A little risky picking a single sentence from this masterpiece, but I tried to find one that was emblematic of many of his other stunning sentences. He often also pays tribute to Hemingway with long compound, paratactic sentences.
Jun 17, 2023·edited Jun 17, 2023Liked by Nina Schuyler
There is a correlation there. But though it’s clear that Hemingway was involved in the first world war, was McCarthy ever actually in a war? (Speaking of war writing, one of my all-time favorites is “The Pugilist at Rest,” by Thom Jones. The battle scene is absolutely breathtaking, not to mention the rest of it. Kind of pro-war and anti-war at once, which I think is not easy to do, but I like how it covers the entire spectrum of human feeling about both the glory and insanity of violence.)
From his biography on his website: "McCarthy joined the U.S. Air Force in 1953; he served four years, spending two of them stationed in Alaska, where he hosted a radio show."
I haven't read Thom Jones' novel, but now I will. Thank you! The writers who have been to war show both the beautiful intensity and the horror (I'm thinking of Tim O'Brien in particular).
The Pugilist at Rest is a short story, one of my all time favorites. Thom Jones worked as a janitor in a high school in Olympia, I believe, recovering from Vietnam and writing in his spare time. Well worth a read.
I've re-read Blood Meridian this week. I've never read his novel Suttree so that's next. I'm feeling his risk-taking, the move toward ornateness, grandiosity; feeling the bones of the judge is a manifestation of Nietzsche's philosophy, especially his criticism of morality. From The Gay Science: "Indeed, we philosophers and "free spirits" feel, when we hear the news that 'the old god is dead,' as if a new dawn shone on us; our heart overflows with gratitude, amazement, premonitions, expectation. ... all the daring of the lover of knowledge is permitted again; the sea, our sea, lies open again, perhaps there has never yet been such an 'open sea.'
I have heard that Suttree and Child of God are the best of the early ones.
I guess I better put Nietzche back on my list. Although there is a shudder there too, when thinking of where Germany went not long after…but what we do with free will is the crux.
Thank you, Nina. One of the most interesting, challenging, idealistic and one-of-a-kind writers. I feel I should read his entire oeuvre. I often find him disturbing, but his glorious command of language usually drowns out my misgivings. (And possibly my misgivings are misplaced mistakes, anyway!)
When I first picked up Blood Meridian years ago, I had to put it down. I made it to the carnivalesque, pandemonia killing, p. 52, "Already you could see through the dust on the ponies' hides the painted chevrons and the hands and rising suns and birds and fish of every device like the shade of old work... "
Then, later, I was ready to fall into the language.
My first time through I skipped about 50 pages in the middle, which felt like he was trying to beat the reader to death with the violence. The last 50 pages are still my favorite ever.
This was a great substack to randomly stumble across! I skimmed through the bloody meridian some years back, appalled by its wantonness and I just couldn't. Maybe I should get back into my breeches. You know, I am still haunted by the very last pages of the Border Trilogy and so when you said McCarthy was Melllvillous, it struck me then how similar an emotional impact the Border Trilogy and Moby Dick had upon me, particularly the endings.
"In the second relative clause, McCarthy uses synecdoche, a part of the whole, with “floor of the pit” which stands for despair or misery."
I'll admit, I constantly struggle to negotiate the distinctions between synecdoche and metonymy. I'm not the best at it, which is why I am getting hung up on analyzing the quoted material above. Some examples, yes, are pretty straightforward discernments: "wheels" to speak on behalf of an entire "car" (synecdoche); "the eating of the apple" to denote the "fall of man" (metonymy).
I find McCarthy's example interesting, because it sort of entangles both synecdoche and metonymy. I think???
My strongest inclination---at a sort of macro level---is to say that "floor of the pit" is more metonymy than synecdoche. He has created a concrete metaphor for something abstract, no different than saying [the concrete] "crown" represents [the abstract concept of] "power or royalty or governing rule, etc." Here, the concrete visual of "floor of the pit" represents an abstract concept of debasement---or any number of abstract/intangible terms here, i.e. misery, despair, awareness/revelation of the crudeness of humanity, hopelessness, etc.
The phrase ("floor of the pit") isn't really a "part of a whole"; rather, IMHO, it is ACTING as the whole thing. The "floor of the pit" is THAT ONE PLACE where all the pains and griefs of what we witness and feel are felt at the most extreme and elemental and sentient level of our human existence. For this reason, I primarily see "floor of the pit" as being more of a metonym.
However . . . and this is why it's interesting . . . if we look at synecdoche, which would be a "part of a whole," then we are looking for the "wheels" that belong to the "car." So, on a micro-level, we have "the bottom-most floor of floors" or "levels" in this larger building of "the pit." So, in a weird way, we do have a "part"---a floor or level---that relates parts-wise [and tangibly] to a "whole"---the pit structure. Of course, the type of pit would be implied at this point ("pit of despair"/ "pit of doom"/ "pit of crude humanity" etc.).
