Blood Meridian

Wow. Blood Meridian is a literary masterpiece, perhaps THE great American novel. Highly recommend if you're looking for a book that will pull you in and not let you look away.

If you're sane, it will make you squirm and feel uncomfortable at times, that's for sure. But it's so worth it. I just finished reading it and am trying to decide if I want to read something new on my list or read this again. I think I'll let it digest and come back for a re-read in a couple months...it's so good.

You can open this book to any paragraph and read something that is amazing, or beautiful, or deep, or all 3; you can re-read and chew on it for a while, for example:

“Whatever in creation exists without my knowledge, exists without my consent”

Another:

“The universe is no narrow thing and the order within it is not constrained by any latitude in its conception to repeat what exists in one part in any other part. Even in this world more things exist without our knowledge than with it and the order in creation which you see is that which you have put there, like a string in a maze, so that you shall not lose your way. For existence has its own order and that no man's mind can compass, that mind itself being but a fact among others.”

(Those first 2 quotes are said by the same character)

One more:

“It was raining again and they rode slouched under slickers hacked from greasy half-cured hides and so cowled in these primitive skins before the gray and driving rain they looked like wardens of some dim sect sent forth to proselytize among the very beasts of the land.”

If you haven't read this book, you need to.

Absolutely incredible. A novel that I think is likely more potent now, in an age where depictions of violence are more common place than ever before, than it was when it first came out. To me that's one interesting part of reading about reactions to the book when it first came out up until the early 2000s even, the general feeling that it's too violent. If anyone has kept up with television in the past 10 years (Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad), I'd say they could handle Blood Meridian. There are still scenes in the book that will make you shudder, which I think is a bigger testament to this being written in 85 and McCarthy's foreknowledge of the continued evolution of America's obsession with brutality.
The book is of course so much more than the violence McCarthy depicts. To me it's the most brutally realistic vision of the romanticized West I've ever encountered. There are no heroes, moral codes belong to each man's interpretation of his place in the universe, it is not a land of inviting sunsets and enchanting adventure but brimstone and chaos.
And yet amid this intense realism McCarthy blends in the fantastic, the nephilim Judge Holden, pulsating depictions of the desert and seemingly surreal moments the kid experiences. Characters that feel as though they're summations of western archetypes (the protagonist as the epitome of the wanderer without a name, the expriest now ironically turned cutthroat, the crazed bandit leader), this is the balancing act McCarthy walks, he sets before us these concepts or archetypes we've become familiar with in the western canon and subverts them by making them abundantly realistic. These assumptions of character we take as larger than life are presented as no more than gravely flawed and tormented human beings.
This makes for perhaps the most engaging literary experience I've ever had, I've never felt a book so effortlessly flow off the page before yet McCarthy has a rhythm, diction, syntax and verve that makes this addictively entertaining from the first chapter to the epilogue.

The greatest novels in the English language are not only excellent narratives; they enrich the language, show its beauty, invent and make us realize how language is not a dead entity, instead very much alive. They're exhilarating, they energize, they inspire. Melville's Moby-Dick: or, the Whale (1851) certainly fits the bill. So does Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness In the West (1985), Cormac McCarthy's epic among his epics.

The best books aggrandize the act of reading itself. The joy of reading enthralling literature is immense. Only a handful have replicated my feelings for Blood Meridian; it's impossible to stop thinking about it, either between reads or after finishing. Its atmosphere and language are completely engrossing. Judge Holden, just like his predecessor proper, Captain Ahab, is beyond explication, since he's supposed to be superhumanly omnipresent, omniscient. He remains an enigma from beginning to end, and for this reason he's so mysteriously transcending. He's evil just as Iago is, yet unlike Iago, we never learn to understand him too much, not even at his most passionate, as evasion is how he converses with us. He breathes life into the narrative and we can't get enough of him.

