The quote is from Larry McMurtry, on the occasion of winning the Golden Globe award for the screenplay for "Brokeback Mountain." I'm reading that, from 2006, because I just got around, after all these years to making a Larry McMurtry tag for this blog. I dislike tag proliferation, and I avoid making a tag for individuals unless I think they'll be used a few times. It turned out there were 4 old posts with Larry McMurtry's name in them.
The other 3 are:
1. Larry McMurtry effusing over Diane Keaton: "She told me she hoped to be complicated, someday."
2. Larry McMurtry answering questions from a NYT interviewer, including ""What, exactly, do you think cowboys represent, other than the triumph of alpha males?" Answer:
Cowboys are a symbol of a freer time, when people could go all the way from Canada to Mexico without seeing a fence. They stand for good ol' American values, like self-reliance.3. Here's the good, timelessly timely one: "Larry McMurtry raves (literally) about Clinton's book." Clinton is Bill Clinton, and the book is "My Life." Let's go back and read what McMurtry banged out on his juicy Hermes 3000 back in 2004:
Maybe some American values, but you can't say that cowboys were ever interested in spreading democracy.
No, they were interested in spreading fascism.
Undoubtedly he has occasionally made time for bedroom sports, but not much time. Gennifer Flowers, Paula Jones and Monica Lewinsky may be three of the nicest ladies in America, but their "conquest," however we are to understand that term, does not make Clinton the world's No. 1 ladies' man, or even the No. 1 ladies' man of northwest Washington....
The very press that wanted to discredit him and perhaps even run him out of town instead made him a celebrity, a far more expensive thing than a mere president....
And somehow, vaguely, it all has to do with sex - not necessarily sex performed, just sex in the world's head. I doubt myself that Bill Clinton's sex life has been all that different from anybody else's: pastures of plenty, pastures of less than plenty, pastures he should get out of immediately, and not a few acres of scorched earth.
During the silly time when Clinton was pilloried for wanting to debate the meaning of "is," I often wondered why no one pointed out that he was educated by Jesuits, for whom the meaning of "is" is a matter not lightly resolved.
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I think McMurtry was confusing cowboys with gunslingers. Cowboys drove cattle. They were libertarian, not fascist. Perhaps there were cattlemen ranchers--those who owned the cattle--who were fascist--otherwise why the range wars with farmers? but cowboys themselves were cattle caretakers and movers.
Brokeback Mountain was another salvo in the long running media attempt to fabricate the myth of an ongoing war of persecution against gay men.
The myth is that tens of thousands of gay men died during the 70s and 80s at the hands of roving bands of homophobic straight men.
They died of AIDS as a result of their own behavior.
Althouse likes to play this game of blood libel, too. But, then, Althouse has been using straight men as scapegoats all her life. Fag hags do that.
That movie is a vicious propaganda lie.
Hermes 3000.
Betamax3000.
The 3000 series is always a good one.
I've never seen the movie "Brokeback Mountain."
I have read the short story, which you can read much faster than you can sit through a movie. I think there's a crying-into-a-shirt scene.
What's the deal about crying into a shirt? Didn't "The Great Gatsby" take possession for all time of crying-into-shirts drama?
Interesting that the NYT reporter feels it important to point out that cowboys weren't interested in spreading democracy.
For the progressive, who is a breed of moral fundamentalist (minus the belief in God), everything is viewed through the lens of their religion, egalitarianism. If you're a progressive, you can't allow the idea of a cowboy to go uncriticized, representing as it does the ideal of free, virile, assertive white masculinity. If there is an archetype more directly opposed to the progressivism of a NYT reporter than a cowboy I don't know what it would be.
Apparently McMurtry is a good, tamed liberal himself, because he belches up a tired progressive meme about fascism. (Not to mention writing a novel tarnishing the cowboy myth by associating it with homosexuality.)
No, they were interested in spreading fascism.
Please. This is an insult to cowboys past and present.
The very press that wanted to discredit him and perhaps even run him out of town instead made him a celebrity, a far more expensive thing than a mere president...
The press has ALWAYS loved Slick Willy. He was loved then and loved today. The press was dragged kicking and screaming into the Lewinsky scandal. The press NEVER "wanted to discredit him." These are facts easily discerned by anyone paying attention back then and now.
I doubt myself that Bill Clinton's sex life has been all that different from anybody else's …
GET OUT of here! This is just foolish.
During the silly time when Clinton was pilloried for wanting to debate the meaning of "is," I often wondered why no one pointed out that he was educated by Jesuits …
Because the press for the most part simply parrots what the slightly more creative among them invent. Google "JournoList." This is also an example of what the Left likes to call "nuance."
Undoubtedly McMurtry is an accomplished writer but that does not give him a pass on some obvious idiocies.
Said before but it deserves repeating: The more intelligent the person the more exquisite and convoluted the rationalizations for their contradictions. I believe that I have a predilection toward being beguiled by the talented and/or intelligent. I also believe that I am far from alone in that propensity. Once I realized this a little bit more of reality was revealed to me. Forearmed is forewarned.
I wish I knew how to QWERTYU.
Apparently McMurtry is a good, tamed liberal himself, because he belches up a tired progressive meme about fascism. (Not to mention writing a novel tarnishing the cowboy myth by associating it with homosexuality.)
He just wrote the screen play. It is based on a short story by.....some woman whos name I can't remember. I got the impression from the book of short stories that the writer didn't like men very much.
Brokeback Mountain was another salvo in the long running media attempt to fabricate the myth of an ongoing war of persecution against gay men.
