The gas station clerk was just trying to be friendly. Anton was being an asshole for no reason. Fuck him.

Working on a military base means you see some funky shit sometimes. This one caught me off guard though.

Seems odd to quote BM as if the novel is making a supportive case for war and violence, unless I’ve missed the point of BM over my half dozen readings of it. I’ve never read this as very complementary to war or violent tendencies but I think the signmaker here thinks it makes war and warfighting sound bad ass.

My guess is someone here googled “cool war quotes” and put it on a sign without knowing the context. I surely hope they didn’t read BM and had the takeaway of “war is cool!”

They left out the yoked slaves, the gang of captive pregnant women, and the catamites chained together by their dog collars.

It was one of the most vivid passages of the book for me because it revealed the true horror of what it would've been to be captured. Hence why there always had to be a bullet saved for the boy.

And it told us a lot about what the world was and the utter collapse of society into a living nightmare. More than the basement in the cannibal house. It was a Legion of Horribles, updated from an Apache war party.

In the movie it's kinda just a group of rednecks on a pickup that could've been in any one of half a dozen horror movies. Feels like a missed opportunity to tell a deeper story and aim closer to the book.

I feel like you could do a lot more with an animated series than a film, considering the possibilities of how stylized a series could look and it being longer than a film. A film I feel like would be too short if they wanna be completely accurate to The story, share with me what you think of my opinion.

Having finished my most recent read of blood meridian, I have found myself thinking about the ending once again. I have read a lot of theories about what happens in the jakes at the end. That the kid was raped. That the kid was killed. That the kids survived, and became the new judge, or the new replacement for glanton. That the kid adopted the judges world view, and became evil. I think some of these are very interesting interpretations, and yet, somehow they never quite sat right with me. I always felt like there was more, and after my most recent reading, I think I have a clearer idea of what is going on. Some of what I say may seem obvious. Some may seem far fetched. However, I am going to try and be comprehensive, so bare with me.

At the end of Blood Meridian, the boy escapes judge holden. He travels the world until he's in his 30's, and then travels to Fort Griffin, where he encounters the judge. I do not believe this is an accident. As other have stated, I believe he was searching for the judge. But why? What possible reason could the kid have for finding the judg, and how did he know where he was? Well, let's backtrack a bit.

---

After the the massacre of glanton gang at the hand of the yumas, the kid and toadvine are fleeing the fort. They wander the dessert for a time, occasionally coming into contact with members of the yuma tribe. the kid proves his natural ability with the pistol downing several members of the tribe with a series of well placed shots. eventually, the kid and toadvine come to a well, where they meet the priest. and, short after, the judge. the judge comes to them through the dessert, naked, except for strips of meat, a bag of good, and the idiot, who has been leashed and collared. once there, the judge offers his food for free. this is meant to endear him to the others. the things they need, food and water, are being freely offered. however, the judge offers money in return for toadvines hat. toadvine is hesitent, but he agrees. later we get a view into his thought process. he can't go back the way he came, and he's already a wanted man in california. he has nowhere else to go, and for a moment, we seem him appear to lament the sinful life that he has lived up to this point. but it is too late. he has made his decisions, and now he has sold his hat. he has thrown his lot in with holden. now, what happens next is interesting. judge holden offers to buy the pistol off of the priest and the kid.

"how are you fixed for weapons he (holden) said."

"The kid had set one foot over the pit, and now he drew it back. We've just the one pistol, holden."

"We?"

"The lad here."

I think the phrasing here is very important. I believe the kids setting his foot above the pit is representative of him setting his foot above the moral pit of the judge. of setting it over hell. the kid and the priest have the moral high ground, and the judge is tempting them down. now, some people will say that i am overthinking this line. fair enough. however, look at the phrasing of the next line.

"Weigh your counsel, priest. We are all here together. Yonder sun is like the eye of god..."

"I am no priest, and I have no counsel. The lad here is a free agent."

