Thank You, Cormac McCarthy

I don’t see movies in the theater very often. So, I was thrilled when, for a just-after-Christmas gift, my parents treated me to No Country for Old Men at out local “dinner and a movie” theater. Yes, I though it was brilliant (and no, it’s not for everyone). But I hadn’t read the novel before I went, so when I was at the library earlier this week, I grabbed the paperback off the shelf, a gold sticker declaring “Now a Major Motion Picture” on the front cover.

I thought the book was brilliant, too. And it made me like the movie all the more, because Ethan and Joel Coen flawlessly took Cormac McCarthy’s words and put them on the screen, following the novel nearly scene-for-scene. Some critics have gone so far as to say the movie is better than the novel; I only wish I would have read the book first, so I could have judged that more objectively (I will be reading Blood Meridian before Ridley Scott’s movie version comes to theaters, though I will admit to being a bit skeptical he could do it any better than – or even close to as well as – the Coen brothers).

But, more importantly (for me!), McCarthy’s book gave me direction for my own work-in-progress. I tend to get hung up in details and intricate plot contortions to explain away any perceived holes. My stories can also – for the sake of making things more “interesting” – get a bit convoluted. But, as I read No Country for Old Men, I was again reminded of the elements that make great novels. Immediacy. Relationships. And, most importantly, letting the words stand by themselves. Things I know, but had somehow lost in my desire to write something “relevant” and “meaningful.” McCarthy’s writing helped me to dump the whole “this is the important thing I’m trying to tell you” attitude. I’m just writing people now. People dealing with the world around them. What that means, I’ll let the reader decide.