Cormac McCarthy
Our class reading for Writing 39b Fall Quarter 2013 was Cormac McCarthy's "Blood Meridian." Let me begin to say that the way the book is written is one of the strangest ways to write a book. However to this day it has been one of the most interesting that I have read. It all begins with the over all plot of the story, which revolves around a crew of men who make a living out scalps. For those that do not know what scalps are, well it is the skin that covers the top of all of our head. These men would actually make a living from killing a scalping Apaches and Comanches. If we only knew this we would assume that these men were the villains of the story. However they are not. Cormac McCarthy’s writes in a way that is so confusing but yet so interesting that you cannot stop reading. The amount of detail that he places in each confrontational scene has so much detail that in a few it can be said that there is too much. In cases it is even hard to read because of the amount of detail in gore and blood. If I recall correctly the one scene that got to me the most was the one in which the “Judge” scalped the little Apache boy. I actually had to read it twice to see if I had read it correctly. For those that have read it, you know exactly what I am talking about. You would have never expected the Judge to kill the little boy after caring for him. We can all agree that the way that Cormac McCarthy writes in a way that psychologically forces us to think in a different way and as we read on we realize that we should expect the unexpected from Cormac. You might think that I am exaggerating, but once you read it you will realize that the way in which McCarthy writes and all the detail he uses sometimes is so to much. Anyways if professor McCoy chooses Blood Meridian once again for the following quarter I am sure you are really going to enjoy all except the ending.