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Topic: McCarthy's Southern Works
Thread: Guillemin's Claim

Total messages for all days: 31

Guillemin's Claim	John F	12/21/2004
In Georg's new book, he claims Suttree is the only intellectually active protagonist in Mac's novels. Uh . . . what about John Grady?? Knows the name of every bone in a horse's body. Displays a keen interest in horse books. Introduced to Guzman by Rocha. John Grady as apprentice scholar???? Yes. :)

Guillemin's Claim	wesmorgan	12/21/2004
Yeh, but Suttree knows the meaning of "yegg" (p. 235). :-) Wes

Guillemin's Claim	rick Wallach	12/21/2004
"Just like some god damned bolshevik picking up his orders at yegg central." -- The Dane. Anyhow, I don't think John Grady's mastery of his sole craft, impressive as it is, qualifies him as "intellecutally active." Everything he knows seems to be subordinate to a one-dimensional lifestyle. Moreover, it's just this propensity for tunnel vision what gits him kilt. Suttree's problem is nearly the opposite: his consciousness incorporates much more than he needs to know given the straits of his lifestyle, and his knowledge, this unsubordinated to any clear vision, comes at him like a swarm of killer bees.

Guillemin's Claim	greg hyduke	12/21/2004

Guillemin's Claim	John Cant	12/22/2004
The judge is clearly not a human figure; his superhuman qualities and dimensions mark him out as mythic. He belonhgs with those other American giants we meet in the tall tales.He allegorises a particular aspect of Enlightenment hubris. John Grady lacks the intellectual wherewithall to escape from the romantic cowboy mythology that eventually destroys him. A prophetic figure? We are all keeping our fingers crossed.

Guillemin's Claim	Greg Hyduke	12/22/2004

Guillemin's Claim	Greg Hyduke	12/22/2004

Guillemin's Claim	John F	12/22/2004
My impression is the Guzman is at least partially in French, heavy-duty, in-depth material that is not for the intellectually faint of heart. It stymies JGC, and he communicates its difficulty level to Don Hector. But still, JGC has the old brainbox working in a scholastic sense. And if Georg is dismissing equine studies as trivial, then he is doubly wrong.

Guillemin's Claim	John Cant	12/22/2004
re. the judge as actually human: consider his tossing of the meteorite. Picador edn. p. 240. John Grady's ability with horses is similarly quasi-magical. The taming of Don Hector's horses (Hector - mythic hero of Troy - tamer of horses)carries the same mythic charge as does Billy's journey with the wolf. In my view much the same can said of most of McCarthy's principal characters. The placing of these protagonists in 'realistic' times (except for 'Outer Dark' of course - a clearly mythic, Oedipal tale) and contexts reflects his unifying theme - the manner in which human lives are structured by mythic tales, especially those inappropriate myths that lead is to destruction. As I suggested above - we're keeping our fingers crossed.

Guillemin's Claim	lon	12/22/2004
Hi, Greg! Regarding your comment: "The novel breaks no laws of the physical universe; it flaunts them." Not to put too fine a point on it, but "... it flouts them." Please don't get the wrong impression; I'm new here and an infrequent contributor, but I do "lurk" often and am impressed with the general quality of discussion. I may contribute more when I am equal to the task. By the way, I agree with everything else you said; well done! Lon

Guillemin's Claim	bruce serafin	12/22/2004
Hi Lon. Welcome to the forum. Quite apart from the Judge's and John Grady's mythic status - and here I agree with John Cant (as you would guess, Greg, from our earlier posts on this subject) - apart from that, i question whether the Judge actually _thinks_ or is "intellectually active" in the way old suttree is. We see Suttree feeling his way into the world, suffering it, contemplating it, reacting to it - experiencing it on his skin - but we don't see that with the Judge. He is impenetrable as a god. He orates: speaks: acts. But does he think? Is he shown thinking in any way the reader can respond to, empathize with? No.