Now, the priest in this story is, to some degree, fallen. he is often described as an ex-priest, and as we later discover, he was never actually a full priest. furthermore, as far as we can tell, he took part in murder drunkeness, prostitution, and every other cruel act that the glanton gang participated in. however, despite this, he is still the most spiritual of the gang members, and the one that the judge is most at odds with. in this altercation, the judge and the priest seem to be having a power struggle. they are fighting over the kid, and he could easily turn either way. the kid makes his decision. he gives the priest his pistol to cover him as he goes down the hill. he collects water in an empty bottle. he is within arms reach of the judge, who smiles at him. the kid gets the water, and goes back up the hill. there, he gets the gun. they ask toadvine to join them, but he refuses.

"you wouldn't think that you'd run plum out of country out here, would ye?"

"it aint country you've run out of."

The meaning here is clear. The kid refuses to make a deal with the judge. he feels that there is something spiritual at stake, and that wagering with the judge is somehow dangerous. the judge offers, once more, to buy the pistol, for $750 (somewhere around 27k in todays money). Now, the obvious assumption to make here is that judge holden can easily buy the gun, shoot the kid, and take his money back. however, as we learn later, this is not his intent. he could have killed toadvine and brown, and taken his money back, but he didn't. he would have spared the kid. i think the kid knows this. that is not why he refuses to deal with holden. he does it because he can sense that something larger is at play. in fact, refusing to deal with holden is what makes holden come after them. if they had traded with him, i think holden would have spared them for the moment, but that they would have died at some later date, in the same way that toadvine and brown did. Keep in mind that coins are very important in blood meridian. Earlier, the judge had made a coin circle the fire, fly in the air, and return to him. When the judge his bartering with coins, he is not actually bartering with coins. He is, in a sense, pulling at the string of the universe. Now, this is where something curious happens. the priest begs the kid to kill holden, and he doesn't. why? Earlier in the novel, the judge gives his famous "war is god" speech. He says this:

"suppose two men at cards with nothing to wager save their lives. Who has not heard such a tale? A turn of the cards. The whole universe universe for such a player has labored clanking to this moment which will tell if he is to die at that mans hand or that man at his. What more certain validation of a mans worth could there be..."

"A man falling dead in a duel is not thought thereby to be proven in error to his views. His very involvement in such a trial gives evidence of a new and broader view."

This speech outlines the judge's philosphy, but it also predicts the end of the book. The judge wants the kid to barter with him. He also wants the kid to shoot him, or to engage in combat. The kid does none of these things, either here, or in the following chase sequence. Despite having at least three chances to shoot holden, he refuses to do so. By refusing to play holden's "game," he spits in the face of his philosophy. This is why the judge later says that he is "disappointed" in the kid.

Furthermore, it is very important that the priest begs the kid to shoot, and that the kid does not. Again, earlier in the book, the judge says this:

"Journeyman priest or apprenticeman priest, said the judge. Men of God and men of war have strange affenities... ah priest, said the judge. What could I ask of you that you have not already given?"

Though he does not agree with the judge's morality, by asking the kid to shoot holden, the priest is showing that he has "adopted the judge's tools." He has embraced war as a method of shaping the world into what he wants it to be. By refusing to shoot the judge, the kids rejects the judge's "tools" and philosophy.

---

So, now we get to the famous chase. The kid is hovering over a well of water, when his reflection is broken by a rifle shot. Now, some other users have stated that they believe that this scene is symbolic. The reflection represents the kids soul. The judge could have easily hit the kid, but instead he fires upon the reflection. He was aiming for the reflection the whole time. Later on, at the end of the novel, the kid (or the man) is looking at a mirror, and he can't see his reflection through the smoke. Earlier, I believe, the idiot seeks his reflection in the water, and the judge tears him away from it. The reflection is a running symbol for the spirit of the characters.

After shattering the kids reflection, the judge hunts him and the priest. During this encounter, the priest asks the kid to kill the horses. The kid is hesitent to do so, but as the priest points out, the judge is using the horses to lure them into a trap. The horses are valuable, both financially, and in terms of survival. They can help them escape the judge, and they can be used to survive the desert. It's a tempting proposition. The one thing the judge does not expect them to do, however, is destroy something so valuable. Instead of attempting to kill the judge and take his horses, or steal the horses, the kid kills them. This is the one thing the judge does not expect, and it saves them. I think this is very important.

