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In a Narrow Grave : Essays on Texas
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Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
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Writing with characteristic grace and wit, Larry McMurtry tackles the full spectrum of his favorite themes -- from sex, literature, and cowboys to rodeos, small-town folk, and big-city slickers.
First published in 1968, In a Narrow Grave is the classic statement of what it means to come from Texas. In these essays, McMurtry opens a window into the past and present of America's largest state. In his own words:
"Before I was out of high school, I realized I was witnessing the dying of a way of life -- the rural, pastoral way of life. In the Southwest the best energies were no longer to be found on the homeplace, or in the small towns; the cities required these energies and the cities bought them...."
"I recognized, too, that the no-longer-open but still spacious range on which my ranching family had made its livelihood...would not produce a livelihood for me or for my siblings and their kind....The myth of the cowboy grew purer every year because there were so few actual cowboys left to contradict it...."
"I had actually been living in cities for fourteen years when I pulled together these essays; intellectually I had been a city boy, but imaginatively, I was still trudging up the dusty path that led out of the country...."
PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS:
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 976.406
EAN: 9780684868691
ISBN: 0684868695
Label: Simon & Schuster
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 208
Publication Date: 2001-07-17
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Studio: Simon & Schuster
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CUSTOMER REVIEWS:
Entertaining, intelligent perceptions with occasional tributes -
This book, dating back to 1968, following the immense success of three early novels, is the author's first attempt at writing non-fiction. In some ways, McMurtry seems more comfortable in the novel where his imagination and characterizations flourish. It could be that in fiction, all people are held equal at least in original creation of the characters, and an author is then free to treat them in the way he sees fit. Whereas in non-fiction, it becomes more difficult to offer opinions apart from naming people directly. At the same time, it is in non-fiction where an author has an opportunity to be forthright and authentic. These qualities remain true in this volume.
Keeping this in mind, McMurtry instead chooses to deal with regional subjects including Cowboys, cities, growing up, and family issues. Each essay with the possible exception of one is filled with classic McMurtry prose that spins smoothly, academically, and honestly. What begins with a humorous look at the making of Hud, ends with a deep, heartfelt tribute to members of the McMurtry clan. In the middle we find honest appraisals of various cities, sexuality, literature, and a diatribe against the astrodome.
The writing is intelligent and erudite with an appropriate blend of training and folkish earthiness, resulting in essays that set the stage for a lifetime of great writing in both fiction and non-fiction genres. The final essay in this book covers the McMurtry family and in particular Uncle Johnny, a man worthy of distinction and treated with the honor he so richly deserves. Aside from the sweeping generalizations and rather banal explanations of various cities in Texas, this book is an energetic read that could be enjoyed by everyone, particularly residents of Texas.
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In A Narrow Grave -
Larry McMurtry's only great works was Lonesome Dove. He is very narrow minded. In my opinion, he abused his readership just because he had a successful novel in Lonesome Dove. He is a very negative person and offers nothing of positive influence in A Narrow Grave or any of his other publishings except Lonesome Dove. Larry McMurtry is prejudiced to all people from the south just because one southerner "offended" him. I reget wasting my money on any of his other "works". He reminds me of Steinbeck. Steinbeck's only greatness was Grapes of Wrath, yet he was considered a literary giant because he published so many other books.
Messing with Texas. . . -
McMurtry, in this collection of essays about Texas, says he prefers fiction to nonfiction, for various reasons, but I for one find these ambivalent ruminations on his home state more enjoyable than some of his fiction. The insights come fast and furious in this short book, by comparison with a slow-moving novel like "Moving On," written about this same time, where a few ideas are stretched thin across several hundred pages.
Published in 1968, the content of "Narrow Grave" will seem dated to some readers. Written in the shadow of the assassination in Dallas and while another Texan was in the White House, the essays capture Texas in a period of rough transition from its rural past to its globalized present (the rise and fall of Enron would certainly have been featured in a current version of this book).
Much of it is timeless, however. It includes one of my favorite McMurtry essays, "Take My Saddle From the Wall: A Valediction," in which he provides a history of the McMurtry family, who settled in the 1880s on 320 acres west of Wichita Falls and in the following generation relocated to the Panhandle to live mostly as cowboys and ranchers. In this essay, McMurtry separates the mythic cowboy from the actual one and describes how cowboys are probably the biggest believers in the myths about them. It's full of ironies, colorful personalities, and wonderful details.
Altogether, the book attempts to present an unsentimental portrait of a state that also tends to get carried away by its own myths. The result is often a jaundiced view and gets to sounding like the worst Paul Theroux travel writing, where it seems like the writer has a personal grudge against the place he's describing. A car trip from Brownsville to the Panhandle is great fun for the wealth of local color captured along the way, but McMurtry focuses on every unhappy and unfortunate detail as if to warn the reader away from ever doing the same. The description of a fiddlers contest in East Texas is downright unkind.
It's easy to see, however, that it's a lover's quarrel McMurtry has with Texas. I gladly recommend this entertaining book to readers curious about the Lone Star State and the man who wrote "The Last Picture Show" and "Lonesome Dove"
Accurate and Fun Record of Texas of the l960's -
So it's dated history now, but written when Larry McMurtry was a young man beginning his publishing career. What an interesting and insightful read into the views of a "younger man" who later became an honored Pulitzer prize winner! As a native Texan, about McMurtry's age, I can recall a l960's Texas. He has treated his account with wit, energy, honesty and humor! I loved every page of the book and found myself chuckling at life the way it once was in the Lone Star state. As some have mentioned, it would be interesting to have a modern-day follow up of the Texas of today, but perhaps since Mr. McMurtry has now chosen to return to his roots, in Archer City, leaving the Eastern cities to other folks, he might be completely satisfied and comfortable with life as it in his small hometown in rural Texas where on each corner of the town square, he has placed a sizeable bookstore housing rare and collectable books, his legacy to future generations of Texans and others interested in such matters. I have toured these collections, and they are impressive indeed!
Evelyn Horan - teacher/counselor/author
Jeannie, A Texas Frontier Girl Books One - Three
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Narrow Graves & Wide Open Spaces -
Larry McMurtry knows Texas, and in 1968 put together a book of his observations about all things Texas called In a Narrow Grave. The title is a fragment of a line from the song "The Dying Cowboy"; the title of the song relates more obviously to McMurtry's main topic. From McMurtry's perspective Texas is on the cusp of a change of identity, from cattle rich to oil rich. He both laments and celebrates the passing of the cowboy looking from the Texas that once was to what Texas is becoming. He does all of this in a manner that is both amusing, informative and thought provoking.
McMurtry chose to be "bookish" as he puts it, to following in his father and uncles' footsteps, though as McMurtry relates, those footsteps were being blown away and getting more difficult to follow all the time. He is critical of both the past he admires and the present he seems to distrust.
His journey is at times objective, subjective and intensely personal. In the most touching piece, the last in the book, he introduces us to the McMurtry clan and gives us a family profile of success and failure on the open Texas plain that is touching and heartbreaking in its depth. He describes lost times, places and people.
The shortfall here is the material is dated. Thirty-plus years have produced much change and it would have been interesting if McMurtry had produced an epilogue to bring us up to date and help us close the years since In a Narrow Grave was first published.
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