Guillemin's Claim	Greg Hyduke	12/22/2004

Guillemin's Claim	David N. Cremean	12/23/2004
On the flaunts/flouts front, there are a number of interesting regionalisms here in western South Dakota that flout the illogic of language: my favorite is that many here not only say but also write "take it for granite." This not merely among our stoogents, but also among the adult population.

Guillemin's Claim	bruce serafin	12/23/2004
Ha! ok Greg, right you are. Of course the Judge thinks. I don't know what _I_ was thinking. But you see my point, I hope, vis a vis Suttree. And vis a vis "thinking" characters in literature in general - in Tolstoy, say. You can "see into" them. I can't see into the Judge. But he thinks, all right. Flout/flaunt. inneresting. Up here we have "irregardless."

Guillemin's Claim	John Cant	12/23/2004
Interested in your use of the word 'juggernaut' there Greg. Beyond the merely human perhaps?

Guillemin's Claim	Greg Hyduke	12/23/2004

Guillemin's Claim	odsbodikins	12/23/2004
You think he's real until the time comes to shoot him. The kid and Tobin discuss this same concept (watered down or maybe distilled) in the book. I think McCarthy makes it deliberately ambiguous. The judge's nature I mean. Just because he says he'll never die doesn't mean he's immortal. If he is immortal though I'd like to see him turn up in No Country for Old Men. On the concept of "seeing into" characters, I think it's clear that Suttree's the only character we ever get a look into. In the other works McCarthy seems very deliberate in describing the physical (or sensory) aspects of the events in his stories. But there's no introspection. No Hamlets or Daedeluses or Quentins (Except Suttree of course) brooding over life and death or time and the ocean. This is where he goes away from modernism. Seems to me like the point of it is that our actions are knowable but our souls are not.

Guillemin's Claim	MBOneil	12/24/2004
'Intellectually active' is really a problematic thing to define. In their own way most all of Mac's protagonists, except maybe Lester Ballard and Culla & Rinthy Holme, are mentally active, alert, sorting things out inside themselves just like old Sut. Old Arthur Ownby in The Orchard Keeper is another one of those Suttree type characters -- we also get a good look inside him as he sits there relating one story about the old 'painters' to the boys there drinking dandelion wine but remembering another much more vivid and frightening tale about the loss of his wife. I think both John Grady and Billy Parham are intellectually active, The Judge of course and a good many minor characters. Another thing to note, though, is that Suttree was actually begun before The Orchard Keeper and these two books are the only ones in which Mac uses Modernist Streams of Consciousness techniques -- that is, they are the only two novels in which Mac allows direct entry in the consciousness of his characters. After that, without that privilege, McCarthy shows his characters' mental activity by the way they live and behave, not by what they've read, remember, or think, but rather by what they do. I think from Outer Dark on we are to judge the minds and souls of Mac's characters by how they behave and perhaps by their dreams. Note, though, that a dream in this context is not really entry into the consciousness of the character either, for if we read the Epilogue of COTP we come to see that Mac believes that we don't 'have' dreams but rather dream 'have' us. Either way, in streams of consciousness narrative the narrative is immersed in the consciousness of a single character, in Mac's later technique the consciousness of the character is immersed in the narrative.

Guillemin's Claim	mike zechel	12/25/2004
The judge is intellectual activity or rationalism run amuck. John Grady 'sees more clearly' than the judge. http://hjem.get2net.dk/civet-cat/zen-writings/essentials-of-practise-and-enlightenment.htm HAPPY HOLIDAYS TO ALL!