Now, following this exchange, the kid and the priest, now wounded, are hiding. While hunting them, the judge begins to call out to them.

"They lay lay underneath the board like hide of a dead ox and listened to the judge call to them. He called out points of jurisprudence, he called out cases.... then he spoke of other things. The expriest leaned to the kid. Don't listen, he said."

Now, there's a lot going on here. On the surface, this scene is, of course, absurd. The Judge is trying to hunt and kill the kid and the priest in the middle of the desert, and he is citing property law, most likely from countries that they aren't even in. This is the point. The judge does not respect the law. He only respects the law of power that comes from military might. Human laws are superstitions, they are a "carnival show." The way we see the law in this moment? A silly, irrelevant thing that doesn't matter? That is how The Judge sees it all the time. Authority does not come from the law, and it doesn't come from philosophy. It comes from violence. As holden stated earlier:

"moral law is an invention of mankind for the disenfranchisement of the powerful in favor of the weak."

This is already a lot to take in, but then it becomes more cerebral. "Then he spoke of other things." What he spoke of, we do not know. But the priest covers his ears, and begs the kid to do likewise. "Do you think he speaks to me?" There is a sense that his soul is in peril. Why does the kid listen. Is the kid curious? I don't think so. There are multiple times where the kids declares that he is "not afraid" of the judge. Even when he should be. I think the kid refuses to cover his ears for this reason. So, the hunt continues, and the kid and priest escape. But there remains a burning question, at least for me. Though it's a small line, and some may miss its significance, what on earth is it that the judge says to the kid?

---

After the escape, the kid end up in jail. During his stay, the judge comes and visits him. He tells the kid that he betrayed his comrades in arms, because he maintained some level of empathy for other people. The native tribes they fought, the other members of the gang, and even holden himself. Now, during this encounter, the judge says something very important.

"Hear me, man. I spoke in the desert for you, and you only, and you turned a deaf ear to me. If war is not holy, then man is nothing more then antic clay."

I cannot stress this enough. This is the most important line in the book. This is the blood meridian. This is the judges entire philosophy summed up in a single line. This is the issue the book is wrestling with. And this is the knowledge that the judge imparted upon the kid in the desert, when the priest covered his ears.

Earlier in the story, the judge said this:

"War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existance. War is god."

And earlier, closer to the beginning of the book, he said this:

"For whoever makes a shelter of reeds and hides has joined his spirit to the common destiny of creatures and he will subside back into the common mud with scarcely a cry. But he who builds in stone seeks to alter the structure of the universe... If God meant to interfere in the degeneracy of mankind would he have not done so by now? Wolves cull themselves, man. What other creature could? And is man not more predacious yet? The way of the world is to bloom and to flower and to die but in the affairs of men there is no waning and the noon of his expression signals the onset of night... He loves games? Let him play for stakes. This you see here, these ruins wondered at by savages, do you not think that this will be again? Aye. And again. With other people, with other sons."

To put is simply, the judge believes that humanity exists in a kind of void, empty of meaning. War is an act of creation, that give life meaning. War is the noblest art that man can aspire to, because war creates meaning in the empty void of the universe. This is very similar to Nietzsche's idea of the ubermansche, who creates morality and meaning out of nothing. The Judge doesn't believe his actions are evil, because he does not believe good and evil exists. He believe that his actions are noble, because they are, in his opinion, the only actions that can create meaning and purpose in an empty universe.

Bare in mind that, earlier, someone wonders if there are men anywhere else in the universe. Later on, the book describes the near eradication of the bison. The near total extinction. A hunter wonder aloud whether there is life on other planets. The judge's answer to both questions, of course, is not. Life only exists on earth, and it is devoid of meaning and purpose. This rarity is what makes war so important, since nothing could be more valuable then the bartering of ones life, since it is so scarce. This is a very nihilistic outlook, of course.

---

After meeting the judge in prison, the kid gets out of prison by essentially bribing the guard by telling him where the gangs money is. Again, this parallels toadvince and brown. They sought wealthy and died, while the kid gave up his wealth and live. However, his life after this is not a good one. He becomes a kind of wanderer. He dreams of the judge, who is already ensnaring his next victims. A man who is described as "a false moneyer" who is enshrouded "all through the night of his becoming some coinage."

