The Crowd

All I feel is sweaty bodies.

Sticky wet bodies that have begun to consume their own clothing like trees that grow around foreign objects placed too close to them. A shirt disappears in a cloud of flesh like a pole placed in the nook of two branches.

I could imagine myself becoming one of these expansive bodies. I can feel myself tearing at my own garments from the inside. Lots of tiny cells, lots of little beings that want to get beyond their casing.

The room warps. I stare into eyes and I can't feel myself anymore. I feel outside of my self. I feel like I'm zip zapped from one world into the same world, unable to grasp the size of the room and the content of the conversation.

And then I need to move. I can't simply stand in the midst of these beautiful bodies anymore. I put a hand out in front of me. I grope everyone and everything that gets in the way of my movement. I just need to move forward. I just need to move forward.

I take a step. I feel something crunch under my bare feet. Where did my shoes go?

I take another step and the ground gets softer. I imagine myself being in a Walmart losing my fucking mind. I imagine trampling a clerk who dared to open the front door on Black Friday. I imagine my desperate need for those fucking things. I need them all. I want all your fucking Walmart shit. I want it so badly that I'm willing to forget that I'm crushing you. I want it so badly that I'm willing to eat someone's child.

I take another step and I see light changing color and shape on the skull of a giant. An enormous man that towers above this crowd. Not a single hair on his misshapen head or his slender neck. Only a delicate surface that reminds me that I'm in this room. But this shining skull holds the only hope I have.

I make my way past the giant and the ground feels like flattened paper clips. It feels like thousands of tiny lines that have been arranged for my feet alone. Thank god I'm barefoot in this room. Thank god I lost track of my shoes days ago. Thank god this crowd extends moments into days. Thank god for this fucking time.

I start crawling. I want to slip beneath the layers of people. I feel myself brushing against ankles and calves. Everyone's wonderful legs. I envy their ability to stand. Because I can't do it anymore.

I lie on my stomach and hope to be trampled. I hope to be the death of the American dream.

I spread my limbs and hope to be destroyed by powerful hungry feet. I want them to want something that badly. I hope that people want things so badly that they are willing to break my skull.

I don't ever want to escape this crowd. I want this crowd to be the death of me.

Short Fictiony Prose

Sometimes when I walk into a dark room I just know that there is something else there. I put the key in the door and I feel every little ridge sliding into place. I turn the key because I know I want to find it. I want to find that other thing in the room. I walk into the room and I don’t even turn a light on because I just don’t care anymore. I know what this thing looks like. I know what it feels like. It doesn’t feel soft and it doesn’t look friendly.

When I walk into the room my mind does this thing where it turns into several octopuses. It turns into a blue cloud and it lets all of its dozens of tentacles go in every direction. My mind becomes a blue fog because it wants to feel the space. It wants to know exactly where this thing is and exactly what it wants from me. But this isn’t really about what this thing wants. This is about what I want.

I wanted more than anything else to be eaten by something in the dark. I wanted this thing to walk towards me and breathe all over me. I wanted it to smell me without my knowledge. I want something to devour me. Something to take that kind of initiative and really just kill me. I would probably feel its teeth in my shoulder. I want to feel bones splintering. The sound would probably be one of the most remarkable things. The wet crunching of bone entering flesh that had never been there before. I want these teeth. These large and only felt teeth. I want all of them to come out of the dark. I want the hot breath to be mixed with these teeth. I’ll feel it all. I won’t scream though.

Like I said, I knew there was something waiting for me in the dark. I walked in because I wanted to be the one in the dark. I stood in the room and I didn’t reach for the light switch. I didn’t reach for the umbrella that I knew was next to the door. I didn’t reach for anything at all that resembled a weapon. I wanted to be eaten this time. I wanted to be the one that was pushed into my own life. I wanted to be the one that would be broken in all directions by a dark force.

Every night I came home and I knew this thing was in the dark. I turn on the light and I felt it moving. I felt it come towards me and disappear into something else. It would penetrate my imagination and make me think of it. I would be in the dark and it would be in different shapes and different forms. It never really exists until I imagine it. But at the same time i know that it has a definite form. It exists as a cave beast. It exists as something with spikes on its head. Something with spikes on its head but something that doesn’t even exist.

But on this night I wanted to let my imagination devour me. I wanted to let it rip my flesh and just let me die. Just let me die by these things in my mind. That is all I want. All I want is to be consumed by these things that will never leave my head alone. I want to be consumed by these things that exist within my bones. They will break free from the inside of me and show me the teeth they have always had. Then I’ll finally be able to feel the teeth of these parts of me that I love so much. I’ll be able to set myself free from this body that can’t consume itself. This mind that holds itself back from really thinking what it wants to think.

