Counternarrative Possibilities reads Cormac McCarthy's westerns against the backdrop of American mythology's two formative national tropes: virgin land (from the 1950s) and homeland (after 9/11). Looking at McCarthy's westerns in the context of American studies, James Dorson shows how his books counter the national narratives underlying these tropes and reinvest them with new, potentially transformative meaning. Departing from prevailing accounts of McCarthy that place him in relation to his literary antecedents, Counternarrative Possibilities takes a forward-looking approach...
Counternarrative Possibilities reads Cormac McCarthy's westerns against the backdrop of American mythology's two formative national tropes: vir...