The Passenger (The Passenger #1)

by Cormac McCarthy

What, another eight years of you and your pennydreadful friends? Nine, Mathgirl.

See if he describes all nine of his friends in the novel.

Seven. Plus the pilot and copilot. Nine in all.

Same number of The Kid's associates mentioned in the previous chapter.

You think there’s already been somebody down there, dont you? I dont know. Yeah. But that aint an answer. How would they get in the plane? They’d of had to cut their way in the same way we done.

See if this question is ever answered.

else. I think that my desire to remain totally fucking ignorant about shit that will only get me in trouble is both deep and abiding. I’m going to say that it is just damn near a religion.

Religion is a state of induced joyful ignorance about existential questions.

Familiars out of another life. How many tales begin just so?

Bobby has familiars just as Alicia does. Are they just as unreal to Bobby as Alicia's are? This story begins that way.

The plane was intact. Yes. There was no breakup on impact. We didnt see much sign of an impact. The plane was sitting on the floor of the bay. It didnt even look like there was anything much wrong with it.

I want to know where you came from, she said. You mean some place we were before we were here? Yes. The cohorts moved slightly closer. As if to hear. All right, said the Kid. Anyone want to take that? It’s a simple question. Yeah, right. How did you get here? We came on the bus. You came on the bus. Yeah. You didnt come on the bus. We didnt? Well pardon me all to hell. No. You didnt. Why not? You didnt come on the bus. How could you come on the bus? Christ, Clarissa. The driver opens the door and you climb aboard. How hard is that? Were there other people on the bus? Sure. Why not? And no one said anything? Like what? You didnt get any funny looks? Funny looks. Could they see you? The other passengers? Yes. Who knows? Jesus. Probably some could and some couldnt. Some could but wouldnt. Where’s this going? Well what kind of passenger can see you? How did we get stuck on this passenger thing? I just want to know. Ask me again. What kind of passenger is it that can see you. I think I know what we’ve got here. Okay. What kind of passenger? The Kid stuck what would have been his thumbs in his earholes and waggled his flippers and rolled his eyes and went blabble abble abble. She put one hand over her mouth. I’m just jacking with you. I dont know what kind of passenger. Jesus. People will look at you and they look surprised, that’s all. You know they’re looking at you. What do they say? They dont say anything. What would they say? Who do they think you are? Who do they think we ...

Passenger section.

He could be the first person in creation. Or the last.

By the time he got to the marina he thought that the man who’d gone ashore on the island was almost certainly the passenger.

And then I woke up one night in the middle of the night and I was lying there and I thought: If there is no higher power then I’m it. And that just scared the shit out of me. There is no God and I am she.

I dont know who God is or what he is. But I dont believe all this stuff got here by itself. Including me. Maybe everything evolves just like they say it does. But if you sound it to its source you have to come ultimately to an intention.

She smiled. She raised one slender arm and looked at the thin whitegold Patek Philippe Calatrava she wore.

The second time a character checks their watch then asks the time. Previously was Bobby and his boss.

He thought that God’s goodness appeared in strange places. Dont close your eyes.

Why is the six written out? Shh. Jesus. If the projector was upside down you’d know it.

What is the importance of nine?

Good guys, bad guys. You’re all the same guys.

If someone said to you that you had thrown your life away over a woman what would you say? Well thrown.

In the coming night he thought that men would band together in the hills. Feeding their small fires with the deeds and the covenants and the poetry of their fathers. Documents they’d no gift to read in a cold to loot men of their souls.

There's vintage CM.

I know that the characters in the story can be either real or imaginary and that after they are all dead it wont make any difference. If imaginary beings die an imaginary death they will be dead nonetheless. You think that you can create a history of what has been. Present artifacts. A clutch of letters. A sachet in a dressingtable drawer. But that’s not what’s at the heart of the tale. The problem is that what drives the tale will not survive the tale. As the room dims and the sound of voices fades you understand that the world and all in it will soon cease to be. You believe that it will begin again. You point to other lives. But their world was never yours.

CM's theory on writing fiction?

For all my ragging there are times when I see with a cold clarity the wisdom of the path you’ve chosen. Hovering as you do out there at the edge of the intactile dark. A thing wholly beyond my talents. Broken upon the wheel of devotion. Sniffing tentatively at the cool air of the evening lands. No more questions. Who am I what am I where am I. Of what stuff is the moon stamped. What’s the plural of woodwose. Where can I find good barbeque. I look for flaws in your stance.

You would give up your dreams in order to escape your nightmares and I would not. I think it’s a bad bargain.

Some people cling to the wreckage forever.

Like the pasengers that died in the crash.

History is a collection of paper. A few fading recollections. After a while what is not written never happened.

Wherever you debark was the train’s destination all along.

Mercy is the province of the person alone. There is mass hatred and there is mass grief. Mass vengeance and even mass suicide. But there is no mass forgiveness. There is only you.

He knew that on the day of his death he would see her face and he could hope to carry that beauty into the darkness with him, the last pagan on earth, singing softly upon his pallet in an unknown tongue.