(no subject)

[proximoception]

Blood Meridian is a great book but it hasn't left me very happy. I feel I'd better read some more McCarthy for triangulation: He seems to be at least half in love with his Judge Holden, whose perspective is left unopposed--but how could he be? His prior novel Child of God seemed to me essentially compassionate, valuing the humanity even in a murderer. The judge, though, identifies murder as humanity's value. The desire to object to this is briefly noted, but no objection is given. Another midlife crisis book? I saw and liked very much the All the Pretty Horses movie, where there was a way out, but wonder if the book concurs.

Particularly dismaying and admirable was how purely The Faerie Queene's mode was channelled, doubtless entirely through Moby-Dick, BM's overt model. "In the afternoon they came unto a land..." (Tennyson) and the land is hell. He channels it to hell.