Guillemin's Claim	Jeff Shalek	5/16/2005
This is my first post on this board. I am not a scholar, professor or learned librarian (in fact, I am a poor speller and editor). I read McCarthy's novels and try to gain some insight about the quality of his work by lurking around here. But I challenge the entire proposition that Suttree was Intellectually 'Active'. I think that the word 'Active' should be replaced with 'Able.' There is no doubt that Sut is eduated and has a greater mental capacity then most McCarthy characters. But, in my opinion,while Suttree was educated and intellectualy able, I have strong reservations that his intellect was at all active. He knows the difference between right and wrong, but consistently choses the wrong path. And I am not referring to his choice to live as a fisherman and associate with neerwelldoers. Even in that environment, he could occasionally demonstrate some intellectual activity. Knowing what a Vegg is is not intellect. In fact, to me, the only intellectual activity (his only desire to gain some significant new knowledge) he dmonstrates is when he inquires about people in photographs. I recall this occurring twice, once when he was asking his Aunt about a family picture and once when he was asking the witch dwarf about a photo on her wall. I think that it is his bad choices within his chosen lifestyle that, demonstrate a greater deal of intellectual inactivity. Why does he dump a 6 month old human carcas in the river (he knows better then to get involved), why does he inherit $300 only to wake up in a mud crusted new suit. His failure to use his intellect appears to me to be his biggest flaw. It appears to me that the tragedy McCarthy describes throughout this novel is Suttree's failed intellect.

Guillemin's Claim	wesmorgan	5/17/2005
Jeff, You are correct in trying to distinguish between being intellectually “active” and being intellectually “able.” Suttree is rightly judged “able” by virtue of his educational accomplishments and his vocabulary as you point out. But I think he is also “active.” One line of evidence pointing to his intellectual activity is his rather constant reading. He reads about the “earthquake” in the paper (p. 270), he picks-up a copy of The Book of Mormon he finds in a bus station pamphlet rack and reads it (p. 294), he reads a paper “from front to back” in Newport (p. 335), later he finds “about a dozen” books in a motel office and reads them (p. 358), at breakfast he asks Ulysses for a piece of the paper (p. 169), he buys a newspaper to read in Bryson City (p. 291), he read a “scrap of newsprint” he found in a drawer (p. 381), “he spent a lot of time in the library reading magazines” (p. 386), Joyce would bring him a paper (pp. 395, 402) and he would buy the morning paper in the hotel lobby each day (p. 397), he saw Hoghead’s picture while looking at a paper in the drugstore (p. 403), he read the papers in the apartment kitchen (p. 404), and he checked the papers for news (p. 446). These are things done by an active mind seeking information. Suttree’s life problems seem to stem from his personality make-up and conflicts in values rather than intellectual inactivity. He seems able to think through situations and anticipate outcomes although he often acts in self-defeating ways. It is not his intellect activity that fails him. It is his character. Wes

Guillemin's Claim	Richard L.	5/17/2005
I agree. He's a bit like Donn Pearce's Cool Hand Luke of the 1960s; there is no aspiration to coolness, in a 1950s sense, but instead a rejection of what is commonly thought cool. I read into him an alienation that makes him reject what passes for "the good life." The book jells well with the essays in Colin Wilson's The Outsider, and the preface makes it clear that "ruder forms" outside the realm still survive. And at the end, there is Suttree's transformation.

Guillemin's Claim	Jeff Shalek	5/17/2005
Wes, Thank you very much for your kind reply to my post. Being a new poster here (but a frequent lurker), I have a great deal of respect for the insights you provide. I don't want to come across as arrogant, but I still am uncertain that (1) the passages you suggest demonstrate "intellectual activity" do, and (2) that Suttree's flaw is his character. I believe that Suttree's strength is his character and his weakness is his utilization of his intellect, briefly as follows: "[H]e reads about the “earthquake” in the paper (p. 270);" yet he is the only one in town with knowledge that it was really a blast of Harragote's dynamite. "[H]e picks-up a copy of The Book of Mormon he finds in a bus station pamphlet rack and reads it (p. 294);" yet he reads it in a state of delirium and hides behind it to avoid vagrancy charges. "[H]e reads a paper “from front to back” in Newport (p. 335);" only to squelch his anger about finding out that the Tennessee pearls are worthless and Reese misled him. "[H]e finds “about a dozen” books in a motel office and reads them (p. 358)", only because it was raining four days straight and he needed something to do to kill time. In short, I think he reads not to gain knowledge or learn something, he reads to hide or kill time. I think by showing us that Suttree can and does read whre the other character can't, Cormac only reinforces in us that Suttree is intellectually able, and not that his intellect is active in any manner. With regard to character as a flaw, an arguement can be made that Suttree is a man of good, solid character. He helps his neighbors (helps the Indian recover his stolen boat, gives Reese's family a cat fish); he is charitable (gives money to street vagrants) he pays his debts (returns $20 to his uncle), is loyal in his relationships to a fault, would rather earn a dollar then take a hand-out, he doesn't steal, and he never lies. The fact that he is of such strong character, yet choses his chosen lifstyle is, to me, what makes him interesting. It is also interesting to me that he consistently rejects religion (the baptism by the river and attending church with Reese's family), but when he needs to contemplate certain situations he finds himself in, he wonders into churches to isolate himself and ponder (uh-oh I think I just contradicted my intellectual inactivity theory). But why does Cormac place in in churchs to ponder. Because it is clear that his good character comes from the Judeo-Christian baggage he carries with him from his privileged upbringing. That stays with him through-out. He is not portrayed as immortal, he sins, he drinks, he enjoys whores. These human sins, in my opinion, do not conflict with his good character though. I disagree that Suttree’s life problems seem to stem from his personality make-up and conflicts in values. I see very little conflict in his values. He has very good values. I think he doesn't think, I think he abandons his intellect.

