Essay: "The Western and the Apocalypse"

As a kid and a teenager I wasn't much into Westerns, and neither (it seems) were you, since Unforgiven is probably the only really significant Western film of the 80s and 90s.  But it seems to me that the Western is experiencing a resurgence in popularity, and I have a theory regarding at least one reason why this might be.

My own interest in Westerns arose from reading Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy (best known as the author of All The Pretty Horses, No Country for Old Men, and The Road).  Blood Meridian tells the story of an unnamed boy who joins a savage band of mercenaries who are murdering Indians in order to collect the bounty placed on their scalps by the Mexican authorities.  The mercenaries are led by the merciless Captain Glanton and accompanied by a sinister figure known as "the judge", a tall, fat and hairless man who seems to have supernatural powers.  The judge is highly educated and erudite and espouses a sophisticated philosophy celebrating mindless violence.  Indeed, most of Blood Meridian's immoral protagonists are openly contemptuous of civilization and rationalize their actions as an alternative model or ideal.  These themes which are further developed by McCarthy themes in The Border Trilogy (consisting of All the Pretty Horses, The Crossing, Cities of the Plain), although those works (along with No Country for Old Men) deal with the border between Mexico and the United States, rather than the distinction between nature and civilization.

Blood Meridian probably inspired the film The Proposition, directed by John Hillcoat and written by Nick Cave, which tells the story of the murderous Burns family in the Australian Outback in the 1880s.  The authorities capture Charlie and Mikey Burns, the two younger Burns brothers, and threaten to execute the simple Mikey unless Charlie kills their older brother Arthur, a relentless psychopath who lives deep in the wilderness.  Like the judge from Blood Meridian, Arthur Burns is intelligent and educated, and his actions seem to be driven from a profound hatred and contempt for civilization rather than ignorance or backwardness.

The recently-released video game Red Dead Redemption has a very similar plot.  The protagonist John Marston is forced by government agents to track down Dutch van der Linde, the leader of his former gang.  The game takes place in 1911 and Dutch represents the last of the outlaws of the old west.  Like Arthur Burns, Dutch seems motivated by disdain for government and civilization (his gang seems to be mainly composed of Native Americans).

All of these are what I would call "Apocalyptic Westerns."  They share a number of qualities, including that their villains are not uncivilized (whether Indians or outlaws) but rather anti-civilized, those who have consciously rejected developed society.

 

Second, they have a slightly unique depiction of the "old west."  Unlike a frontier story, where people battle in a lawless environment, the Apocalyptic Western focuses on the dichotomy between civilization and nature and the risk that the nascent civilization of the old west will be destroyed.  This, together with a high level of violence, gives these works what I would call an apocalyptic or post-apocalyptic feeling.

 

Finally, these westerns are also notable for their ambivalence towards civilization itself.  In Blood Meridian, government officials put bounties on the scalps of Indians.  In The Proposition, the desire to "civilize" Australia leads the authorities to force Charlie Burns to kill one of his brothers to save the other.  And in Red Dead Redemption, the true enemy is not Dutch, the outlaw, but the sinister and hypocritical government agent who breaks the law whenever it suits him in his relentless search for power.

Of course, some of these ideas may sound familiar to some of you who have read my novella, Oklahoma 1891 (available at the Love and Fiction website).  In my book, Bill Bread leads an attack on a Cherokee camp where Augustus Winter (the leader of his former gang) is hiding.  Winter escapes and begins to round up the other members of the gang for a final stand.

If it's true that what I call Apocalyptic Westerns are a relatively recent development (although there are earlier films, such as The Wild Bunch, that might qualify) and are gaining in popularity, why is this the case?

I think the answer comes from a sense of ambivalence towards technology and developoment.  Not only does humanity seem to be destroying the planet, we seem to be powerless to stop it, despite everyone's best intentions.  Why is it that we get richer and more free and more educated, we start destroying the planet even faster?  Why is it that when everyone knows what needs to be done, we don't do it?  How is it that something like the gulf oil disaster can happen?  How can we be so powerless to stop the forces we unleash?  Sometimes, to me at least, it seems like our whole society is like a runaway stage coach, with all the horses galloping towards a cliff. 