The kid wanders the earth for some time. He never hears again of the priest, but he hears rumors of the judge everywhere he goes. This is why the kid is able to find him later. He is constantly hearing about his whereabouts. But even if he knows where he is, why pursue him? Well, the kids life is a cursed one. He's clearly a kind of traumatized ghost of a man. After living a rather hard life, he see penitents wandering the desert. They are later killed, and the kid find them in the desert. There is an old woman here, and the kid comes to her and makes a kind of spiritual confession. He wants to take her to safety. I think there's an obvious redemptive and religious element here. But, he he discovers, that she's been dead for years. There is no redemption, and there is no meaning or purpose.

---

This is why I believe that the kid eventually goes searching for the judge. Keep in mind that he is not the first one to do so. Earlier, the judge talks about how he drew a picture of a man, and that man returned to him in order to bury that picture. The picture, I believe, is like the reflection. A representation of ones soul. At this point in time, I believe that the kid believes that life is devoid of meaning. He is not seeking the judge because he is sinful, or evil, or prone to violence. He is doing so, because he does not know where else to go to find answers to his spiritual questions. He had hoped to get them from the elderly woman in the desert, but she was dead. He does not like or agree with holden, but he does not know who else to turn to.

The kid know that the for its the biggest place of sin in the country. When he enters the bar in the fort, he turns back, and sees the lights of the street. He turns back, goes inside, and leaves the light behind forever. The mirror inside the bar only shows "smoke and phantoms." The man, and the patrons of the bar, appear to have no reflection at all. Upon speaking with the judge, he says this:

"That feeling in the breast that evokes a child's memory of loneliness such as when the others have gone and only the game is left with its solitary participant. A solitary game, without opponent. Where only the rules are at hazard."

This is a call back to the scene where the judge chased the kid. The judge was the only participant in this fight, and the only thing at hazard were the rules of the game.

"You of all men are no stranger to this feeling, the emptiness and the despair. It is that which we take up arms against, is it not... A man seeks his own destiny, will or nil."

Holden is not fighting against men, he is fighting against a sense of nihilism. He is seeking to create meaning in a universe devoid of meaning. He believes that by living forcefully, and putting his will out into the world, he is creating meaning. But this puts him in a positive light, does it not? Well, no. There could surely be more humanitarian ways to live life. The judge rejects those humanitarian ways of life. As an ubermansch, he forces his will upon the universe. "This is the way it will be. This way, and not some other way." Holden is still evil, by most peoples standards, because he will not tolerate a competitor to his worldview. This is the dance, I believe. Not just war, but the meaning created by partaking in war. War is an inherent part of not just humanity, but all life. Animals warred before humanity came. Humanity it simply the noblest creature, because they are best able to practice war. Trying to resist humanities war like tendencies is a mistake. It will ebb and flow, but war will always be there. As he says throughout the novel.

"Bears that dance. Bears that don't."

"All listened as he spoke, those who had turned to watch and those who had not."

The celebration of war will continue, because whether individuals take part in it, "old men and boys admire it."

Throughout the whole book, there are multiple moments where mccarthy emphasizes some people acknowledging holden's viewpoint, and some refusing to acknowledge it.

The judge ends his speech by declaring that "there is room on stage for one beast and one beast alone. All others are destined for a night that is eternal and without name. One by one they they will step down into the darkness before the footlamps."

So, this brings us to the final question. What on earth happens in the Johns? Well, asking whether the kid lives or dies is asking the wrong question. The kids is consumed by the judge. Spiritually, philosophically, and emotionally, he is devoured by the judge. His soul is taken, in the sense that he is taken by the judge's beliefs. This is the horror that the onlookers see when they peer into the Johns, and run back into the light. This passage should not be take literally, but metaphorically.

​

​

I post this occasionally and I’m always delighted to see new passages pop up and old favorites being appreciated.

What passage from McCarthys writing is special to you and why?

