The Sunset Limited

published	October 24th 2006 by Vintage
binding	Paperback
isbn	0307278360 (isbn13: 9780307278364)
pages	160
description	A startling encounter on a New York subway platform leads two strangers to a run-down tenement where a life or death decision must be made. I...more [close] A startling encounter on a New York subway platform leads two strangers to a run-down tenement where a life or death decision must be made. In that small apartment, “Black” and “White,” as the two men are known, begin a conversation that leads each back through his own history, mining the origins of two fundamentally opposing world views. White is a professor whose seemingly enviable existence of relative ease has left him nonetheless in despair. Black, an ex-con and ex-addict, is the more hopeful of the men–though he is just as desperate to convince White of the power of faith as White is desperate to deny it. Their aim is no less than this: to discover the meaning of life. Deft, spare, and full of artful tension, The Sunset Limited is a beautifully crafted, consistently thought-provoking, and deceptively intimate work by one of the most insightful writers of our time. [close]
date added	12-18-06 edit book

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Weems rated it:

07/11/08

Read in November, 2006

I am impressed by the scope and challenge of Cormac McCarthy's canon. This particular work is a little more akin to earlier works like _Child of God_ and _Outer Dark_, where the settings were a little more sparse and laced with symbolism. In this, however, McCarthy has pared himself down to minimal basics, and his symbolism thrives for that and tackles ideas more expansive than those earlier works. The two characters of this 'novel in dramatic form' are simply called White and Black, and the pre...more I am impressed by the scope and challenge of Cormac McCarthy's canon. This particular work is a little more akin to earlier works like _Child of God_ and _Outer Dark_, where the settings were a little more sparse and laced with symbolism. In this, however, McCarthy has pared himself down to minimal basics, and his symbolism thrives for that and tackles ideas more expansive than those earlier works. The two characters of this 'novel in dramatic form' are simply called White and Black, and the previous reviewer duly noted some of the dualistic connections through that simplicity. The mastery here works in that the connections are quite multifaceted--Black is simple in his dialect, yet addresses wonderful complexities and paradoxes of Christian thought, his ideas of God's design wonderfully circular and avoidant of easy rhetoric. White goes through much of this book a little too reactionary until the very end, but he is opposed to Black in so many ways. There are echoes here of racism, arguments in philosophy, hell and purgatory, and as I read I became aware of more and more possibilities.

The situation itself may sound somewhat high-schoolish in its almost adolescent initial stab at symbolism (Black, a simple religious man living in a ghetto, saves White, who is a professor and well-to-do intellectual, when White jumps in front of a subway train in a suicide attempt--Black brings White back to his home in the ghetto and takes this as an opportunity to proselytize), but McCarthy quickly establishes this initial angle so that the rest of his book can deepen the levels of meaning within this book. Being dramatic in its format, the narrative of course hinges primarily on dialogue between the two, and at its best moments that dialogue turns around on its own axle and examines endlessly the true meaning of salvation, of samaratinism, of hell and punishment.

Though I enjoyed the banter endlessly, I did find that I missed some McCarthy's uncanny ability to make even the most symbolic of situations grounded heavily in the earth--his ability to keep your feet on the floor and let you know that the story itself comes from a very concrete setting. _The Sunset Limited_ feels almost a little too Sartre-esque at times when Black says things like, "Do you know what's out there?" It lacks the handling of someone like Beckett, who could make something like a coffee pot or a dinner infused with mango and rutabaga so real and tactile that one can easily be distracted from metaphor for a while to enjoy the scenery, no matter how sparse. In _The Road_, for example, McCarthy deals with the big questions of what distinguishes man from beasts, but does so in a very palpable situation, even though alien. The desolate, post-apocalyptic world McCarthy created for that novel was wonderfully immediate and vivid, and perhaps for this book (play), he let his symbolism carry away the narrative, and his little moments of verisimilitude don't weigh as heavily as they have in other works.

Clearly, the ideas in this book will resonate long after reading them, and I love how McCarthy is becoming a writer who is willing to tackle the biggest questions of existence in very effective ways. I would give this book 3.5 stars if I could--exquisite in its ideas, though maybe a little less masterful in its execution.

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