6 Degree of Separation: from The Turn of the Screw to All the Pretty Horses

I've been meaning to post more of 6 Degree of Separation - a monthly meme hosted by Kathy - and only waiting for a book which I have actually read, and is interesting enough. The time has finally come, here it is...

The Turn of the Screw by Henry James

In this gothic story, a young woman (a governess) is placed in a country house, where she experiences mysterious and supernatural things which threatens to shatter her sanity. A similar condition is experienced by another young woman in...


The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Ratcliffe

Emily St. Aubert, a young heroine of this (another) gothic tale, also experiences mysterious apparitions, and even more than that, while staying in the Castle of Udolpho. These misfortunes befall her after the death of her father that made her an orphan. There is another (more) misfortunate young lady, who is left alone in the world after the death of her father. She is the heroine of...


The Deerslayer by James Fenimore Cooper

Judith Hutter might be stronger and braver than Emily St. Aubert, but she lacks Emily's pure innocence. She is cocquetish and regarded as too liberal at that era (18th century). Notwithstanding her diligent efforts to redeem herself from her follies, the society stamped her fate as fallen woman. This particular aspect of The Deerslayer is too much in common with the main theme of...


The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

Lily Bart must have, perhaps, worked harder than any woman of her time to get a husband. Why? Because, after her family's ruin, she belongs to the working class. She hates poverty, so she desperately (though not too diligently) worked to belong to the higher class - the same case as in....


The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Poor Jay Gatsby... For a man to love a girl from a class higher than himself, is almost an impossibility. You're not alone, old sport, in this struggle. Another hero shares your agony in this book:


All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

Grady Cole is a ranch worker who has the audacity to fall in love with the rancher's daughter. His fate is very similar to that of Jay Gatsby. This is the sixth book, and at this point I have to stop the chain.

Interestingly, Kathy has set a freebie theme for November, picking the last book on October chain to start next month's. See you then!

All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

This was my first Cormac McCarthy. Years ago I have meant to try The Road, but after reading about his poor-punctuation style, I cancelled it. All the Pretty Horses is the first of his Border Trilogy, and since I'm always interested in similar theme, I thought this would be my entrance - and who knows, I might enjoy it!

I was wrong. The theme is great, but it's far from what I've expected. The story is dark, and at times it's even quite bloody, despite of "all the pretty horses".

John Grady Cole is a 17 y.o. boy grew up in a ranch. The ranch has become his life, so when his mother decided to sell it after all the family died, Grady decided to leave the ranch altogether. Together with his friend, Lacey Rawlins, he travelled to Mexico to become a cowboy - a romantic dream of boys their age.

Before crossing Mexican border, they met a skinny and shaggy young boy called Jimmy Blevins, who insisted that he was 16 y.o., and that the (too fine) horse he is riding is really his. Out of compassion, the two boys (Grady in particular; Rawlins distrusted Blevins from the first) let the skinny boy rode with them along the way. Blevins' horse run away one night after a terrible thunderstorm, bringing with it Blevins' vintage pistol (again, they doubted it really belongs to the boy). Blevins convinced Grady and Rawlins to steal the horse back after they found it in a nearby village. It turned into a chaos; Blevins was caught, and the boys ran away.

Eventually they found a big ranch, and were hired as workers. Impressed with Grady's great skill with horses, the owner brought him to stay near the big house. Grady fell in love with the boss' daughter Alejandra. At around this time a group of rangers came to the ranch, caught Grady and Rawlins, and put them into jail, where they had hard times, and almost got killed.

Enough with the summary, now let me bring out my scale to weigh the whole story:

Positive things:

* the cowboy things, both during the journey, but especially at the ranch (the horse trainings are fabulous!)

* bildungsroman - it's marvelous to witness how their journey matured Grady and Rawlins. When you are close with the nature, you'll think a lot about life, God, and all spiritual and philosophical stuffs.

Negative things:

* lack of punctuation - how annoying it is to follow a long dialog without proper punctuation; you'll get lost of who's talking right now, and it lacks the emotion too.

* polysyndetic syntax - okay, I confess I have had no idea that Hemingway's style has a name! Yep, it feels like reading Hemingway, you know... with a lot of "and" serves as the only conjunction on a passage. I guess it's half the reason I'd stopped reading Hemingway! So polysyndetic is something about "conveying a flow and continuity of experience in a passage" using certain conjunctions.

So, what's the final verdict? I guess 3 / 5 is the max. Another writer to be deleted from my list.