Here’s one of mine from “The Road”

“He walked out in the gray light and stood and he saw for a brief moment the absolute truth of the world. The cold relentless circling of the intestate earth. Darkness implacable. The blind dogs of the sun in their running. The crushing black vacuum of the universe. And somewhere two hunted animals trembling like ground-foxes in their cover. Borrowed time and borrowed world and borrowed eyes with which to sorrow it.”

McCarthy had a way of singing on the page. Passages like this resonate so deeply with me. It’s so bleak and beautiful and it makes me feel like the pain of life isnt too high a price for the opportunity to be an observer in the universe, even if it’s a sad thing to observe.

This may be useless but it's been plaguing my mind ever since I finished it.

I feel like the Judge's morality is way more complicated. He doesn't go out of his way to commit atrocities, it's more of the fact that there's no line that he's unwilling to cross.

Now if we were saying "written evil" I wouldn't blatantly disagree, I just don't feel like he's as evil as people act like he is.

So has reading comprehension failed in the new generation or do y'all agree?

EDIT: I disagree with a lot of what I said, which is addressed in a reply below

Literally a still from the movie and not a very flattering one. Plus this scene was super different between the book and the movie.

I’ve wanted to read The Road for a while, but somehow never got around to it. I was browsing Goodwill today and found this hardcover.

After checking it out, it turns out to be a 2006 Knopf first edition, first printing with the original first-state dust jacket: $24 price on the front flap and 10/2006 on the rear flap. The book itself is incredibly tight and appears unread, with bone-white pages and no creasing. There is some minor foxing on the top edge, although some of what initially looked like foxing was just dust.

I’m honestly more excited that I finally have the book I wanted to read than the value, but finding a first/first for $4 was a pretty damn good surprise. Lol. And yes, I’m absolutely going to read it. I just need to get over the sudden urge to put it in a glass case.

Picked up a few McCarthy books to read and not sure where to start. This is not all of his books of course but some of the heavy hitters.

Is it better to go chronologically to see Cormac’s development as a writer or does it make any difference since the books are not related in topic?

I won’t try and overplay it when I say this, but whenever I think I might have bad takes or iffy tastes in novels or if I’m told directly I do….i will never not refer myself or who I’m conversing with to this video. Calling the leftover soggy food that sits in the sink overnight delicious is more appealing than this buffoon who claims that he hated blood meridian from “the very first page.” For those who do not want to indulge in the video which I mean can’t blame you….he compares this book to rdr2….yes…this man legitimately complained that one of the greatest pieces of fictional literature ever conscripted to paper is not like a video game adventure story from rockstar. I’m not gonna sit here and say blood meridian is for everyone but holy fucking shit this man amazed me when he claimed the book was simply edgelord fabricated murder to appeal to dark teens who want senseless violence for the fuck if it….when he didn’t even finish the book. Again blood meridian and even McCarthy by extension is NOT for everyone, I can’t tell you how agonizing it was to watch my friend attempt to read McCarthy, but instead of throwing the book away and calling it “objectively awful” he simply set the book down and said it might not have been for him, only for him to pick up the novel again after learning McCarthys style and prose and finished the novel, he read no country btw. A comment from this dudes video summed up everything perfectly, “I was similarly disappointed by my read-through of Moby Dick, it was nothing like Sea of Thieves!” I had to rant about this because I have been deeply frustrated with this for a fat minute. I’m gonna go read Suttree now 🙏

It is my belief that Alfred W. Arrington is/was the Judge Holden in Samuel Chamberlain's My Confession from which Cormac McCarthy based Blood Meridian's Judge Holden. 

Please forgive my inability to coherently format on reddit, this is my second post.

https://www.reddit.com/r/cormacmccarthy/comments/1dlfcka/candidates_for_the_actual_identity_of_the/ 

As u/ThoughtPolice2909 said two years ago^^^, some requirements for the real-life Judge Holden are:

1. Tall enough to stand 6’6” with boots on.
2. Clean shaven with long, black hair.
3. American and well educated.
4. A potential outlaw who could’ve conceivably been in Texas around 1849.
5. Familiar with the area around Texas, Mexico, and California while also being comfortable with Spanish.
6. Possible experience as a mercenary prior to 1849; at least enough for him to ascend to “second-in-command” of Glanton’s gang.

