I started reading another Cormac McCarthy novel today. I've read a couple of his and I find them okay, though I don't love him the way so many apparently do. I think what bothers me about his work is what I perceive as a double standard. Here is an example from the very first page of this novel called The Crossing:
"He pulled his breeches off the footboard of the bed and got his shirt and his blanketlined duckingcoat and got his boots from under the bed and went out to the kitchen and dressed in the dark by the faint warmth of the stove and held the boots to the windowlight to pair them left and right and pulled them on and rose and went to the kitchen door and stepped out and closed the door behind him."
You see, he gets to be called brilliant by writing such run-on sentences with 12 'and's in them, which he does all the time, but if any of us dared to do such a thing, any agent or editor would reject us outright and consider us complete amateurs. It just pisses me off a tad that the very same set of eyes that would read that sentence coming from me and hit the Delete key will foam at the mouth with ecstasy because it is written by a famous author.
Sorry, just had to do a mini-rant about that before I go on reading.
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10 hours ago
My father read No Country For Old Men and said it was really difficult to read without the punctuation.
ReplyDeleteLOL. You are so correct. I'm reading a suspense novel by a multi published author and I couldn't help but notice how many 'was' 'be' and other passive verbs are in every paragraph.
ReplyDeleteHis lack of punctuation bothers me too, but his descriptions and characters usually end up hitting an emotional mark in the reader by the end that just makes him stand out as one of the greats. And, yeah, you or I would get rejected in a minute for those kinds of grammatical experiments.
ReplyDeleteI didn't like The Road for the same reason, Ted. Extremism doesn't appeal to me in fiction. I don't want to admire the 'form'.
ReplyDeleteI guess they are right in saying it really is all about the story. Despite the author's foibles...if you can't put it down...then it doesn't matter.
ReplyDeleteEdge of Your Seat Romance
I struggle not to point that kind of thing out. An agent I very much want to work out once said "Don't do this." and then suggested one of her clients as an example, except that same client "did this" in the very first chapter of her hugely successful first novel. Consistency, people. Consistency.
ReplyDeleteOf course, I see it all the time time. It's quite prevalent, and disappointing.
ReplyDelete