Guillemin's Claim	odsbodikins	5/17/2005
Suttree is a chthonic embryo experiencing birth pains. His problem is that he's immature, not yet ready for the world, clinging to the bottle. He doesn't reject religion he seeks it. Wandering into churches via the nave(l) heh heh he's trying to get born. Haunted by a weird until he realizes that all things are one and yet there is one suttree and one suttree only (after being pursued by his weird all this time). Visionary mystic that he is his way of apprehending the world is nonintellectual but he's not stupid. God is the thing that watches, the only observer who can see the world of motion from His stillness, the only one who can see beyond the quantum veil, the only one unplagued by uncertainty. Or maybe not.

Guillemin's Claim	Jeff Shalek	5/17/2005
By the way, based upon my thoughts above, Suttree's good character completely deserts him when he choses to sleep with Reese's daughter. Suttree knew it was the worst thing he could do, he sent her away once, but she took her again nonetheless. Is it conincidence that his major "out of character" experience resulted in death?

Guillemin's Claim	Rick Wallach	5/17/2005
Jeff: Yes, I think so. Everything he gets close to winds up the same way. He also merely walks away from Reese & family after the rockslide, as he apparently has done from anything that got rough, his own family situation included. One thing about Suttree's life that folks keep missing, it seems to me, is his comment to his uncle John very early in the novel that "I was expected to turn out badly." It seems important to me that his entire youth appears to have been saturated with some form of rejection or ostracism, perhaps subtle, but most likely - given what we know about his father - not so subtle. It's not hard to understand his consistent failure to stabilize his self-image nor his life in general given a childhood of such crushing filial opprobrium. It also seems clear that his grandfather stood between him and his father's emotional battery, and that his grandfather's death represents the moment when he was left defenseless against it - hence, his several encounters, in memory, dreams and in fact (as when he visits the ruined mansion) with the old man. How any Oedipal angst plays into this, I'm not sure - it's such a complete victory of the castrating father that even the few comments about his mother - made to John, for example - or the brief encounter with her in the workhouse visiting room - don't play smoothly into a classic Freudian reading of his psychic damage. His inability to function in a relationship with a woman on any but the most tenuous basis would ordinarily form the basis of a neat Freudian Oedipal analysis. This includes his marriage, his liason with Joyce, his disastrous dalliance with Reese's daughter, even his coitus interruptus when Leonard shows up for assistance in deep-sixing his own father's body. However, it's not his mother or her ghost who's vanquishing his prospective mates. Suttree is instead a bit like a Norman Bates, only with Dad's rotting corpse in the bedroom instead of Mom's. Wes, as our ranking clinician, what sayest thou to this?