McCarthy's prose is poetic, visual. The first line of the book emphasizes this well, being one of the most beautiful openings to any book I know of: “See the child. He is pale and thin, he wears a thin and ragged linen shirt. He stokes the scullery fire. Outside lie dark turned fields with rags of snow and darker woods beyond that harbor yet a few last wolves.” It reads like a poem. But my favorite part, in fact the image that has become the emblem of McCarthy for me can be found from Chapter XV:

It was a lone tree burning on the desert. A heraldic tree that the passing storm had left afire. The solitary pilgrim drawn up before it had traveled far to be here and he knelt in the hot sand and held out while all about in that circle attended companies of lesser auxiliaries routed forth into the ordinate day, small owls that crouched silently and stood from foot to foot and tarantulas and solpugas and vinegarroons and the vicious mygale spiders and beaded lizards with mouths black as a chowdog's, deadly to man, and the little desert basilisks that jet blood from their eyes and the small sandvipers like seemly gods, silent and the same, in Jeda, in Babylon.

This is my second time experiencing this story, and I have to say that I STRONGLY recommend the audio version of this book over a physical copy any day of the week. After reading other reviews for Blood Meridian, I completely understand why people could easily pick it up, spend ten minutes reading the first few pages, and put it down forever.

Cormac McCarthy's descriptions of this world are gorgeous, but can so easily wear you down with long-winded sections until you forget that you're supposed to be reading a scene in a book. The story is dramatic and symbolic, but so insanely violent and nihilistic that you're scared to read more. Speaking of the story, the biggest complaint that I've seen is that the plot is really hard to follow. And I completely agree when I'm trying to read the physical copy.

On my second time through, though, I will never regret my time reading this book. I listened to the narration by Richard Poe, and have never been able to picture a story as vividly as this version. Shoutout to Richard Poe, his voice is awesome.

Obviously, not a book for everyone. It's absolutely wild how disturbing it is, and how casually McCarthy includes those details in the same sentence as describing something as minor as the dirt on their boots. Also, there are a ton of slurs. Very jarring. The Judge (one of the greatest antagonists in fiction honestly) is the scariest character I've ever experienced.

I think in order to enjoy the story, you kind of have to know what you're getting into. And since I did, I'm giving it 4/5 stars. Wild story. Left me feeling very gross, but I was fascinated with the heights of violence that this book reaches.

I can recognise the greatness but I didn't enjoy it. It was a slow, extremely painful read.

The author's legendary aversion to commas imposes a certain tempo, and most sentences require at least two run-throughs before the syntax falls together correctly.

At the same time though, many of those sentences were so wonderful that I re-read them over and over; some of them I must have read dozens of times. This has never happened to me before on a scale quite like this.

There are so many images in Blood Meridian that are absolutely horrific and that induce compassion fatigue and nightmares and that deter from picking up the book again for days. I almost gave it up after the snakebitten horse, and that was nothing compared to what was coming.

I don't know if I can recommend this to anyone; it's hard to handle all this lyrical beauty when it wraps so much extreme violence.

One to come back to when I'm older, wiser and more cynical.

Blood Meridian was my second attempt at reading McCarthy. I've enjoyed No Country for Old Men, with a slight preference in the movie adaptation's favor, but found the prose and writing style of the book to be an interesting take on how a book could be written: short, minimalist prose that heightens the tension in a grim, nihilistic world. My wish was granted - only it succeed so well that I found myself never wanting to read another one of his books.

It is so overly serious and cynical to the point it is nigh parody, making everything grim and gloomy that everything about it just becomes nullifying to read even the most gruesome of parts. It is almost as if the author is trying to hard to make a point about the “truth” of the genre, but completely swings too far to a side that it becomes a laughable attempt. There was not a single character that had an ounce of humanity which makes it hard to care about anything that's going on. The judge was the only interesting character, but that comes at the expense of every other character who does not nearly get enough attention - which includes the protagonist himself.