Monsters in the dark. If I gave them the chance to eat me they would. If I didn’t reach for the light switch every single time they would be able to rip me up. That is definitely what I want. I want to be in the dark with my carnivorous mind.

Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian: Defining Human Nature and Redefining 'Manifest Destiny'

This is a paper I wrote for an English class in December of 2008. During a conversation with a friend today I remembered that this paper centered heavily on war and violence. And with my recent return to thinking about war and military history, it struck me that I should perhaps post this paper.

Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian: Defining Human Nature and Questioning Manifest Destiny

Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian is a bleak representation of American westward expansion during 1849 and 1850. The story centers on a character known only as The Kid, and his experiences with a gang of men known as the Glanton gang. John Joel Glanton, and a man known as Judge Holden are the founders of the gang. They lead the gang as they are contracted to protect settlers from Apache Indians, often receiving a bounty per scalp. The Glanton gang participates in such an extreme amount of violence that it may appear gratuitous. However, McCarthy is merely depicting the reality of the brutality that was inherent in Americas Westward expansion. Matthew Guinn (2000) wrote that McCarthy “Employs the past to establish continuous patterns of human behavior” (94). In fact, McCarthy uses Judge Holden as his primary representation of the true nature of humanity, and the real causes for westward expansion during the 19th century. As an openly atheistic character, the Judge represents the best and the worst aspects of humanity in a world without god. The Judge is incredibly intelligent and curious, speaking many languages and possessing in depth knowledge of many subjects. However, the intellect of the Judge is not used for the betterment of humanity. Rather, the Judge espouses a supreme belief in war, stating, “Before man was, war waited for him. The ultimate trade awaiting its ultimate practitioner. That is the way it was and will be. That way and not some other way” (McCarthy, 1985: 248). Ultimately, the Judges incredible intellect is only used to further actions of a violent or sexual nature. This reveals that man is not an agent of god, expanding westward to fulfill his “manifest destiny.” Rather, it shows that man is essentially a violent and sexual creature, and that American westward expansion was merely a violent, “aimless westward journey” (Bell, 1988: 118).

From very early in the story it is apparent that Judge Holden is an extremely intelligent man who takes an aggressive stance towards religious figures, and the belief in God in general. One of the earliest examples of the Judge’s disdain for religion comes from his interactions with a man named Reverend Green. The reverend had been preaching in the same town for two weeks, regularly drawing a crowd. However, when the Judge arrives he slanders the reverend, claiming “The gentleman standing here before you posing as a minister of the Lord is not only totally illiterate but it also wanted by the law in the states of Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Arkansas” (McCarthy, 1985: 7). The reverend attempts to refute this claim, but is eventually overcome and killed by the crowd. In the next scene, the Judge and the Kid are having a drink at a bar. A patron asks the Judge, “Where did you know him to know all that stuff on him?” and the Judge confesses, “I never laid eyes on the man before today. Never even heard of him” (Ibid. 8). In addition to committing acts of violence against religious figures, the Judge also questions the faith of the ex-priest that accompanies the Glanton Gang.

The ex-priest that accompanies the Glanton Gang is known as Tobin. Turning from divinity late in his life, Tobin joins the Glanton Gang instead. The irony that an ex-priest is directly involved with a group of men that commit such violent atrocities is not lost on Judge Holden. While discussing the nature of man, and his role in a godless world, the Judge asserts that not only is there no god, but that “Moral law is an invention of mankind for the disenfranchisement of the powerful in favor of the weak” (Ibid. 250). And asserting that, “If God meant to interfere in the degeneracy of mankind would he not have done so by now?” (Ibid. 146). Such strong statements naturally caused commotion among the gang, and the judge awaited a rebuttal. When no one dared to refute him, the Judge directly addresses Tobin, saying, “but what says the priest?” (Ibid. 250). To which Tobin responds “I’ll not secondsay you in your notions… Don’t ask it.” The judge merely responds “Ah Priest… What could I ask of you that you’ve not already given?” (Ibid. 251). The fact that Tobin has turned away from his life of divinity to join such a violent gang merely reaffirms the Judges atheistic notions. Having no faith in the existence of God, the judge turns to intellectual study in order to gain a sense of the world.