Guillemin's Claim	wesmorgan	5/18/2005
Jeff, I view intellectual activity as existing on a continuum from passive and inert to engaged and productive. Sut could have elected to spend his time sleeping, smoking a cigarette, listening to the radio, playing cards or a number of other less intellectual activities in response to boredom. However, he often elected to read. How he elects “to kill time” reflects the level of his intellectual activity. Certainly he could have read the “classics,” solved NYT crossword puzzles or Scientific American puzzlers, written poetry or his memoirs in his spare time, things that I would have regarded as showing more intellectual activity, but he did not. Nevertheless, I would still regard him as intellectually active, especailly when compared to other characters in the book. I don’t recall using “character as a flaw” or character flaw in my description. I understand “character” to be simply the kind of person an individual is, not a valanced judgment about the person. Sut strikes me as a person who could be easily regarded as having a divided self. He could be a poster child for psychodynamic understanding (although that would not be my personal preference). It is this conflict between opposing motivations and values that make Sut such an interesting person and one who is worth our time and effort to understand. One example where conflict seems manifest would be one that Rick (above) suggested: Sut encountering his visiting his mother in the messhall of the workhouse (p. 61). What should he say, how much emotion should he reveal, what should he do? What makes this situation so difficult for him? Why does he flee? If Sut’s life problems do not stem from his personality make-up or character, how are they to be explained? It seems to me that McCarthy’s later works better illustrate the role that chance, accident and fate play in the lives of his characters. Sut seems to show less of this kind of thing. Wes

Guillemin's Claim	bruce serafin	5/18/2005
Jeff, you make an excellent point. It makes me think. But here's what I think. Remember the scene where Suttree studies the moth, its mask face? And there are so many similar scenes. Hundreds of them, a blizzard of them. Suttree absorbs the world like loose dry soil sucking up water. He studies it, contemplates it, reacts to it, lives in it. You know how it is watching Tv and getting into a channel-changing jag. How alienated. Suttree never ever lives like that. Ods is right that he is like an embryo being born; but this being born is an active process, a strenous process; a painful one too. And Sut is a genius so the pain is terrific. But still your point resonates. Suttree doesn't work.

Guillemin's Claim	Jeff Shalek	5/18/2005
Bruce, Thank you for your response. An I am beginning to agree with both you and Wes. Perhaps "inactive" intellect is the wrong way to define how Suttree responds to his environment and experiences. More likely, I am simply troubled by his refusal to adequately display and utlize the breadth of his intellect. Wes may well be correct in stating that intellect can be active yet profoundly passive nonetheless and you too may be correct in comparing Sut to the embryo still coming to grips with the breadth of his intellect. But honestly, you lost me when you said that my pint resonate, "Suttree doesn't work." If you have a spare moment, would you please expound upon this thought.

Guillemin's Claim	odsbodikins	5/18/2005
he's kinda flailing in the void. The book seems to me like I said a painful bloody birth, but more in a symbolic sense, like a shaman. It includes starvation-induced visions in the forest primeval, a trip to the underworld, and the visions in fever at the end. The kid also has fever visions at the end of Blood Meridian. I think Suttree is a very stubborn dude who must find his own path, or, like Blake, create his own system or be enslaved by another man's. This seems to me to be a deeply painful but ultimately meaningful and fecundating struggle. And I think that Wes is right about the inner dissonance, two souls in the breast, and it seems to me like one suttree is dying while the other is being born until there is "one Suttree and one Suttree only," and he is no longer haunted by his weird twin. In other words, the dead guy that's there when he comes back to the houseboat actually is him.

Guillemin's Claim	bruce serafin	5/19/2005
Not flailing in the void, ods. I know what I mean. Who is more languid than Suttree? He's an odd Oblomov: tragic yet detached. His catfish catching? No. That's not work. I like Wes's point - and I admire your elaboration of it. But I think Rick Wallach points to something basic about Suttree (and indeed most if not all of McCarthy's characters). They live alone because the Father put them there; and they suffer their loneliness more than they suffer anything else. To put it another way, they are doomed to remain Sons. (Not a bad thing, I would say: but still a hard fate.)

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