The Development of John Grady Cole in Corman McCarthy's "All the Pretty Horses"

Seminar paper from the year 2006 in the subject American Studies - Literature, grade: 1,7, University of Mannheim, language: English, abstract: Cormac McCarthy is one of the most famous contemporary writers in America and is celebrated as one of the major American novelists of his time. However, this has not always been the case. Despite his earlier writings, it was for McCarthy¿s All the Pretty Horses that he finally became famous for. With the publication of this sixth novel, for which he won both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award , he gained widespread recognition as an American writer. All the Pretty Horses was first published in 1992 and is the first part of his Border Trilogy.

As Morrison notes

most of McCarthy¿s novels [...] involve both metaphorical and literal journeys which bring their voyagers inevitably into a series of conflicts and confrontations with themselves as well as with the various communities intersected be their wanderings. And, in most of these novels, the central characters¿ journeys, however random in time and place they may be, are apparently rooted in dysfunctinal families and troubled filial relationships.

This also applies to All The Pretty Horses. In this novel, Cormac McCarthy concerns himself with the development of his main protagonist, the 16-year-old John Grady Cole: At the beginning of the novel, McCarthy portrays John Grady as a boy in search for adventure, freedom and a home. During his journey to Mexico however, he soon has to grow up. He has to witness the execution of his compagnion; he is put in jail even though he is innocent; he has to fight with other convicts, and at last he is attacked by a hired killer. He thus has to learn that the world is a dangerous and violent place and that the world portrayed in All The Pretty Horses has nothing to do with an idyllic wild country as the novel¿s title might suggest. In the end, John Grady has hardened. He has killed a man, he has lost his innocence and he returns as a man and as a hero.

In the following, I will first outline the plot of the novel. Then I shall want to concentrate on the development of its main character. Last, I like to discuss whether All the Pretty Horses may be read as a Bildungsroman. I will come to the conclusion that McCarthy¿s novel is partly a Bildungsroman and partly a Western for several reasons which I shall point out in due course.