The Achievement of Cormac McCarthy

by Vereen M. Bell

US Hardcover

168 pages, Hardcover

First published August 1, 1988

About the author

Vereen M. Bell is Professor of English at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. He is the author of Robert Lowell: Nihilist as Hero and The Achievement of Cormac McCarthy.

Reviews

[Ed Courtney]

I’m rating this book low because I had a hard time following this scholar’s thoughts. Originally published in 1988, it was written before scholars took into consideration the idea that some, or many, laymen may read their books. Today, in some cases it may be a majority of laymen who are reading a book written by a scholar of some sort.

I ended up skipping a portion of the middle, and reading the part about Blood Meridian. It informed me a bit, but was also a bit over my head. I’m looking forward to some other scholarly books about Blood Meridian and McCarthy’s work that might be interesting and more lucid.

[Harry]

Only read the introduction and section on Blood Meridian. Really interesting to see the progenitor of where a lot of ideas about the novel came from, even if future critics deviated from them.

[Brett]

It’s nice to see his relatively overlooked earlier books get an in-depth examination, but it’s really odd that Blood Meridian manages to be the shortest chapter in that regard...