“Before Man Was, War Waited for Him”. Blood Meridian e la Guerra del Vietnam

Abstract

With the exception of No Country for Old Men, the Vietnam War has never appeared openly in Cormac McCarthy’s novels, but it has nevertheless left a deep trace on his early work (Child of God, Suttree, and Blood Meridian). Blood Meridian in particular shows, despite his western setting, an imaginary influenced by the military-political experience of Vietnam. A few scenes in the book in fact read more like a war novel rather than a western, and the connection is even deeper than that. The Vietnam novels typically have some concerns – such as the chaotic descriptions of the battle, the explosion of meaningless violence often perpetrated by friendly fire, and the guerrilla warfare – which are to be found at their best in Blood Meridian. My essay discusses these issues through a comparison with a western movie often associated with the Vietnam War: Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch.