What a magnificient stunt for McCarthy to have pulled off and that eludes most readers because they only read for plot. He deserves his genius award to have pulled the wool over the eyes of all readers. And I’m sure that was not his intention, to trick readers. I’m sure he, like any serious writer who doesn’t write schlock, craves a close reading and craves someone to ask the question: Just what the hell is he doing, writing a story that can be read in two ways and in no way.

The tone and language do not change once the father dies. So whoever is the narrator is remaining consistent.

I put this out: there was never any father. Was the story told by the child the entire time?

“You said you wouldnt ever leave me.
I know. I’m sorry. You have my whole heart.You always did. You’re the best guy. You always were. If I’m not here you can still talk to me. You can talk to me and I’ll talk to you. You’ll see.
Will I hear you?
Yes. you will. You have to make it like talk that you imagine. And you’ll hear me. You have to practice.” (pg.235)

The novel is the child practicing.

The novel is framed, sort of, by two dream. It opens with a dream, but whose dream is it? And it ends with an impossiblity, a detail that could only take place in dream: fish. But in this world there can be no fish. Most probably the water is too polluted. The black water in the opening dream, the trout in the last paragraph, who sees these images?

There are way too many instances of dreams for them to be discounted.

“Why dont you tell me a story?
I don’t want.
Okay.
I dont have any stories to tell.
You could tell me a story about yourself.
You alredy know all the stories about me. You were there.
You have stories inside that I dont know about.
You mean like drems?
Like dreams. Or just things that you think about.”

Is this novel the dream of the child? The above passage goes on in which the child says stories are suppose to have happy endings. This one does, albeit in the last paragraph, ironically. Ironically, because the weight of the preceding paragraphs completely cancels out the measly last paragraph.

There are no easy answers to the questions I’ve posed. These questions need to be addressed. These questions indicate, if you read the text closely, that McCarthy is on top of his game and remains brillant.

Clue: why are there no contrations? i.e. Why is “I dont want to” not “I don’t want to.”

Hint: because the child hasn’t learned grammar yet and the entire text may be from the child’s POV.

And after he’s dead he continues to imagine the child. Neat trick. You’re making a valiant effort to save a bad book – sort of like “It was all a dream” – but it doesn’t work.

The book is genre fiction. It’s a combination of wish fulfillment and horror story. The people aren’t meant to be real people- they’re fantasy projections of the intended reader (in this case, middle-class dads- I know, I am one) – about how they would behave if put in a difficult situation.

I also had precisely the same reaction as China: that it was aimless; pointless.

But again, Jill’s explanation brings it all together for me.

So I’m with Jill. There is no child.

The man is talking to himself, or an imaginery child, the entire book.

PS- I thought No Country for Old Men was truly horrible.
PPS- As a political work it’s perhaps got some importance. “This is what a war would mean.”

I was wincing at some of the atrocities recounted in Niall Ferguson’s last book; the need to imagine atrocities after the 20th century just seems a bit suspect to me, somehow.