It is entirely possible to create a narrative that deconstructs the western by showing everyone at their absolute worst, but it substitutes critiquing the genre with nuance instead with overt descriptions of violence that it becomes overbearing and numbing. It definitely is not a “realistic” narrative McCarthy creates, but it also is not a very convincing one either.

The writing style is overtly dry and lends itself to incredibly bad pacing issues. So much of this book was describing scenery, making the plot move at such a glacial pace. You can sense that the world is being described as bleak and uncaring, but it comes at the cost of the narrative. There is not much of a balance between the setting and the story.

The way the author withholds information is so disorienting at times that it makes it hard to follow, and especially suffers during the action sequences. Much of this book is declarative statements strung together to act as a sense of urgency, but it just doesn't work for a book this long. Much of it seems structure-less, almost repetitive with the events that take place. Perhaps it is to comment on the neverending cycle of violence, but it also does not make for an engaging story.

This marks the longest I have ever went in a book before stopping completely - with only 75 pages left. Apparently the ending is good, but I just don't care enough to continue.

Even then, I still have faith in the author. If this is his magnum opus, this is more of a misstep that I just don't enjoy. The brilliance of No Country for Old Men keeps me hopeful to read another one of his works.

Every time I start reading a page of this book I wish I was reading something else. The run on sentences, repetition, and lack of punctuation leave me caring little as to what happens in the rest of the book. I am afraid I will have to shelf this book until the time comes that I want to punish myself.

A tough read!

The language is slow, the story is gruesome and filled with violence and the story is without true excitement. With all that being said, it was a very interesting read!

It's well written, however the linguistic choices lend it a very slow pace and I was never truly ‘excited' or ‘glued to my seat' waiting for another thrill.

With all that being said, it's a good book with an interesting story to tell about mans abilities, desires and actions when there is no moral or ethical compass to guide them, except their own greed and lust.

I lack the necessary tools to explain to you why me, someone who only read YA his whole life and then somewhere halfway through being 22 years old decided to pickup seriously reading again, thinks that this might be in the top ten pieces of writing ever written, so what I will do instead is just share some things I wanted to disorderly throw into this obligatory review.
There were multiple times during reading before I ended up getting used to mcarthys style (don't make this your first book of his please lol) where I would reread a page five or six times trying to make sense of the insanely dense prose only to realize what I'm reading is just the thirtieth time our characters are riding horses through the desert, but it's written in like the most beautiful way you've ever seen

5/10
The Judge truly dominates Blood Meridian, casting an intimidating shadow that solidifies his standing as one of the most vile and repulsive villains in literature. However, despite his strong presence, the book falls short in delivering a satisfying experience. The relentless and seemingly endless march through the desert, accompanied by RELENTLESS live-leak level gore, really drained me. The constant barrage of never ending nihilism, climaxing in a confusing and unsatisfying conclusion, left a bitter taste in my mouth, leaving many parts of the story feeling disjointed and incomprehensible.

That being said, there were moments of hope amidst the chaos. The Kid's occasional acts of heroism and the relationships he forms along his journey offer glimpses of humanity in an otherwise bleak story. And, of course, the Judge's psychopathic and unhinged behavior provides moments of humor and tension that manage to captivate despite the book's shortcomings. But who knows, I'll probably watch some youtubers video essay and change my mind tomorrow.

I will say this: if nothing else, the ending will stick with me for the rest of my life.

7

The writing takes some getting used to as its quite a difficult read, but once you get used to it, it hooks you right the fuck in and its so incredibly good at drawing you in to the atmosphere of the book. Dialogue is hilarious, realistic and terrifyingly well written. Even though I might never fully understand all the intricacies of the book, I'm okay with that because I've shared the experience with the characters - if you know you know.

The world is unrelenting. The people are horrible. The violence is brutal. The kind are unrewarded. An incredibly important book. Must read.

