to New Orleans. ... A meteor shower, some of which are known as a meteor storm or meteor outburst, is a celestial event where a group of meteors are observed to radiate from one point in the sky. ... Official language(s) English Capital Nashville Largest city Memphis Largest metro area Nashville Metropolitan Area Area  Ranked 36th  - Total 42,169 sq mi (109,247 km²)  - Width 120 miles (195 km)  - Length 440 miles (710 km)  - % water 2. ... A Revival is the apparent restoration of a living creature from a dead state to a living state. ... Nacogdoches (pronounced ) is a city in Nacogdoches County, Texas, in the United States. ... Pedophilia or pædophilia (see spelling differences) is a mental state in which an adult has a preferential sexual attraction to prepubescent and in some definitions, preadolescent children. ... Satan frozen at the center of Cocytus, the ninth circle of Hell in Dantes Inferno. ... Teamsters, armed with pipes, riot in a clash with riot police in the Minneapolis Teamsters Strike of 1934. ...

After a violent encounter with a bartender establishes the kid as a formidable fighter, he joins a party of ill-armed U.S. Army irregulars on a filibustering mission led by a Captain White. Failing to stay clear of a huge herd of rustled and stolen animals, White's group is overwhelmed by an accompanying group of hundreds of Comanche warriors. Few of them survive. Arrested as a filibuster in Chihuahua, the kid is set free when his acquaintance Toadvine tells the authorities they will make useful Indian hunters for the state's newly-hired scalphunting operation. They join Glanton and his gang, and the bulk of the novel is devoted to detailing their activities and conversations. The gang encounters a traveling carnival, and, in untranslated Spanish, each of their fortunes is told with Tarot cards. The gang originally contract with various regional leaders to protect locals from marauding Apaches, and are given a bounty for each scalp they recover. Before long, however, they devolve into the outright murder of unthreatening Indians, unprotected Mexican villages, and eventually even the Mexican army and anyone else who crosses their path. Motto: (Out Of Many, One) (traditional) In God We Trust (1956 to date) Anthem: The Star-Spangled Banner Capital Washington D.C. Largest city New York City None at federal level (English de facto) Government Federal constitutional republic  - President George Walker Bush (R)  - Vice President Dick Cheney (R) Independence from... A filibuster is a private individual who engages in unauthorized warfare against a foreign country, often with the intent of overthrowing the existing government. ... For other uses, see Chihuahua (disambiguation). ... Tarot (Tar-oh) is a system of symbolical images. ... For other uses, see Apache (disambiguation). ... Bounty can refer to different things: The Bounty a 1984 film with Mel Gibson and Anthony Hopkins A bounty is an amount of money or other reward offered by an organization for the capture of a person or thing Bounty is a brand of paper towel manufactured by Procter & Gamble...

Throughout the novel Holden is presented as a profoundly mysterious and awe-inspiring figure; the others seem to regard him as not quite human. Like the historical Holden of Chamberlain's autobiography, he is a child-killer, though almost no one in the gang expresses much distress at his committing these acts. According to the kid's new companion Ben Tobin, an "ex-priest", the Glanton gang first met the judge while fleeing for their lives from a much larger Apache group. In the middle of a blasted desert, they found Holden sitting on an enormous boulder, where he seemed to be waiting for the gang. In a scene with distinctly Faustian overtones, they agree to follow his leadership, and he takes them to an extinct volcano, where, astoundingly, he instructs the ragged, desperate gang how to manufacture gunpowder, enough to give them the advantage against the Apaches. When the kid remembers seeing Holden in Nacogdoches, Tobin tells the kid that each man in the gang claims to have met the judge before he joined forces with Glanton. This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Faust depicted in an etching by Rembrandt van Rijn (circa 1650) Faust or Faustus (the Latin for auspicious or lucky) is the protagonist of a popular German legend in which a mediæval scholar makes a pact with the Devil. ... For other uses, see Volcano (disambiguation). ... Smokeless powder Gunpowder is a pyrotechnic composition, an explosive mixture that burns rapidly, producing volumes of hot gas which can be used as a propellant in firearms and fireworks. ...

