All the Pretty Horses Criticism

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Seeing God in Different Places Cormac McCarthy’s novel, All the Pretty Horses is about a young man, John Grady Cole, and his good friend, Rawlings, journey to Mexico to escape the industrializing United States. Along the way, John Grady falls in love, only to be thrown in jail and deserted by his lover, Alejandra, whose actions contribute to John’s loss of faith in God, which he ponders as he rides off into the sunset at the end of the novel. All the Pretty Horses is highly religious in nature and goes into vast detail to describe the faiths and beliefs associated with God through symbols, such as blood, the beliefs of other people, and imagery, which seem to affect John’s spiritual journey. All the Pretty Horses is filled with several references to religion such as varied portrayals of faith, beliefs, and practices associated with God. The spirit of the landscape through which John and Rawlings journey is also portrayed is also portrayed in a reverent, if not religious, light (Tieger). While the novel is told through mostly through brief vignettes and clipped dialogue, the passages pertaining to God, horses, and landscape are longer in length and more poetic in language (Tieger). When Tieger proclaims that, “Even the blood so often referenced in the story can be related to the book’s religious themes and imagery. Christian theology, after all, is based on Christ’s bloodshed as the defining act that redeems humanity,” It further supports the thought of blood as a religious symbol. The Catholic practice of communion is also a blood ritual; Catholics believe that the wine imbibed during the communion is transfigured into Christ’s blood (Ahearn). McCarthy was raised Catholic and is familiar with these practices (Tieger). Tieger states that, “Interestingly, while John believes in God, the people around him question God’s existence,” which is supported by several
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