1 Snagel

Luther Snagel
Hennagir
Block 8
10/16/15

The Cowboy in All the Pretty Horses

In the stories of The Searchers and All the Pretty Horses the main characters should be
the starting point for analysis of the content of each work. The majority of the story is focused on
them, and the reader projects their own feelings and beliefs onto them. The way the main
character acts is of utmost importance to the content of a story and its true meaning as a literary
work. Each character comes from a different ontological angle in relation to their surroundings
and the creator writes them in a different way that truly conveys the meaning behind their intent
in the making. The cowboy is an individual that stands alone against their adversary, and as such
the starting point of analysis should be based on them and them alone. This stance includes the
characters attitudes toward many things that people encounter and struggle with, such as age,
formulation in their respective work, other groups of people, and a relationship with nature.
First we can view the relative age of the main characters. In The Searchers, Ethan is of
indeterminate age, but is fairly old having fought in multiple wars. He emerged from trying times
with a uniquely American cynicism about all things and people. On the flip side, John Grady
Cole is young and untarnished by the evils of the world. Naive and innocent but with a strong
moral compass and an uncompromising perseverance that stems from a deep-seated desire to
become just as the images and ideas of the cowboy are, and characters such as Ethan in The
Searchers had been, he moves forward into all things to come. This provides a lens through
which one can view all of the action taken by either character. John Grady Cole as a young
individual is more open minded and that shapes the world of his action. Whenever he acts it is
through an uneasiness with his relationship with the world, and therefore he is much more
accepting of any new stimuli thrown his way in direct opposition to the character of Ethan and
the myth of the cowboy.

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The character of Ethan is much more an amalgam of cultural ideals that are a product of
their time than John Grady Cole. He is purely a combination of the elements of the myth of the
cowboy. In contrast, John Grady Cole is more of a real person, and relatable as such. Cormac
McCarthy pulls from sources such as The Searchers to create a world which to the reader is
much more real than the world of The Searchers is. He uses these narratives in order to create a
world that is influenced by the fictitious narrative of the cowboy just as much as our own. He
puts the characters of his story in the same position as that of the reader. This gives us
perspective on the various myths that allows us to relate to the characters in a more personal way,
and makes the whole reading experience more enjoyable and engaging, since the material being
pulled from to influence the characters in All The Pretty Horses is the same as what we are
influenced by in the real world.
In The Searchers the myth of the cowboy is barely challenged in any way by Ethan. He
reinforces ideas of white racial superiority, Manifest Destiny, and reinscribes the west as a place
with traditional gender roles. This is heavily contrasted in All the Pretty Horses where John
Grady Cole is not a hardened veteran like Ethan. He is just a kid who knows what he wants and
what he believes in, but doesn't have the experience that Ethan has so is more blind in his action.
What he does and stands for mainly flies in the face of the myth of the cowboy. He is young so
he doesn't subscribe to the same cynicism that is often seen in the character of the people
depicted in the base literature of the myth of the cowboy. He has a profound respect for other
cultures the opposite of which is true for Ethan. His respect for Mexican culture can be shown in
the following quotation due to his willingness to learn the language out of respect for their
culture, not out of necessity:
Has pensado alguna vez en la muerte?
S. A veces. Y t?
S. A veces. Crees que existe un cielo?
S. T no?
No lo s. Quiz s. Crees que puedes creer en el cielo si no crees en el infierno?

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Creo que puedes creer lo que quieras.

Ethan nearly came to killing the girl he set out to find just because she was impure due to
having been with an Indian man setting an extreme tone of racism throughout that piece that is
not present in All the Pretty Horses. In relation to other groups of people John Grady Cole is
obviously the more progressive of the two main characters making the representations and
images of All the Pretty Horses a more modern or at least tolerant and acceptable philosophical
work. The underlying philosophies of each work manifest themselves partially in the main
characters actions toward other people, and in All the Pretty Horses John Grady Coles
philosophical attitude is much more in line with modern sensibilities.
Another point of contrast comes in the form of the characters relationship with nature.
Each has a unique stance on nature and acts on that stance differently. Ethan seems to hold little
to no regard for natural beings having value and The Searchers plays down the value of even
horses, the cowboys ultimate tool and companion. All the Pretty Horses on the other hand with
John Grady Cole at the forefront relates itself to the natural world more amicably. John Grady
Cole and his companion wander through this world enthralled with the beauty and majesty of
everything from the slightest creature to the grandest landscape He lay a long time listening to
the others breathing in their sleep while he contemplated the wildness about him, the wildness
within. (60) He assigns a value to horses that bridges the human-nature dichotomy. That point
is illustrated in the following quotation: What he loved in horses was what he loved in men, the
blood and the heat of the blood that ran them. All his reverence and all his fondness and all the
leanings of his life were for the ardent hearted and they would always be so and never be
otherwise. (6) He posits the horse as an extension of himself and therefore the cowboy is
really a man and horse as an indivisible unit. The stance, then, taken in All the Pretty Horses
rather than one of eternal struggle between the forces of humankind in opposition to those of
nature, is one of harmonious coexistence with nature even if humankind is still the dominant
party in this relationship.

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The contrast between these two characters can give the reader a more complete
understanding of All the Pretty Horses as well as the viewer a more complete picture of The
Searchers. The representations of The Searchers go on to influence the characters in the book
and its writer, all the while the book itself takes an alternative stance to the film by taking images
and reinterpreting their meaning in a more modern context. A great lesson of historical literacy
and scholarship can be learned from the interrelation of contemporary tales of the cowboy to
those from the height of its popularity. We can see the development of the ideal of the cowboy as
it relates to the cultural and temporal contexts in which it is deployed. The personality and action
of each character has a weight about it by the nature of being a cowboy. The cowboys
personality is what defines him and therefore should be the point of contrast between competing
interpretations of what it means to be a cowboy. Through multiple lenses and points of contrast it
is thoroughly shown that Ethan from The Searchers is very much in support of traditional values
of the cowboy while John Grady Cole in All the Pretty Horses challenges them assigning new
meaning to the term.