After months of marauding, the gang crosses into U.S. territory, where they eventually set up a systematic and brutal robbing operation at a ferry on the Gila River at Yuma, Arizona. Local Yuma (Quechan) Indians are at first approached to help the gang wrest control of the ferry from its original owners, but Glanton's gang betrays them, using their presence and previously coordinated attack on the ferry as an excuse to seize the ferry's munitions and slaughter the Yuma. Because of the new operators' brutal ways, the U.S. Army and the Yumas set up a second ferry at a ford upriver. After a while, the Yumas attack and kill most of the gang. The kid, Toadvine and Tobin are among the survivors who flee into the desert, though the kid takes an arrow in the leg. The kid and Tobin head west, and come across Holden, who first negotiates, then threatens them for their gun and possessions. Holden shoots Tobin in the neck, and the wounded pair hide among bones by a desert creek. Tobin repeatedly urges the kid to fire upon Holden. The kid does so – only once – but misses his mark. It has been suggested that this article or section be merged into Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. ... The Gila River, a tributary of the Colorado, is shown highlighted on a map of the United States The Gila River (Oodham [Pima]: Hila Akimel) is a tributary of the Colorado River, 630 mile (1,014 km) long, in the southwestern United States. ... Yuma is a city in and the county seatGR6 of Yuma County, Arizona, United States. ... Yumas. ...

The survivors continue their travels, ending up in San Diego. The kid gets separated from Tobin and is subsequently imprisoned. Holden visits the kid in jail, and tells him that he has told the jailers "the truth": that the kid alone was responsible for the end of the Glanton gang. The kid declares that the judge was responsible for the gang's evil, but the judge denies it. The kid stoically rebuts all of Holden's statements, but when the judge reaches through the cell bars to touch him, the kid recoils in disgust. Holden leaves the kid in jail, stating that he "has errands." The kid is released on recognizance and seeks a doctor to treat his wound. While recovering from the "spirits of ether", he hallucinates the judge visiting him along with a curious man who forges coins. The kid recovers and seeks out Tobin, with no luck. He makes his way to Los Angeles, where Toadvine and another member of the Glanton gang, David Brown, are hanged for their crimes. “San Diego” redirects here. ... In British and American law, the term recognizance is usually employed to describe an obligation of record, entered into before some court or magistrate duly authorized, whereby the party bound acknowledges (recognizes) that s/he owes a personal debt to the government or Crown, with a defeasance, subject to a... Ether is the general name for a class of chemical compounds which contain an ether group — an oxygen atom connected to two (substituted) alkyl or aryl groups — of general formula R – O–R.[1] A typical example is the solvent and anesthetic diethyl ether, commonly referred to simply as ether...

The kid again wanders across the American West, and decades are compressed into a few pages. In 1878 he makes his way to Fort Griffin, Texas. The lawless city is a center for processing the remains of the American Bison, which have been hunted nearly to extinction. At a saloon he meets the judge. Holden calls the kid "the last of the true," and the pair talk. Holden describes the kid as a disappointment, stating that he held in his heart "clemency for the heathen." Holden declares that the kid has arrived at the saloon for "the dance" – the dance of violence, war, and bloodshed that the judge had so often praised. The kid seems to deny all of these ideas, telling the judge "You aint nothin [sic]," and noting the performing bear at the saloon, states, "even a dumb animal can dance." Fort Griffin was a Cavalry fort established in the late 1860s in northwest Texas, specifically northwestern Shackelford County, to give settlers protection from early Comanche and Kiowa raids. ... Binomial name (Linnaeus, 1758) Subspecies B. b. ...

The kid hires a prostitute, then afterwards goes to an outhouse under another meteor shower. In the outhouse, he is surprised by the naked judge, who "gathered him in his arms against his immense and terrible flesh." This is the last mention of the kid, though in the next scene two men come from the saloon and encounter a third man (possibly Holden, though it is not stated) urinating near the outhouse. The unnamed third man advises the two not to go in the outhouse. They ignore the suggestion, open the door, and can only gaze in awed horror at what they see, one of them stating only "Good God almighty." The last paragraph finds the judge back in the saloon, dancing and playing fiddle among the drunkards and the whores, saying that he will never die.

The ambiguous fate of the kid is followed by an ambiguous epilogue, featuring a possibly allegorical man augering lines of holes across the prairie, perhaps for fence posts. The man sparks a fire in each of the holes, and an assortment of wanderers trails behind him.

