[zerbinxx]

There a couple themes in this particular passage that really come through to me: steel/fire/stone, the holes in the earth being a “path”, the wanderers following a command they can’t comprehend. To me it evokes it’s a commentary on the weary fatalism of westward expansion, the grim meaninglessness/banality of evil of the nascent industrial revolution. I really love the idea of those exploring the west as a gang of bone-collectors, which tracks with BM’s ghastly but realistic scalp economy.

[dclowd9901]

I get the sense that McCarthy didn’t just find banality in evil but also in beauty and good. Not that they were bad things (any more than “banal evil” is a good thing) but more that they just _are_. His storytelling always felt to me like an illustration of “how can you know what’s bad or good in the grand scheme?”