So yeah, I don't quite know what I am saying or if I am just turning myself around, but, overall, I keep seeing the "floor of the pit" as more of a metaphor and more of a metonym. I'm thinking my confusion has something to do with the idea of McCarthy trying to apply a concrete visual to an abstract noun, but then I revert back to the crown/royalty example, which is more metonym.
HELP, lol. I feel like I am either missing something or I am catching a glimpse of both devices being used. ERRRR.
I struggled with this too. I have read a lot about synecdoche and metonymy and many professors often can't distinguish which one is being enacted.
Here are Professor Kate Brady's definitions:
Synecdoche: substitutes the part for the while, such as "give us this day our daily bread," in which daily bread (the part) stands for the more generalized concept of food.
(so I was thinking: "the floor of the pit" is a concrete image that stands for the more generalized concept of despair/misery.
Metonymy substitutes some attribute of a thing for the thing itself: "these radicals spit on the flag" where spit stands for express contempt and flag for patriotism.
BUT:
"As many rhetoricians acknowledge, we can't always distinguish between these two closely related tropes, but most of us readily decipher substitutions in a text." (citing Edward P.J. Corbett and Robert J. Connors, Style and Statement). See also: "Speaking and Thinking with Metonymy," in Metonymy in Language and Thought," Raymond W. Gibbs.
I must confess I've never been a fan of his, partly because in general I find his style stilted and mannered, and partly because I find the unrelieved violence so repellent. However, this is a superb analysis of a single sentence - and a very good one the sentence is, I concede - so perhaps I should give him another try.
It took me several times, Gary; years went by... the violence, the savagery. But then my curiosity prevailed: what was he doing with his sentences? What is he combining or transcending that is unique?
Doing your exercise felt almost sacrilegous after such rawness.
But I tried...
Even then, when you gave of your breast to the hungry fiends, when you tore off the skin from your eyes and cursed the damned in their cribs and spoke in tongues foul and moist with the madman's lust, even then I loved.
Excellent selection and a great tribute. Blood Meridian is my favorite book.
A little risky picking a single sentence from this masterpiece, but I tried to find one that was emblematic of many of his other stunning sentences. He often also pays tribute to Hemingway with long compound, paratactic sentences.
There is a correlation there. But though it’s clear that Hemingway was involved in the first world war, was McCarthy ever actually in a war? (Speaking of war writing, one of my all-time favorites is “The Pugilist at Rest,” by Thom Jones. The battle scene is absolutely breathtaking, not to mention the rest of it. Kind of pro-war and anti-war at once, which I think is not easy to do, but I like how it covers the entire spectrum of human feeling about both the glory and insanity of violence.)
From his biography on his website: "McCarthy joined the U.S. Air Force in 1953; he served four years, spending two of them stationed in Alaska, where he hosted a radio show."
I haven't read Thom Jones' novel, but now I will. Thank you! The writers who have been to war show both the beautiful intensity and the horror (I'm thinking of Tim O'Brien in particular).
Tim is another one!
The Pugilist at Rest is a short story, one of my all time favorites. Thom Jones worked as a janitor in a high school in Olympia, I believe, recovering from Vietnam and writing in his spare time. Well worth a read.
Then I really can barely wait to discover his influence on you!
I've re-read Blood Meridian this week. I've never read his novel Suttree so that's next. I'm feeling his risk-taking, the move toward ornateness, grandiosity; feeling the bones of the judge is a manifestation of Nietzsche's philosophy, especially his criticism of morality. From The Gay Science: "Indeed, we philosophers and "free spirits" feel, when we hear the news that 'the old god is dead,' as if a new dawn shone on us; our heart overflows with gratitude, amazement, premonitions, expectation. ... all the daring of the lover of knowledge is permitted again; the sea, our sea, lies open again, perhaps there has never yet been such an 'open sea.'
I have heard that Suttree and Child of God are the best of the early ones.
I guess I better put Nietzche back on my list. Although there is a shudder there too, when thinking of where Germany went not long after…but what we do with free will is the crux.
Thank you, Nina. One of the most interesting, challenging, idealistic and one-of-a-kind writers. I feel I should read his entire oeuvre. I often find him disturbing, but his glorious command of language usually drowns out my misgivings. (And possibly my misgivings are misplaced mistakes, anyway!)
When I first picked up Blood Meridian years ago, I had to put it down. I made it to the carnivalesque, pandemonia killing, p. 52, "Already you could see through the dust on the ponies' hides the painted chevrons and the hands and rising suns and birds and fish of every device like the shade of old work... "
Then, later, I was ready to fall into the language.