Themes

Blood Meridian is a dense, sometimes difficult novel that demands close attention. There are references on nearly every page to historical, religious or mystical concepts, events or persons. John Emil Sepich's Notes on Blood Meridian was the first examination of the novel's sources, their context and significance. Additional books and articles have also examined McCarthy's sources for the novel.

Violence

A major theme is the warlike nature of man. Violence is present from the early pages of the novel to the end: "the kid" is shot in the chest not long after he leaves home, and in the subsequent years, he witnesses and/or participates in nearly every type of violence and depravity. Throughout the book, Holden expounds his views on the warlike nature of human beings, arguing that there is little more to human existence. This pervasive violence is sometimes criticized, but McCarthy's defenders have made the point that he is merely representing the indiscriminate slaughter of the time, and have noted that the brief, curious epilogue seems to offer a glimmer of hope for humanity.

"The kid," adhering to a certain personal code of morality to some extent, contrasts sharply with the scheming brutality of the Judge, though he is party to the group's various killings. This is perhaps attributable, at least in the case of "the kid," for a general human tendency not to go against the prevailing trend or crowd behavior. The protagonist is never vindicated in killing the villain, which is perhaps uncommon in Western novels; indeed, the book closes with the Judge dancing after his meeting with the kid, having earlier drawn an analogy to an "endless" dance of violence, or perhaps the balance existing in life between the righteous and the wicked, each of which is never able to overcome the other, no matter what the time and place. This article does not cite any references or sources. ...

Caryn James argued that the novel's violence was a "slap in the face" to modern readers cut off from the brutality of life, while Terrence Morgan thought that, though initially shocking, the effect of the violence gradually waned until the reader was bored.^[1] Lilley argues that many critics struggle with the fact that McCarthy does not use violence for "jury-rigged, symbolic plot resolutions… In McCarthy's work, violence tends to be just that; it is not a sign or symbol of something else."^[2]

Ending

As noted above, the most common interpretation of the novel is that that Holden kills the kid in the Griffin, Texas outhouse. The fact that the kid's death is not depicted might be significant. Blood Meridian is a catalog of brutality, depicting, in sometimes explicit detail, all manner of violence, bloodshed, brutality and cruelty. For the dramatic climax to be left undepicted leaves something of a vacuum for the reader: knowing full well the horrors established in the past hundreds of pages, the kid's unstated fate might still be too awful to describe, and too much for the mind to fathom: the sight of the kid's fate leaves several witnesses stunned almost to silence; never in the book does any other character have this response to violence, again underlining the singularity of the kid's fate.

Though most readers (and many critics) seem to fill this vacuum with the kid's death, Patrick J. Shaw argues that Holden has sexually violated the protagonist. As Shaw writes, the novel had several times earlier established "a sequence of events that gives us ample information to visualize how Holden molests a child, then silences him with aggression."^[3] When the kid is imprisoned in Los Angeles, Holden visits him in jail and reaches towards him through the bars; the kid recoils in disgust. According to Shaw's argument, Holden's actions in the Griffin outhouse are the culmination of what he desired decades earlier: to rape the kid, then perhaps kill him to silence the only survivor of the Glanton gang. If the judge wanted only to kill the kid, there would be no need for him to undress as he waited in the outhouse. Shaw writes,

When the judge assaults the kid in the Griffin jakes… he betrays a complex of psychological, historical and sexual values of which the kid has no conscious awareness, but which are distinctly conveyed to the reader. Ultimately, it is the kid's personal humiliation which impacts the reader most tellingly. In the virile warrior culture which dominates that text and to which the reader has become acclimated, seduction into public homoeroticism is a dreadful fate. We do not see behind the outhouse door to know the details of the kid's corruption. It may be as simple as the embrace that we do witness or as violent as the sodomy implied by the judge's killing of the Indian children. The kid's powerful survival instinct perhaps suggests that he is a more willing participant than a victim. However, the degree of debasement and the extent of the kid's willingness are incidental. The public revelation of the act is what matters. Other men have observed the kid's humiliation… In such a male culture, public homoeroticism is untenable and it is this sudden revelation that horrifies the observers at Griffin. No other act could offend their masculine sensibilities as the shock they display… This triumph over the kid is what the exhibitionist and homoerotic judge celebrates by dancing naked atop the wall, just as he did after assaulting the half-breed boy. François Elluin, Sodomites provoking the wrath of God, from Le pot pourri de Loth (1781). ...