Have you seen it? I'm guessing you haven't. It isn't about persecution of gays.
Ann Proulx wrote BBM.
I can't see how someone can equate Fascism with the rugged individualism we associate with cowboys. Perhaps he was joking?
1). What the fuck was fascist about cowboys? Talk about Does Not Compute. It's annoying that people fall into using "fascist" as a substitute for "vaguely distasteful."
2). I already dislike the guy because he fetishizes a damn typewriter. I hate writers who cart around their damn typewriters and can't stop talking about it. It's just damn tool and you would likely write just as well on a computer or with a pen.
"Lonesome Dove" was great, the book and the series. I have missed the rest of his oeuvre. It sounds as though I didn't miss much.
Clinton raised lying to the state of art it occupies today in politics. Politicians used to avoid obvious lies that would be easily identified. Now, they revel in them, especially Obama. Of course, that doesn't apply to Republicans. They lie but they get caught and shamed.
"Ann Proulx wrote BBM."
She didn't write the screenplay of the movie though.
Thanks Ken.I knew it was an Ann , but couldn't remember her last name.
"She didn't write the screenplay of the movie though."
Sort of covered that already.
Michael K said...
"Lonesome Dove" was great, the book and the series. I have missed the rest of his oeuvre. It sounds as though I didn't miss much.
Anything he wrote about the old west is worth reading. The other stuff....meh.
Try "Buffalo Gals"
Yeah, I'd say Clinton's sex life was (or even is) a tad spicier than most guys. Clinton got blowjobs under the desk while he was discussing foreign policy on the telephone. You try doing that in your job.
I've never seen the movie "Brokeback Mountain."
Ang Lee directs the most ponderous movies. I haven't read the short story, but I bet it moves along a lot faster.
I do miss the Hermes 3000 portable that got me through journalism school. The handle was on its fiberglass cover. You could grab the handle, lower the cover over the typewriter, and pick it up in one swift motion. Way cool. Here is an example.
McMurtry's interviewer for the Times was Deborah Solomon, who took McMurtry's statement about fascism at face value (Cowboy Culture). Here's what art critic Jerry Saltz says about Deborah Solomon:
"OMG! Deborah Solomon! One of my writing heroes, a friend who’s brilliantly transforming the interview format into a form of criticism!"
OMG! Criticism!
Cowboys were the original seasonal migrant labor force. No wives and no children known about, and not much if any education. That Democratic enough for you?
Then there were the the King Ranch land assembling cattle barons when the RR to Chicago go as close as Ft Worth. They relied on Hispanic families living as peasants. That was a feudal way, but not fascist.
Then along came oil wealth. See, the movie Giant that was first an Edna Ferber novel about the history of this period. Add in Liz Taylor, Rock Hudson, James Dean and Chill Wills and you got yourself a TNT movie classic.
Cowboys were the original seasonal migrant labor force. No wives and no children known about, and not much if any education. That Democratic enough for you?
Then there were the the King Ranch land assembling cattle barons when the RR to Chicago go as close as Ft Worth. They relied on Hispanic families living as peasants. That was a feudal way, but not fascist.
Then along came oil wealth. See, the movie Giant that was first an Edna Ferber novel about the history of this period. Add in Liz Taylor, Rock Hudson, James Dean and Chill Wills and you got yourself a TNT movie classic.
@rusty.
Sorry, I'd scrolled past your comment and thought I was being corrected.
I disliked the short story. No reason at all to think it expresses what gay men feel, and I'm not sympathetic to gay men who marry women and confuse and disappoint them. That these men also cheat on those women is more hurt to the women.
Lonesome Dove
Comanche Moon
Cadillac Jack
All excellent!
I disliked the short story. No reason at all to think it expresses what gay men feel, and I'm not sympathetic to gay men who marry women and confuse and disappoint them. That these men also cheat on those women is more hurt to the women.
I agree it was a dishonest portrayal.it seem contrived to me, labored. Most of the stories in that book were.Almost as if she was trying to prove her feminist credentials.
Larry McMurtry does write a good western yarn.
My maternal grandfather was a land surveyor in west Texas and eastern New Mexico around the turn of the last century. He traveld by horse. There were still bandits on boarder of Mexico and Texas. Other than the local sheriff he was one of the few people that owned a handgun. He was paid in sections.
McMurtry is a very talented writer. Not only the books that Viking in Winter mentioned but "The Last Picture Show" and its sequels following the adult Duane and the books about graduate students and contemporary including "Hud", "Red River", "All My Friends are Going to be Strangers" and "Terms of Endearment" among others are all well worth reading.
@Freeman
Yes, indeed, I did see the movie.
And it is exactly what I said it was... a typical martyrdom manufacture movie intended to continue the myth that straight men have been deliberately carrying out a war of terror against gay men.
I also read the interview with Annie Proulx, who wrote the story on which the movie is based. She was quite explicit about her desire to write a propaganda tract.
1) I liked Lonesome Dove but I was annoyed that McMurtry didn't know what a Henry rifle was.
2) When I read the excerpt from the interview, I assumed "they were interested in spreading fascism" was a joke -- in response to the interviewer's stupid comment about the cowboys not spreading democracy. Certainly if anybody ever interviews me (unlikely, of course), I will look for an opportunity to blame the American cowboy for fascism.
Tough to read McMurtry after reading Cormac McCarthy.
I hope McMurtry was joking when he said the Cowboys were interested in spreading fascism. If not, you have to wonder what he thinks the word means.
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