No genre represents the struggle between nature and civilization as starkly as the Western.  In particular, the lifestyle of the Native Americans or Aboriginals represents a different way humanity could have organized itself, one which is more in tune with nature.  And so the Western allows us to ask: what would we do if we could turn back the clock?  Would we choose our modern lifestyle, with health care and culture, but also with landfills, fast food, Internet pornography, nuclear weapons and religious fanaticism?  Or would we say no to it all?  Would we side with Arthur Burns and Augustus Winter, and turn our backs on it, and disappear into the wilderness, in private apocalypses of our own making?

 

Whereas post-apocalyptic fiction shows us the potential horror of the downfall of our civilization, the Apocalyptic Western explores the beginning of that process - and to ask whether we should have started it at all. It implies that all our endeavours may be futile, that we are just heading back to where we began, and that in the end, the only thing left will be the laughter of the judge - waiting for us, after all this time.

See below for some quotations.

 

From Blood Meridian:

 

And they are dancing, the board floor slamming under the jackboots and the fiddlers grinning hideously over their canted pieces. Towering over them all is the judge and he is naked dancing, his small feet lively and quick and now in doubletime and bowing the the ladies, huge and pale and hairless, like an enormous infant. He never sleeps, he says. He says he'll never die. He bows to the fiddlers and sashays backwards and throws back his head and laughs deep in his throat and he is a great favorite, the judge. He wafts his hat and the lunar dome of his skull passes palely under the lamps and he swings about and takes possession of one of the fiddles and he pirouettes and makes a pass, two passes, dancing and fiddling at once. His feet are light and nimble. He never sleeps. He says that he will never die. He dances in light and in shadow and he is a great favorite. He never sleeps, the judge. He is dancing, dancing. He says that he will never die.

 

From The Proposition:

 

Samuel Stote: What's a misanthrope, Arthur?
Two Bob: Some bugger who fuckin' hates every other bugger.
Samuel Stote: Hey, I didn't ask you, you black bastard
Arthur Burns: He's right Samuel. A misanthrope is one who hates humanity.
Samuel Stote: Is that what we are, misanthropes?
Arthur Burns: Good lord no. We're a family.
 

From Red Dead Redemption:

 

Ross: Oh spare me the noble savage fall on my sword tripe, already. It's nauseating. You don't wish to be dead. You're an insignificant creature, desperately clinging onto life like the rest of the scum in this town. Yeah, I know it's tough. You like Dutch. He's a charming fellow. He makes sense. He's like one of those nature writers from back East. Only he gets things a tiny little step too far. Rather than just loving the flowers and the animals and the harmony between man and beast, he shoots people in the head for money. And disagreeing with him.

Archer: He's a goddamn killer.

Ross: Now, I'm not a great intellect, but the metaphysical leap from admiring the flower to shooting a man in the head because he doesn't like the flower, is a leap too far. So...I know it's easy. You see we -- me and Archer -- we're the bad guys. We enforce the rules. Now, while the rules may not be perfect, they're really not so bad.

Archer: Exactly, what's the alternative?

Ross: Yeah, see I'll tell you what the alternative is. It's not complicated. It's about one man and his gun versus another man. Sure, civilization may be dull, but the alternative, Mr. Marston, is hell. 

Marston: And, the way you enforce this civilization, this freedom for men to like or not like flowers or whatever in God's name you were just talking about, is to kidnap a man's wife and son? 

Marston: Well, I know there's contradictions. I'm not going to lie to you. As I said, I'm not a great intellect. Now, after the debacle with the army and the bank, we have to put Mr. Van der Linde to rest ourselves. Will you help us? 

Marston: Do I have any choice? 

Ross: Now that you mention it, no. 

Marston: Then, what was that pretty speech in aid of? 

Ross: I don't rightly know, but it sure felt good saying it.

 

From Oklahoma 1891:

 

“In order for it to exist it cannot tolerate anything else. You can’t be able to step outside of it. It has to be everywhere or else it will die. I thought I was like God, and I guess I was, compared to a civilized man. But I made a mistake. I looked at a civilized man on his own. You can’t do that. You can only understand a civilized man as a part of something bigger. They make something when they’re all taken together. Something meaner than me. I thought I kept coming on. But I ain’t nothing like this thing they’ve got now. I never let up for a moment in my life but it wasn’t enough. I’m just a man. This thing that’s making itself is going to live forever.”

Bill shifted a little in the tub. He opened his mouth and blood came out.

Now Winter was dressing himself quickly.

“People don’t make this thing; it’s this thing that makes people. It’s as natural as a dream. And it’s meaner than me, Bill. And it’s never going to die.”

Winter was dressed. He looked at Bill in the tub. “Be seeing you,” he said.