—Patrick W. Shaw, "The Kid's Fate, the Judge's Guilt"^[4]

Gnosticism

It is generally agreed that there are Gnostic qualities present in Blood Meridian, but their precise meaning and implication have been debated. Among the most detailed of these arguments was made by Leo Daugherty in his 1992 article, "Blood Meridian as Gnostic Tragedy." Daugherty argues "gnostic thought is central to Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian" (Daugherty, 122); specifically, the Persian/Zoroastrian/Manichean branch of Gnosticism. He describes the novel as a "rare coupling of Gnostic 'ideology' with the 'affect' of Hellenistic tragedy by means of depicting how power works in the making and erasing of culture, and of what the human condition amounts to when a person opposes that power and thence gets introduced to fate."^[5] This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... For other uses of this term see: Persia (disambiguation) The Persian Empire is the name used to refer to a number of historic dynasties that have ruled the country of Persia (Iran). ... Zoroastrianism is the religion and philosophy based on the teachings ascribed to the prophet Zoroaster (Zarathustra, Zartosht). ... Manichean priests, writing at their desk, with panel inscription in Sogdian. ... Tragedy is one of the oldest forms of drama. ... Look up fate, Fates in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Daugherty sees Holden as an archon, and the kid as a "failed pneuma." The novel's narrator explicitly states that the kid feels a "spark of the alien divine" and despite his violent streak, he has a measure of awareness and free will that sets him apart from his peers: he is one of the few in Glanton's gang who seems to express any degree of remorse, however slight, or who ever questions, however haltingly, the propriety of their actions. Furthermore, the kid rarely initiates violence, usually doing so only when urged by others or in self-defense. Holden, however, speaks of his desire to dominate the earth and all who dwell on it, by any means: from outright violence to deception and trickery. He expresses his wish to become a "suzerain", one who "rules even when there are other rulers" and whose power overrides all others'. Look up Archon in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Pneumatology is the study of spiritual beings and phenomena, especially the interactions between humans and God. ... Free-Will is a Japanese independent record label founded in 1986. ... Suzerainty refers to a situation in which a region or people is a tributary to a more powerful entity which allows the tributary some limited domestic autonomy but controls its foreign affairs. ...

Daugherty contends that the staggering violence of the novel can best be understood though a Gnostic lens. "Evil" as defined by the Gnostics was a far larger, more pervasive presence in human life than the rather tame and "domesticated" Satan most Christians believe in. As Daugherty writes, "For [Gnostics], evil was simply everything that is, with the exception of bits of spirit imprisoned here. And what they saw is what we see in the world of Blood Meridian."^[6] Barcley Owens argues that, while there are undoubtedly Gnostic qualities to the novel, Daugherty's arguments are "ultimately unsuccessful,"^[7] because Daugherty fails to adequately address the novel's pervasive violence and because he overstates the kid's goodness. But Daugherty has responded that the "pervasive violence," while admittedly present, is irrelevant to his or anybody else's argument about either Gnosticism or tragedy, and that he does not believe, and does not believe his criticism says, that the kid is anybody's model of "goodness" at all. For other uses, see Evil (disambiguation). ... This article is about the concept of Satan. ...

Reception

Blood Meridian initially earned a lukewarm critical and commercial reception, but has since become widely recognized as McCarthy's masterpiece and one of the greatest American novels of the century. In 2006, the New York Times conducted a poll of writers and critics regarding the most important works in American fiction in the last 25 years; Blood Meridian ranked #3, behind Toni Morrison's Beloved and Don DeLillo's Underworld. For the Louisiana politician, see deLesseps Morrison, Jr. ... Beloved is a 1987 novel by Toni Morrison about the legacy of slavery. ... Don DeLillo (born November 20, 1936) is an American author best known for his novels, which paint detailed portraits of American life in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. ... Underworld is a novel written in 1997 by Don DeLillo. ...

Academics and critics have variously suggested that Blood Meridian is nihilistic or strongly moral; a satire of the western genre, a savage indictment of Manifest Destiny. Harold Bloom called it "the ultimate western;" J. Douglas Canfield described it as "a grotesque Bildungsroman in which we are denied access to the protagonist's consciousness almost entirely."^[8] Comparisons were made to the weddings of Hieronymus Bosch and Sam Peckinpah, or of Dante Alighieri and Louis L'Amour. However, there is no consensus interpretation; James D. Lilley writes that the work "seems designed to elude interpretation."^[9] After reading Blood Meridian, Richard Selzer declared that McCarthy "is a genius – also probably somewhat insane."^[10] This article is about the philosophical position. ... -1... 1867 edition of the satirical magazine Punch, a British satirical magazine, ground-breaking on popular literature satire. ... This article is about the history and influence of the concept. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... This article is about the word itself. ... A bildungsroman (IPA: /, German: novel of personal development) is a novelistic form which concentrates on the spiritual, moral, psychological, or social development and growth of the protagonist usually from childhood to maturity. ... Hieronymus Bosch, (latinized; also Jeroen Bosch or his real name Jeroen van Aken) (c. ... David Samuel Sam Peckinpah (February 21, 1925 – December 28, 1984) was an American film director who achieved iconic status following the release of his 1969 Western epic The Wild Bunch. ... Dante in a fresco series of famous men by Andrea del Castagno, ca. ... Cover Louis LAmour book, Showdown at Yellow Butte. ...

The novel is notable for its bleakness (innocents and combatants are massacred alike), its Faulkneresque and Old Testament-influenced language and its apparent exploration of Gnostic themes. It earned rather little notice upon its publication, but its reputation has grown tremendously. Critic Steven Shaviro wrote: William Cuthbert Faulkner (September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) was an American novelist and poet whose works feature his native state of Mississippi. ... Note: Judaism commonly uses the term Tanakh to refer to its canon, which corresponds to the Protestant Old Testament. ... Steven Shaviro is a cultural critic. ...

In the entire range of American literature, only Moby-Dick bears comparison to Blood Meridian. Both are epic in scope, cosmically resonant, obsessed with open space and with language, exploring vast uncharted distances with a fanatically patient minuteness. Both manifest a sublime visionary power that is matched only by still more ferocious irony. Both savagely explode the American dream of manifest destiny, of racial domination and endless imperial expansion. But if anything, McCarthy writes with a yet more terrible clarity than does Melville. American literature refers to written or literary work produced in the area of the United States and Colonial America. ... Moby-Dick book cover Moby-Dick - the official title of the first edition - is a novel by Herman Melville. ... The epic is a broadly defined genre of narrative poetry, characterized by great length, multiple settings, large numbers of characters, or long span of time involved. ... “Ironic” redirects here. ... This article is about the history and influence of the concept. ...

—Steven Shaviro, "A Reading of Blood Meridian"^[11]

The famous American literary critic Harold Bloom has praised Blood Meridian as one of the 20th century's finest novels.^[12] The book was also ranked among the top five American novels of the period from 1980 to 2005 in a survey of writers conducted by The New York Times in May 2006.^[13] The New York Times is a daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed internationally. ...

Adaptations

A film adaptation written by William Monahan is scheduled for release in 2009, to be directed by Ridley Scott. William Monahan (IPA pronunciation: )[1] (born November 3, 1960) is an American novelist and screenwriter. ... 2009 (MMIX) will be a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Sir Ridley Scott (born November 30, 1937 in South Shields, County Durham) is an influential Academy Award-nominated English film director, and producer. ...

Footnotes

Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 141st day of the year (142nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 131st day of the year (132nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...

References

• Canfield, J. Douglas. Mavericks on the Border: Early Southwest in Historical fiction and Film; University Press of Kentucky, 2001; ISBN 0-8131-2180-9.
• Daugherty, Leo. "Gravers False and True: Blood Meridian as Gnostic Tragedy" Southern Quarterly 30, No. 4, Summer 1992, pages 122-133.
• Lilley, James D. "History and the Ugly Facts of Blood Meridian"; in Cormac McCarthy: New Directions; University of New Mexico Press, Albuquerque.
• Owens, Barcley. Cormac McCarthy's Western Novels; University of Arizona Press, 2000; ISBN 0-8165-1928-5.
• Shaviro, Steven. "A Reading of Blood Meridian", Southern Quarterly 30, No. 4, Summer 1992.
• Shaw, Patrick W. "The Kid's Fate, the Judge's Guilt: Ramifications of Closure in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian"; Southern Literary Journal, Fall 1997, pages 102-119.