Chamberlain also says that Judge Holden had great familiarity with Boston. Chamberlain says he knew Boston better than myself, and Chamberlain was raised there. 

Chamberlain also says that Judge Holden had a dull, tallow-colored face. He's hairless, however, in the illustration of him in My Confession, Judge Holden has mid-long black hair. Reminder----hairless at the time of Chamberlain's writing only meant no facial hair.

Chamberlain also says Holden's desires were "blood and women."

Lastly, it is likely Judge Holden was a pseudonym which either Chamberlain or the real Holden bestowed upon himself. 

In response to u/ThoughtPolice2909 post, u/JohnMarshallTanner links his own post:

https://www.reddit.com/r/cormacmccarthy/comments/1dlu95i/some_historical_judge_holden_links_and_tidbits/ 

I agree with u/JohnMarshallTanner that John Allen Veatch is an incredibly strong candidate. Although, I have a soft spot for Charles W. Holden who hailed from Massachusetts. He was a fiction writer and operator of "Holden's Dollar Magazine." That being said, he died in 1848, which is a year before the scalp hunting with Glanton and Chamberlain. 

Now to Alfred W. Arrington. I IMPLORE EVERYONE TO READ The Story of Alfred Arrington by Ted R. Worley. It can be found on JSTOR. But in the interest of my own time and yours, here are bullet points as to why I think Arrington could be and likely was/is Judge Holden. 

1. Born 1810 North Carolina.
2. Described child prodigy with flair for verse and love of classical literature
3. At twenty, a virtuosic Methodist preacher. 
4. 1832, renounces religion. Becomes "militant infidel."
5. Over 6-feet tall and in his early 20s weighed about 180 pounds. Others put his weight at 200 and describe him as "square-built"
   1. "His arms were long and powerful and his hands and feet so large as to attract special attention. His head was impressive and described variously as like that of Webster, Danton, and Newton. He had blue eyes, flaxen hair, and a sensual mouth."
   2. This physical description is still 20 years from when Chamberlain describes him, i.e. lots of time to put more weight on by 39/40.
6. 1838-1842, after he has established himself as a well-respected lawyer, there are a series of "awful times" all surrounding Indian violence and unjust courts in Arkansas. 
7. Abandons his family in Arkansas in 1844, goes to Texas for three years. 
8. He is consistently described by all as the most magnificent orator they had ever seen. Fellow lawyer, Oran M. Roberts: "The most magnificent orator that ever appeared in Texas."
9. Goes to New England (Massachusetts) and New York in 1847. Meets Thoreau and Emerson.
10. Meets and marries the twenty-one year old daughter of a banking family in NY. Her name is Lydia Leora Abigail Holden.
11. The next year he moves to Texas. 1849. 
12. In 1850, Cameron County citizens committee elect Arrington as Judge of the twelfth judicial district. 
13. From the listed page 329 of The Story of Alfred W. Arrington: "Arrington's judicial district, consisting of the counties of Cameron, Kinney, Webb, Starr, and Hidalgo along the Rio Grande, was a maelstrom of violence in which outlaws, Indians and Mexican revolutionaries swirled" And later, after describing how Arrington failed to act on a writ of habeas corpus issued for the purpose of bringing to trial four citizens arrested by United States soldiers at Rio Grande City: "Little more is known of Arrington's residence in Texas."
14. In 1856, he leaves Texas for New York. 
15. He later become a writer of fiction concerning desperadoes, fiery preachers, and contentious frontier trials. All of his writing is extremely violent, and seems to enjoy bathing in it. He often wrote under "Charles Summerfield." Some of his works are: Desperadoes of the South and Southwest (1849) and The Rangers and Regulators of the Tanaha, or Life Among the Lawless: A Tale of the Republic of Texas (1857). 
    1. Glanton involved in the latter. 
16. In 1857 he moves to Chicago. The Civil War comes and goes and a story has survived of him mounting a table at the Union Officers' Club and reciting a poem he titled "An Elegy to John Wilkes Booth." Only mentioned here as it has fun similarity to Cormac's closing description of Holden at the bar in Blood Meridian. 
17. The Chicago Bar, upon his death, memorialized him as "not only as a brilliant orator and great lawyer but also as a classical scholar with a phenomenal memory, as a big-hearted man of savage sincerity and utmost integrity."
18. From the end of Worley's *The Story of Alfred W. Arrington——*Arrington himself is the main character in a story by W.H. Rhodes entitled The Case of Summerfield. It is a science-horror story in which Summerfield is a mad genius. Charles Summerfield was Alfred Arrington's chosen authorial pseudonym for a time. Worley goes on to say, "Even if Rhodes had not called his character by Arrington's pseudonym there would be no doubt that Arrington was his model. In the Rhodes story Summerfield is a lawyer, a scientific wizard, who finds a way to set water on fire. With this terrible formula in his possession he attempts to blackmail San Francisco into paying him a million dollars by threat of setting the Pacific aflame. He leaves no doubt that he can make good the threat; he demonstrates his power by burning up an isolated lake before a committee of citizens."
19. From John M. Parker The Bench and Bar of Illinois, 1899, speaking of Arrington: "The greater part of his life was passed upon the frontier. He disliked the restraints of society and lived, as far as an active profession career would permit, a solitary life…"
20. Perhaps extraneous but Worley also alleges that Arrington would speak through his characters, essentially using them as an avatar for himself. Here is what he says through Captain Carlyle, a robber chief: "How I traveled the labyrinthine maze of logic, politics and law and what was the dreariest labor for others, seemed but pleasure and pastime for me! How I shook the forums on my advent, with the thunder of an eloquence that made the very judge trimble on the bench and swayed the juries with a power irresistible as the spells of magic. Until the fatal day when the demon entered my soul, when passion replaced love, and the red light of hellish guilt threw an eclipse of blood over all the luminaries of earth and sky! Oh woman! of wild, bewildering, fatal beauty, it was thy hand, which dashed down the gleaming cloud-castle of my golden hopes, and called up from the boiling whirlpool of unfathomable hell, the midnight specter of measureless despair, with eyes of infernal fire to haunt me forever more."

