Reading McCarthy

Last October while attending the American Literature Association fiction symposium in Santa Fe, New Mexico, I managed to sequester two live, dyed-in-the-wool employed philosophers who also happen to be Cormac McCarthy experts.  My AV guy (which is me) thought to handle the situation in some arm chairs near an elevator using a very expensive microphone rig ($28 at least) which attached to my phone....

Rick Wallach, one of the founding members of the Cormac McCarthy Society and, indeed, of McCarthy studies in general, passed away on January 27th at the age of 75. A former president of the Cormac McCarthy Society, Rick taught English at the University of Miami.  He instituted and was the senior editor of the Cormac McCarthy Society casebook series, and was the editor of the two-volume collection...

After a long break in which your intrepid host has contended with everything from eye surgery to accreditation, the second part of the panel discussion on The Counselor is finally here. Returning for the second part of his first appearance on the podcast is Dr. Russell Hillier, whose consideration of the screenplay first sparked my interest in examining the text again.  He is Professor of English...

Full disclosure time here on the READING MCCARTHY podcast.  When Ridley Scott’s film The Counselor arrived in theaters with its very own shiny McCarthy screenplay, I was underwhelmed.  We’d been waiting for over half a decade for The Passenger and had no idea we’d be almost another ten years waiting for that project (and of course we had no concept of Stella Maris at the time). I found interesting...

For the podcast's 60th episode we are finally able to develop a lengthy and thorough discussion of The Passenger, McCarthy's penultimate novel from 2022.  I'm joined by two returning guests of the podcast: Dr. Lydia Cooper is a professor of American literature and director of the core curriculum at Seattle University. Her specializations include Native American literature, Western a...

Episode 60 of READING McCARTHY sees the return of one of my favorite guests, Dr. Stacey Peebles. In addition to her many other roles described below, she is the preeminent expert on McCarthy’s work in screenplays.  Please join us for a consideration of his various screenplays, both produced ( The Counselor ) and unproduced ( Cities of the Plain, No Country for Old Men, Men and Whales) as well as a...

The 58th episode brings back the excellent Dr. Dianne Luce to discuss with us McCarthy’s 2006 play The Sunset Limited (or is it a novel in dramatic form?). Produced first by the Steppenwolf Theater in Chicago in May of 2006, it later went on to open in New York.  Dianne Luce saw it in Chicago during that opening run and we’ve both seen the Tommy Lee Jones directed film version which aired on HBO i...

This past December your not-so-intrepid host was able to make a pilgrimage to San Marcos, Texas, to visit the Wittliff Collection in the Alkek Library at Texas State University and plumb its treasure trove of McCarthy archives.  My guest in this episode is Katie Salzmann, who has been Lead Archivist at The Wittliff Collections at Texas State since 2004. Prior to that, she worked with literary and...

This episode has a history that winds like a West Texas border road.  My guests are the Brothers Elmore, and we originally recorded it in April but one of the tracks went bad.  So finally at the end of our collective academic semesters, we once again discussed No Country for Old Men, speculating about its origins, its commentary on neo-liberalism, the film adaptation, and how some critics tried to...

Episode 55 is a discussion with award winning novelist, short story writer, poet, and big-time McCarthy fan, Ron Rash. Ron attended Gardner Webb University in Boiling Rock NC and then earned his master’s in English at Clemson University.  He is a writing and English faculty member at Western Carolina in Cullowhee, NC, where he serves as the John and Dorothy Parris Distinguished Professor of Appala...

This episode of READING MCCARTHY welcomes to the podcast for the first time Austin Smith.  Austin studied history and literature at the University of Georgia. He has worked as a photographer and a professional adventure photographer, following the art into aviation, mountaineering, and motorcycle racing. He now leads a human resources consulting business in Denver, Colorado . A couple of years ago...

This 53rd episode of READING MCCARTHY takes a long ramble down THE ROAD, McCarthy’s 2006 Pulitzer Prize winning novel of a father and son enduring life in a harrowing, ashen landscape after some undisclosed apocalypse. For this discussion I’m glad to welcome back guest Dr. Bryan Vescio. Professor and Chair of English at High Point University in North Carolina, Dr. Vescio has previously joined us f...

Episode 52 is a round table considering the impact of Ernest Hemingway’s writing on the works of Cormac McCarthy.  Joining us for this discussion are Dr. Olivia Carr Edenfield, Professor of English at Georgia Southern University.  She is a founding member of the Society for the Study of the American Short Story and Director of the American Literature Association.  She has recently published a defe...

