The novel is dedicated to Susan Sontag, who published an influential essay in 1966 in which she said the following:
"America was founded on a genocide, on the unquestioned assumption of the right of white Europeans to exterminate a resident, technologically backward, colored population in order to take over the continent."
If I ever meet Larry McMurtry, I want to ask him if his dedication had anything to do with this quote.
4 comments:
Most likely it does not. McMurtry is well aware of the Indians equal (and violent) unwillingness to "get along" with the newly arrived whites. Sontag's comments smack of the sort of one-sided knowledge that is fully described in ad nauseum in Howard Zinn's "liberal" propoganda tome "A People's History of the United States." Sontag is a super left-wing liberal who was once quoted as saying, "The white race is the cancer of human history." She is the sort of liberal I described in my politics post, the sort of person who screams for black reperations yet is absolutely ignorant of the large number of blacks in England who owned slaves as well as the tremendous number of blacks who, from the coasts of Africa, sold their own kin into slavery. McMurtry is probably too old to spend much time analyzing the current set of liberals who are representing his ideals; but I hope to God, despite his gay cowboy screenplay, that he is too smart to fall for tripe Sontag and her set not only represent but blindly salivate over.
You may be correct, but this still leaves the question of why McMurtry dedicated the book to Susan Sontage if he had no affinity with her point of view. Why would a red-blooded American dedicate his novel to an unAmerican shrew like Sontag?
I should point out that the Comanches did not have the option of getting along or assimilating. Such a concept would have had no meaning in their 19th century world. They had to either fight or acquiese.
Like I say, if I ever meet McMurtry, I will ask him why he dedicated the book to Sontag.
In the meantime, I quote from STREETS OF LAREDO.
"But then, none of their work had been glorious. It had all been bloody, hard, and tiring, from their first foray against the Kiowa until now. There were no bugles, no parades, and very few certainties, in the life they led as Rangers. Call had killed several men, Indian, white, and Mexican, whose courage he admired; in some cases he had even admired their ideals. Many times, going into battle, a portion of his sympathies had been with the enemy. The Mexicans along the border had been robbed, by treaty, of country and cattle that had been their grandparents'; the Comanche and the Kiowa had to watch the settlement of hunting grounds that had been theirs for many generations.
Call didn't blame the Mexicans for fighting. He didn't blame the Comanche or the Kiowa, either. Had he been them, he would have fought just as hard. He was pledged to arrest them or remove them, not to judge them."
This is closest that Call, an obtuse man, ever comes that I can recall to any kind of moral sensibility.
Would McMurtry agree with Call?
An addendum to my first comment, since, on second reading it seems harsh--attribute it having written it in the heat and now going on a week with A/C.
I think that perhaps McMurtry is aware of his colleague's ideals, and, why he may share them, he isn't as rabidy vocal as Sontag. My point in a nutshell is that some--like Sontag--have such an aggresive voice toward issues that people who already agree with them to some extent are turned off by her acidic and accusatory approach. All people deserve equality--all races, all straights, gays, etc.--but to constantly fault the majority of whites alive today seems both foolish and defeating. More later, and I want to comment on your above post, and especially the wonderful Bradbury piece. Excellent piece, there. Hope for A/C at the Denison home...
Right, I agree that "getting along" was not a concept that many Native tribes could comprehend, or would have tried to do had they understood it. My point is the Susan Sontag's of the world refuse to look at that aspect of the white/Indian wars.
Who knows why McMurtry would do such a thing. Perhaps she found a book for him he wanted. Or perhaps she was good in the sack. Maybe he was wary of her abusive mouth and wanted to hold back the wolves which might come, so to speak.
I think McMurtry would agree with Call to an extent, mostly because, in many regards, Call is McMurtry, or vise versa. If I had to choose between the two, based upon the non-fiction he's published, I'd say McMurtry is more like Call than Gus--self-absorbed, quiet, and a bit aloof. McMurtry published a book some years back that includes topics along the lines you mention, Oh, What a Slaughter, but it is a slippery book to run across, and I have yet to order it online. Perhpas we can read it and gain some more insight.
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