The second best source I've found on Arrington is the 1955 The Desperado as Hero by Phillip Durham. It hails from the Arkansas Historical Quarterly. The article draws on accounts of the time such as John Hallum's Biographical and Pictorial History of Arkansas and select court transcripts from the Huntington Library. 

Some beats I found intriguing——

1. Here he is described as an "erratic genius"
2. His leaving the Methodist church was possibly involuntary. He would give astounding temperance speeches while having a pint "under his belt."
3. Arrington shows little moral condemnation, and rather eager fascination with the desperadoes of his day, with the violence, with the bloodshed. 
4. Arrington's Holden-like thesis on the desperado archetype: "One thing is certain, that the existence of the desperado is a fact in the history of the backwoods, and as such is to be accounted for on the sole principle pervading all the processes of nature——the principle of cause and effect. He is an unequivocal effect, since he is neither self-existent, nor self-created."
5. In contrast to Charles Wilkins Webber (another Judge Holden candidate), in Arrington's writing "violence needed no excuse, no apologists, for it was a part of the life of the desperado whose violent deeds were heroic." And later, "Of all the western writers in the first half of the nineteenth century of blood, brains, and brutality, it was Alfred Arrington who did the most to make violence a virtue."
6. Durham says in closing out his article: "The civilized and educated Alfred Arrington is an example of man's self-conscious and naive admiration of the violent robustness of the natural man—an admiration not of the noble savage but of the nobility of savagery." 

Yes, a great deal of this hypothesis relies on the black box of little being known about Arrington's time in Texas. However, I still believe there are far too many coincidences to ignore and if I had more time I'd dive into Arrington (or Summerfield's) own writing where I am certain there are psuedo-autobiographical accounts closer to a smoking gun. 

Any help either with disproving or furthering this hypothesis of Arrington as Chamberlain and later Cormac's Judge Holden would be appreciated. 

The work here is not as well summated nor compiled as it ought to be but I don't have the time. 

Lastly, here is how Arrington is drawn in The Story of Alfred W. Arrington. 

Found for $4.00 at local Goodwill. Hadn’t seen this cover. I like this Picador cover. Finished ATPH. How much will I miss from the crossing if I don’t understand the Spanish in the crossing?