My first time through I skipped about 50 pages in the middle, which felt like he was trying to beat the reader to death with the violence. The last 50 pages are still my favorite ever.
I can only be beaten for so long, then I need a break!
Similarly!
This was a great substack to randomly stumble across! I skimmed through the bloody meridian some years back, appalled by its wantonness and I just couldn't. Maybe I should get back into my breeches. You know, I am still haunted by the very last pages of the Border Trilogy and so when you said McCarthy was Melllvillous, it struck me then how similar an emotional impact the Border Trilogy and Moby Dick had upon me, particularly the endings.
Thank you! Lots to explore in this substack. Welcome to the unfurling of sentences!
"In the second relative clause, McCarthy uses synecdoche, a part of the whole, with “floor of the pit” which stands for despair or misery."
I'll admit, I constantly struggle to negotiate the distinctions between synecdoche and metonymy. I'm not the best at it, which is why I am getting hung up on analyzing the quoted material above. Some examples, yes, are pretty straightforward discernments: "wheels" to speak on behalf of an entire "car" (synecdoche); "the eating of the apple" to denote the "fall of man" (metonymy).
I find McCarthy's example interesting, because it sort of entangles both synecdoche and metonymy. I think???
My strongest inclination---at a sort of macro level---is to say that "floor of the pit" is more metonymy than synecdoche. He has created a concrete metaphor for something abstract, no different than saying [the concrete] "crown" represents [the abstract concept of] "power or royalty or governing rule, etc." Here, the concrete visual of "floor of the pit" represents an abstract concept of debasement---or any number of abstract/intangible terms here, i.e. misery, despair, awareness/revelation of the crudeness of humanity, hopelessness, etc.
The phrase ("floor of the pit") isn't really a "part of a whole"; rather, IMHO, it is ACTING as the whole thing. The "floor of the pit" is THAT ONE PLACE where all the pains and griefs of what we witness and feel are felt at the most extreme and elemental and sentient level of our human existence. For this reason, I primarily see "floor of the pit" as being more of a metonym.
However . . . and this is why it's interesting . . . if we look at synecdoche, which would be a "part of a whole," then we are looking for the "wheels" that belong to the "car." So, on a micro-level, we have "the bottom-most floor of floors" or "levels" in this larger building of "the pit." So, in a weird way, we do have a "part"---a floor or level---that relates parts-wise [and tangibly] to a "whole"---the pit structure. Of course, the type of pit would be implied at this point ("pit of despair"/ "pit of doom"/ "pit of crude humanity" etc.).
So yeah, I don't quite know what I am saying or if I am just turning myself around, but, overall, I keep seeing the "floor of the pit" as more of a metaphor and more of a metonym. I'm thinking my confusion has something to do with the idea of McCarthy trying to apply a concrete visual to an abstract noun, but then I revert back to the crown/royalty example, which is more metonym.
HELP, lol. I feel like I am either missing something or I am catching a glimpse of both devices being used. ERRRR.
I struggled with this too. I have read a lot about synecdoche and metonymy and many professors often can't distinguish which one is being enacted.
Here are Professor Kate Brady's definitions:
Synecdoche: substitutes the part for the while, such as "give us this day our daily bread," in which daily bread (the part) stands for the more generalized concept of food.
(so I was thinking: "the floor of the pit" is a concrete image that stands for the more generalized concept of despair/misery.
Metonymy substitutes some attribute of a thing for the thing itself: "these radicals spit on the flag" where spit stands for express contempt and flag for patriotism.
BUT:
"As many rhetoricians acknowledge, we can't always distinguish between these two closely related tropes, but most of us readily decipher substitutions in a text." (citing Edward P.J. Corbett and Robert J. Connors, Style and Statement). See also: "Speaking and Thinking with Metonymy," in Metonymy in Language and Thought," Raymond W. Gibbs.
I must confess I've never been a fan of his, partly because in general I find his style stilted and mannered, and partly because I find the unrelieved violence so repellent. However, this is a superb analysis of a single sentence - and a very good one the sentence is, I concede - so perhaps I should give him another try.
It took me several times, Gary; years went by... the violence, the savagery. But then my curiosity prevailed: what was he doing with his sentences? What is he combining or transcending that is unique?
PS: thank you for reading and for your kind words!
Wow. Just wow. Now I need to read this book.
Doing your exercise felt almost sacrilegous after such rawness.
But I tried...
Even then, when you gave of your breast to the hungry fiends, when you tore off the skin from your eyes and cursed the damned in their cribs and spoke in tongues foul and moist with the madman's lust, even then I loved.
Beautiful!!
And if I may say so, sexy!