Having firm conviction in his atheistic notions, the Judge is able to strongly embrace intellectual pursuits, highly valuing the acquisition of knowledge. One of the Judge’s most common intellectual pastimes is to gather different objects and sketch them in a small notebook that he carries with him. Upon finishing his drawing of the object, he destroys it by throwing it into the fire. When asked why he does this, he states, “Whatever in creation exists without my knowledge exists without my permission… These anonymous creatures… may seem little or nothing in the world... Yet the smallest crumb can devour us” (Ibid. 198). The Judge’s study of nature is meant to defy and gain control of it, for “Only nature can enslave man and only when the existence of each last entity is routed out and made to stand naked before him will he be properly suzerain of the earth” (Ibid. 198). Therefore, for the Judge, knowledge of nature must be an essential part of man’s existence in a godless world. He believes that knowledge essentially amounts to ownership, and “In order for it to be mine nothing must be permitted to occur upon it save by my dispensation” (Ibid. 199). Essentially, “You have to kill a thing to know it satisfactorily”(Bowers, 1999:15). Knowledge of mankind as a whole is also an essential feature of the Judge’s philosophy. Other men in the Glanton Gang feel that “No man can acquaint himself with everything on this earth” (McCarthy. 199). To which the Judge responds, “The man who believes that the secrets of the world are forever hidden lives in mystery and fear. Superstition will drag him down… But that man who sets himself the task of singling out the thread of order from the tapestry will by the decision alone have taken charge of the world” (Ibid. 199). In order for man to assert himself in a godless world, he must first understand nature, and second understand himself. For the Judge, this means we must “recognize our violent nature” (Shaw, 2000: 145).

The Judge’s views on the violent nature of humanity are made explicitly clear during his discussion of war. The judge firmly believes that man is a fundamentally violent creature that will always find outlet through war. While discussing war with the men of the gang, the Judge tells them that war is their primary occupation. They tell him that the same is true of himself, and he agrees that was his craft as well “Very much so” (McCarthy, 1985: 248). The Judge states that war is so prevalent because “All other trades are contained in that of war,” and that “It endures because young men love it and old men love it in them” (Ibid. 250). Moreover, he states, “War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War is god” (Ibid. 250, Italics added). The Judge regards war and violence as paramount not only in theory, but also in practice. This is evident in the way that the Judge treats other people throughout the book. On page 164 the Judge takes a young Apache boy from a village they have recently destroyed. He sits “with the Apache boy before the fire and it watched everything with dark berry eyes and some of the men played with it and made it laugh and they gave it jerky and it sat chewing and watching” (Ibid. 164). Initially treating the child well, the Judge soon scalps the child without any provocation. A character named Toadvine is outraged by the Judge’s act of senseless violence against the child and threatens to shoot him. The Judge said, “You either shoot or take that away. Do it now.” The Judge then “smiled and wiped the scalp on the leg of his trousers and rose and turned away” (Ibid. 164). The violent nature of the Judge is also exemplified by his confrontations with the Kid and Tobin towards the end of the book. After the gang has been broken up by an attack by Indians, the Kid and Tobin set out together without the Judge. However, when the Judge finds the pair he vows to kill them for abandoning the gang. While the Kid and Tobin are hiding from the Judge he continues to call out threats on their lives. He is waiting by the nearest well and calls “Perhaps… perhaps you have seen this place in a dream. That you would die here” (Ibid. 300). The Judge is ultimately unable to kill the Kid and Tobin, but had extremely violent intentions towards them. McCarthy uses that Judge as a representation of mankind by having him explicitly state that violence and war is an essential aspect of humanity. However, McCarthy also uses the Judge to show that humans are fundamentally sexual, as well as violent.

Two scenes in particular reveal that the Judge is being used as a representation of the fundamentally sexual nature of man. In his article “The Kid’s Fate, the Judge’s Guilt: Ramifications of Closure in Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian” Patrick Shaw argues that the Judge’s sexual nature can be seen in his “identification with pedophilia” (Shaw, 1997: 108). The best example of the Judge as a pedophile comes from page 116-119. During this scene the gang finds a young naked child in a ruined village. All of the members of the gang choose to all but ignore the child. However, the Judge is the first to express interest in the child, asking who he is, and eventually taking the boy with him when they leave. Shaw feels that “we can only suspect the Judge of having violated and then murdered this particular boy” (Ibid. 109). However, during the final scenes of the book, it becomes even clearer that the Judge’s actions take on a characteristically sexual nature. During the last scene of the book, the Judge sits inside an outhouse, waiting for the Kid to enter the stall. When the Kid enters the bathroom, the Judge “was naked and he rose up smiling and gathered him in his arms against his immense and terrible flesh and shot the wooden barlatch home behind him” (McCarthy, 1985: 333). The “prevailing interpretation of this enigmatic scene is that Holden simply murders the unsuspecting kid”, Shaw, on the other hand, argues that “the kid’s death is not the crucial issue and that the Judge’s essential motivation is to assault the kid sexually” (Shaw, 1997: 103). Once the Kid is dead the Judge leaves the outhouse and returns to the bar. Two men discover the body, and simply say, “good God almighty” (McCarthy, 334). Shaw notes that at no other time in the book is violence regarded as a shocking site, implying that there was something about that kids death that was more perverse or disturbing than mere murder. Based on the sexuality that the judge has previously displayed through pedophilia, and based on the reaction of the men who discover the Kid, it seems apparent that the Judge did not just murder the kid, but raped him in the process.

Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian forces us to “live intimately with rape, genocide, infanticide, disemboweling, torture, and general savageness” (Shaw, 2000: 134), for this is the reality of mankind. McCarthy uses the character Judge Holden as his primary means of showing that man exists in a godless world, and is fundamentally violent and sexual. By showing that man is not divine, and is responsible for his own will, McCarthy “takes God out of America’s history” (Bowers, 1999: 16). By showing that man is not an instrument of God, McCarthy reveals that the notion of manifest destiny is completely false. Rather, American westward expansion was pioneered by groups of men whose goals were fundamentally violent and sexual. Based on the fact that “only the judge kills out of will and conviction and a deep commitment to the cause and the canons of western rationality,”(Shaviro, 1999: 149) the Judge serves as McCarthy’s primary representation of the true nature of westward expansion.

Works Cited

Bell, Vereen M. “The Achievement of Cormac McCarthy.” Baton Rouge, LA, Louisiana State University Press, 1988.

Bowers, James. “Reading Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian.” Boise, ID, Boise State University Western Writers Series, 1999.

Guinn, Matthew. “After Southern Modernism: Fiction of the Contemporary South.” Jackson, MI, University Press of Mississippi, 2000.

McCarthy, Cormac. “Blood Meridian or The Evening Redness in the West.” New York, Random House, 1985.

Shaviro, Steven. “The Very Life of the Darkness: A Reading of Blood Meridian.” In Perspectives on Cormac McCarthy, Edited by Edwin T, Arnold and Dianne C. Luce, 145-158. Jackson, MI, University Press of Mississippi, 1999.

Shaw, Patrick W. “The Kid's Fate, the Judge's Guilt: Ramifications of Closure in Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian.” Southern Literary Journal, 1997 Fall; 30: 102 – 119.

Shaw, Patrick W. “The Modern American Novel of Violence.” New York, Whitston Publishing Company, 2000.

Short Posts Short Posts Short Posts and My Aversion to Fiction

Last night when I was lying in bed I am almost certain I had an idea for a post. I think I remember that it would have been a short post, but a thoughtful post. It would be a self-contained post, but at the same time would be contributing to the larger posts that I have in the works (on the back burner and in the oven).

I don't remember precisely what the post was to be about. I think it was on W.G. Sebald's Vertigo. I finished it last night in bed so that makes sense. But how does Sebald relate to the work I am interested in doing in general?

Eh, I don't know. Narrative and experience. At the very least it is vaguely connected to that.

David Shields really liked Sebald. I think he read The Emigrants and really like it. Ryan Gleason also read that book, I know.

I find Sebald extremely frustrating though.

Ah, and now I remember what this said short post was to be about: how I have been averse to reading fiction since I graduated college in December.

I think this is the fourth novel I have read since I graduated I think. I read Kobo Abe's The Ark Sakura in December/January, I read Philip Roth's The Counterlife in January, then Haruki Murakami's Sputnik Sweetheart in March, and finally Vertigo in May/June.

I have been reading mostly nonfiction. I think that I am taking nonfiction reading pretty seriously these days. I try to read closely, and I am trying to write about most things I read.

Abe disappointed me, but I think I'll read more by him. Roth was surprisingly good, I really like it, but didn't really care as much for the ending. Murakami I have read before, but thought Sputnik Sweetheart was great, probably my favorite thing I have read by him.

But Sebald is different from these other authors. Such long and complex sentences. Most of the time I end up spacing out and not really understanding a lot of it. But sometimes I have rare moments where I follow a whole sentence and it is usually pretty wild or great. He is an author that you probably have to pay attention to. Unfortunately, these days I have been thinking of fiction as a break from more serious nonfiction reading. So i just lazy read it, but I should maybe start paying attention to fiction more. But I would rather pay attention to nonfiction.

I dunno, its tough. Nonfiction seems the thing right now.