ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS OF THE WESTERN NOVEL Part Three: The Western Place

A Western would not be a Western if it were not located in a specific locale. The place that unifies all Westerns is usually considered the trans-Mississippi western United States. Classic Westerns focused on the high plains regions of the West or such majestic areas as Monument Valley. Rarely were they set in coastal California or the Northwest. The idea has always been that in vast stretches of unpopulated frontier, humanity functions at its most elemental level. The landscape of a Western has become a formative factor in character development. It often serves as an antagonist that must be conquered, as in A. B. Guthrie's The Big Sky (1947). Antimyth Westerns such as Blood Meridian, or the Evening Redness in the West (1985) stretched the Western place to below the border into Mexico, where that landscape served as a foil to the more recognizable landscape of classic Westerns. Place was becoming much less important.

Conclusion
Today, the three elements that traditionally define a Western often seem blurred or altogether absent. Nevertheless, in order to read a Western one must still be aware of the historical context of the genre. In Westerns, perhaps more than in any other genre, the traditions and myths developed over time are assumed to be understood by all viewers. Even such bizarre postmodern Westerns as James C. Work’s Ride West to Dawn (2001) depend on a certain knowledge of previous Westerns.

Unfortunately, a generation of readers has grown up without knowing the assumptions on which Westerns are based. Many people today have never read a Western in their lives. Their entire knowledge often consists of occasionally surfing television channels or encountering references in popular culture, such as John Wayne or Clint Eastwood imitations. For postmodern readers of Westerns, then, the old stories of the West are in the background but no longer hold the imagination. After all, postmodernism by definition repudiates the myths of the past, including Western myths. Since those myths were all told from a white masculine perspective, because they were stories of white men beating up on Native Americans and women and “winning” the West, many have lost interest in Westerns. Few postmodern readers can accept the values on which classic Westerns were based and often have little acquaintance with new postmodern Westerns.

The “question of questions” about Westerns is whether they will continue to thrive in the 21st century. Shelves of Westerns at bookstores seemingly are shrinking. Yet writers of Westerns in literature such as Larry McMurtry and Cormac McCarthy continue to win Pulitzer Prizes. Perhaps with the reinterpretation of history by the New Western Historians we must learn to look for Westerns beyond the Westerns section at the bookstore. In other places we will find Barbara Kingsolver, Sherman Alexie, Cormac McCarthy, writers of Westerns for our own time. Zane Grey and B. M. Bower long ago often set their novels in the present and called them Westerns. Perhaps today we should be seeking to expand our definition of a Western to transcend the Western moment, myth, and place.