A Country of Lone Men: Cormac McCarthy’s Morally Immune Rugged Individuals By Ada Cinar Just how dangerous is he? Compared to what, the bubonic plague? (McCarthy 141) Cormac McCarthy’s ninth novel, No Country for Old Men has captivated American readers since its release in 2005. In it, Anton Chigurh, a killer with no distinguishable features and no identifiable race or creed hunts down a cowboy, Llewellyn Moss, and is tracked by Sherriff Ed Tom Bell. Originally written as a screenplay (and readapted for the big screen less than two years after its initial book release) it unsettled readers and critics alike. It was an instant critical and commercial hit and has served as the object of intense scholarly work since. McCarthy’s works have been interpreted as commentaries on the American – and more specifically, Western – tradition of rugged individualism. No Country for Old Men is no exception, with critics implicating Chigurh, Moss, and Bell in it. For example, in “Democracy, Justice, and Tragedy in McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men,” Benjamin Mangrum suggests that the neoliberal setting of the novel (Texas, 1980) enculturates individualism within which the characters operate and / or fail to survive. Saxton and Cole argue in “No Country for Old Men: A Search for Masculinity in Later Life” that Sherriff Bell’s refusal of professional and personal help ultimately result in his failure to stop Chigurh at the cost of citizens’ lives. Raymond Malewitz sees individualistic rebellion in Chigurh’s use of everyday objects as killing tools in “Anything Can Be an Instrument: Misuse and Rugged Consumerism in McCarthy’s No Country for Old Men.” 97
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