Meridiano di sangue, in originale “Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West” è un romanzo dello scrittore statunitense Cormac McCarthy pubblicato nel 1985, e tradotto in Italia per Einaudi nel 1997. È il quinto romanzo di McCarthy ed è considerato il suo capolavoro. Inoltre, è considerato univocamente uno dei romanzi più violenti e crudi che sono mai stati scritti nel campo della narrativa escludendo i generi fantasy/horror. Il finale è molto ambiguo.

La trama del romanzo racconta la storia di un adolescente in fuga chiamato “Il ragazzo” e per i contenuti dell'opera lo scrittore si è basato sul libro di memorie “My confession” di Samuel Chamberlain, membro della Banda Glanton; siamo nell'anno 1833 nel Tennessee e durante una pioggia di stelle cadenti una donna muore e un bambino nasce e nessuno pronuncerà mai il nome di quel bambino, che per tutto il romanzo sarà the kid. Giovanissimo il ragazzo lascia la casa e il padre alcolizzato per diventare un vagabondo errante tra i nuovi confini americani dopo la guerra con il Messico terminata nel 1848. Il protagonista si ritroverà assoldato nelle fila di una banda che su commissione dei governatori messicani uccide gli indiani portandone poi gli scalpi agli stessi governatori che li pagano a seconda delle teste che porteranno indietro.
Il libro è straripante di violenza gratuita inaudita, terribile e brutale, con sangue ed interiora e pezzi di corpi umani a volontà, come poi è stata la realtà dei fatti: un massacro continuo. Un romanzo potente, scritto in maniera eccelsa, sebbene bisogna abituarsi alla scrittura senza punteggiatura nei dialoghi (che è una caratteristica dell'autore), che ti porta nella polvere del deserto, a sentire l'odore del sangue, al cospetto di una natura immensa tinteggiata in maniera perfetta dalle descrizioni di McCarthy che è un vero maestro nel portare l lettore a vivere un'esperienza quanto mai simile alla realtà. Riesce a rendere a pieno la magnificenza del west americano.

Quello che più colpisce è la freddezza e l'indifferenza totale con cui vengono perpetrate le più abominevoli crudeltà: i personaggi vivono come se tutto ciò che compiono o che subiscono sia una componente ovvia e naturale della loro vita infatti non vengono riportare le emozioni o le riflessioni del “ragazzo” che vive gli eventi in cui viene trascinato come se fosse predestinato a farlo.
La lettura è impegnativa, lenta e faticosa, ed esige la massima attenzione. Tutto ciò costa parecchio perché per esempio io, esaltato letteralmente dai primi capitoli e dalla bellezza della prosa, arrivato a metà romanzo mi sono accorto che ero stanco, svuotato, con il cervello che non riusciva a fissare nella mente quello che leggeva, perso anche io nel deserto come i personaggi crudeli di cui leggevo e presto mi sono trovato impantanato e solo alla fine il libro ha cominciato a scorrere più velocemente ai miei occhi. La sovraesposizione alla sporcizia, all'indigenza e alla crudeltà che trasuda dalle pagine forse merita pause di digestione molto lunghe, cosa che io non ho voluto concedermi, rovinandomi forse la lettura.

Meridiano di sangue dunque più che una lettura è un interminabile pellegrinaggio, una cavalcata sanguinaria e infernale senza una meta, dove si uccide come si respira, dove nulla importa, dove l'abominio è l'ordine naturale delle cose e dove tutti danzano in maniera macabra senza mai fermarsi.

Sono molto contrastato sul voto finale, non riesco a dare più di tre stelle e credo che se ne avessi la possibilità scenderei a due e mezzo, perché sebbene mi rendo conto di aver letto un capolavoro, soprattutto per la descrizione del west che è semplicemente da lasciare a bocca aperta e per i personaggi incredibili, mi sono trovato troppe volte smarrito... come se mi fossi trovato a ballare così forte da rimanerne stordito ed essermi poi ritrovato a sedere per terra con la testa che gira senza sapere il perché.