Although the fact often goes unacknowledged, it is a truth that sometimes an author’s residence within and endurance in the canon is a result of how that author is perceived and taught in the academy.  Most literary scholars are also professors and teachers.  For this episode of Reading McCarthy I round up some of the usual suspects for a panel discussion upon teaching the works of McCarthy to stu...

The guest for our 50th episode is the OG himself, the redoubtable RICK WALLACH, who joins us for a rousing discussion of No Country for Old Men.  Somehow both Batman and Godzilla are referenced as we consider both the novel and the Coen Bros. film.  Rick Wallach has recently retired from teaching English at the University of Miami.  He is a founder of the Cormac McCarthy society, the senior and pr...

In this episode we head across the border one more time for a consideration of the Border Trilogy as a whole.  How does knowing how the story begins and ends change how we read any of the different parts?  My guests on this filibuster over the border include Dr. Nell Sullivan, a Kentuckian who earned her BA in English from Vanderbilt University and earned her PhD from Rice University.  She is curr...

The guest for this episode is Dr. Nick Monk, who joins me for a consideration of perhaps McCarthy’s most idiosyncratic work.  The 90s were an exciting time for McCarthy fans.  In 92 he published the award winning All the Pretty Horses, followed two years later by the next installment in the Border Trilogy, The Crossing. Before he would go on to close out the trilogy in 98, however, in 1995 he also...

Episode 47 of READING MCCARTHY considers the author’s references to and uses of disability in its many forms.  My guest DR BRENT CLINE.  He has published articles and chapters involving disability on Walker Percy, James Agee, and Daniel Keyes. His review  of The Passenger/Stella Maris was published with The University Bookman. He teaches a seminar on McCarthy every two years. As always, readers sh...

In this episode we ride to the end of the road in the last episode of the Border Trilogy, CITIES ON THE PLAIN.  My guest for this foray is Dr. Bryan Vescio, Professor and Chair of English at High Point University in North Carolina.  A guest on former episodes on faith and Suttree, Dr. Vescio is the author of the 2014 book Reconstruction in Literary Studies: An Informalist Approach , as well as num...

This is our final of 3 tribute episodes in the wake of Cormac McCarthy's passing this past June.  Guests on this final tribute episode include:  Dr. Steven Frye, professor and chair of English at California State University in Bakersfield.  Steve has just stepped down as President of the Cormac McCarthy Society. He is the author of Understanding Cormac McCarthy (Univ. of South Carolina Press)...

In the wake of Cormac McCarthy's passing on June 13, 2023, a number of excellent tributes and discussion pieces were published.  In this second of three tribute episode, we've asked for permission for the authors to read some of those tributes to McCarthy here on the podcast and we have also solicited a couple of others.    The guests this episode include:  Stacey Peebles, Chair of the E...

On June 13, 2023, we lost a literary giant.  Cormac McCarthy, the greatest writer of our time (in this podcast's completely unbiased opinion) passed away in Santa Fe, New Mexico, his home these past couple of decades.  E-mails and queries started pouring in, mostly asking, "are you going to do a special tribute podcast?  And the answer to that, is yes.  Episode 43 is the first of 3 plann...

Like the rest of the world I learned this past Tuesday, June 13th, that Cormac McCarthy had passed away at the age of 89.  This episode had already been recorded, but I thought it would still serve as an initial and quick response to the need to offer a tribute: it's a compilation of the responses to the question What's your favorite McCarthy novel, and why? from the podcast's first...

Episode 41 is our second excursion over the border as the Brothers Elmore and I finish our conversation about THE CROSSING.  Returning as the guests are twin scholars Jonathan and Rick Elmore.  That's right, twins.  Jonathan Elmore is Associate Professor of English at Savannah State University and the Managing Editor of Watchung Review .. He is the editor of Fiction and the Sixth Mass Extinct...

Episode 40 is a long ride through rough country as we dig into The CROSSING, McCarthy's masterful middle volume in the Border Trilogy.  My guests today are twin scholars Jonathan and Rick Elmore.  That's right, twins.  Jonathan Elmore is Associate Professor of English at Savannah State University and the Managing Editor of Watchung Review .. He is the editor of Fiction and the Sixth Mass...