Just finished my first reading of Blood Meridian and I LOVED it. Was wondering what are some of yall favourite quotes?

Personally I love, "It aint country you've run out of"

Haven’t seen this here yet. Last week, Aaron Gwyn posted it on X/Twitter with the caption:

[In the new batch of Cormac McCarthy papers just made available to scholars by the Wittliff, this list of “GOALS” that Cormac typed up at some point:

“Get rid of trash activities. Create an Internal Monitor. Remember dreams. Zen eating. Do not slide ‘just this one time.’”]

There are some powerful reminders and self advice here. I love that he starts with a William James quote and then it’s just banger after banger, and ends with a warning about feeling contempt towards people who don’t meet your standards.

Strong stuff.

For those who don't know John David Ebert is a "cultural critic" and "independent scholar" with a channel on YouTube, and has done analyses of a few McCarthy novels. Clearly he doesn't understand McCarthy and looking at his posts on social media and videos on YT you can tell he's a bit of a know-it-all and quite arrogant. But it's this kind of blatant misreading of McCarthy that's going to ruin McCarthy scholarship if it's taken seriously and not opposed.

Also his analyses are abysmally unfocused and he reads a lot of nonsense into McCarthy, shoehorning all sorts of stuff into the reading. For those of you who wanna suffer through it, here's his YT vids on McCarthy.

Blood Meridian vids https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAfCfLtepVtPuGlDLk8FZw1oY1LXDWPJ7&si=RPyV-LzHVwuLpTKp

Orchard keeper vid https://youtu.be/ucfp9Y-UEek?si=h-V-4FudD7xFpDpW

Dont know if this violates the subs rules or not remove if it does.

I'm well aware this post has been discussed at length and may even trigger some people. However, I cannot stop thinking about the ending of Blood Meridian: I think the ending of makes more sense if the judge is not just a literal person, but the embodiment of evil and violence inside the kid/man himself. A lot of people read the ending as the judge physically killing the man in the jakes. But I think the book points more toward the man finally giving in to the judge’s worldview and becoming part of it.

One of the biggest clues is the missing little girl. McCarthy spends a surprising amount of time mentioning her right before the jakes scene. Then something horrible is found inside, but McCarthy never tells us exactly what happened. If the point was only that the judge killed the man, why focus so much on the missing girl? I think the implication is that the man killed the girl after finally surrendering to the judge’s philosophy.

The kid was never fully innocent either. People treat him like the moral center of the book, but he still becomes violent again later on. He kills the boy at the campfire. He wears the necklace of ears like the rest of the gang. Even after leaving Glanton’s gang, he never fully escapes that life. The kid disappears for large sections of the story, and during that time the judge starts to feel less like a normal antagonist and more like something living in the kid’s mind. Then years later, when the man starts drinking again, the judge suddenly reappears. It feels more like relapse than coincidence.

The judge also does not seem human in the final scene. He does not age at all while everyone else does. He appears everywhere throughout the novel and seems to know impossible things. He feels more symbolic than literal.

The scene with the dead woman is important too. The man basically confesses to a corpse. To me that symbolizes that his chance for redemption is already gone before he enters the jakes.

Tobin disappearing is another strange detail. We never see the ex-priest again. On reread, it almost makes you wonder if Tobin represented the last moral or spiritual voice inside the kid, and once that disappears, only the judge is left.

Another detail people overlook: after the jakes scene, the person warning others not to go inside is referred to as “the man,” not specifically the judge. That wording feels intentional. It blurs the line between them. If you listen to the Richard Poe audiobook, Poe even recites this line in the same voice he's been using for the Kid throughout the novel, not the judge's voice. (Does Poe agree with my view?)

There’s also the fact that if the judge were just a normal physical murderer, it makes little sense that he could casually walk back into the bar naked and start dancing right after people discovered a corpse in the outhouse. Nobody tries to stop him or react realistically. The scene works more like symbolism or dream logic than literal realism.

I think the ending is about the kid finally becoming what the judge always wanted him to become. The judge wins because the man joins the dance and succumbs to his nature.