Suttree

It is fair to speculate that this work was special to McCarthy since he was drawing a portrait of the town and era in which he grew up ( Knoxville, Tennessee in the 1950's ). Others, who are familiar with the work of William Faulkner ( as I am not ) will be better equipped to discuss whether this "southern" novel bears any major resemblance to the late master from Mississippi. My "take" on "SUTTREE" can only come ( as is natural ) from past literary experiences and, perhaps more importantly, a particular "world view". Although stronger and more learned readers will undoubtedly shed more light on the work, I hope nonetheless that the following thoughts will help others reflect on "SUTTREE" and decide for themselves what it's "all about".

After a short and soaring descriptive prelude ( a wasteland grotesquerie ), the novel's namesake Cornelius Suttree is introduced. Appropriately enough, this first glimpse takes place alongside the silent and abused Tennessee River, a Styx-like emblem of eternity running through the mid 20th century "Hades" of Knoxville, where Suttree lives on a rundown houseboat. Suttree's desultory "neutrality" towards existence is mixed with hallucinogenic dreams and flashbacks ( a key "vision" in the wilderness is reminiscent of "Snow" from Thomas Mann's "THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN" ). Seemingly carefree, going about his life in moment-to-moment fashion amidst his derelict companions, Suttree in fact lives completely in his past, haunted by ( among other things ) the memory of his patrician upbringing, failed marriage and a mysteriously significant "other". At times he seems an Old Testament prophet, full of insight and sublimated rage ( a contemporary Qoheleth ), his thoughts and actions reflecting the weary ruminations of a man trapped in hopelessness. Suttree's spiritual quandary is in recognizing that while others in his Knoxville circle seem damned by dint of fate, he himself chooses to live in a kind of purgatory, with the possibility of transcending his lot.

As opposed to the mythological archetypes displayed in "BLOOD MERIDIAN", the quirky and entertaining lost souls so sympathetically rendered in "SUTTREE" are all too human. There are several laugh out loud scenes in the book, many focusing on Suttree's oddball friend Gene Harrogate. Though the humor is intertwined with immense sadness, this aspect of McCarthy's style is a delightful surprise.

"SUTTREE" is a hard but compassionate glimpse at the tragedy and triumph underlying the human drama (a "story" in which we all play a part). On the basis of the two works with which I'm familiar, Cormac McCarthy writes with both purpose and artistry; surely he deserves his reputation as a modern literary master.


A terrestrial Hell   April 2, 2003
Daniel Myers (Greenville, SC USA)
36 out of 41 found this review helpful

I have never used this term in a review, but this is a work of genius. McCarthy's Blood Meridian may have a more taut artistic virtuousity to it, but Suttree rings sprawlingly true to life and love while at the same time delivering the poetic lyricism of the arabesques and grotesqueries of life that stamp McCarthy as the greatest and most visionary writer of our time. Here is the pathos, bitterweetness, and comedy (Can anyone forget Harrogate and the bats, much less his getting off the charge of bestiality because "A mellon ain't no beast"?!?) of being human.-All this delivered in the most magnificent sweeping prose since Lowry (A writer I'd recommend to McCarthy fans) and Faulkner.
But down to some philosophical nuts and bolts: This is a dark novel displaying a visionary medieval mindset, much like Lowry's Under The Volcano (To my mind, the only other novelist of pure genius of this century..). It is the seemingly effortless interweaving of the visionary with the mundane that make this novel so astounding. We are witnesses to page upon page of brilliant poetic lightenings upon a tableau of "a terrestrial hell" as Suttree puts it, a place which not only he, but we all inhabit.

To quote at length: "What deity in the realms of dementia, what rabid god decocted out of the smoking lobes of hydrophobia could have devised a keeping place for souls so poor as this flesh. This mawky wormbent tabernacle."

This is the question this brilliant work thrusts before the reader in page upon glowing page.


Suttree   May 22, 2005
C. R. Howard
15 out of 16 found this review helpful

Absolutely exquisite. Perhaps that adjective gets overused nowadays, but here it is appropriate - perhaps even not strong enough of a term. "Suttree" is a must must must-read. It is such a profound indictment of the human race that it could be used as evidence against us if we are ever sued by space aliens. When viewed in terms of "Blood Meridian" and all of C McC's pre-Natl Book Award works, his range as an author is revealed and is humbling. The man is our greatest living novelist. I am grateful to him for having offered this work to the world.


Beautiful Ugliness   July 28, 1999
23 out of 26 found this review helpful

This is a most extraordinary novel, densely packed with dark and dire images, by turns brutal and tender. It is elegant, down and dirty, occasionally shocking and surprisingly funny. I don't know when I have read more beautiful prose describing more debased circumstances than in Suttree.

I was introduced to this novel by a close friend who was so slammed by the impact of the first page that she had to put it down for a week just to let it sink in. I have to admit, I re-read the first 3 pages about a dozen times throughout my reading of the novel. They do pack a wallop. Actually, there are several passages in the book that so floored me I had to go back and re-read them.

The language of this tale is incredible, carefully wrought, full of fantastic words (keep a dictionary close by.) At times laconic, at times incredibly detailed. And at times so unrelentingly down and out you just have to laugh. Harold Pinter once praised Samuel Beckett saying that he 'leaves no stone unturned, no maggot lonely.' I'd say the same for McCarthy in this novel. Who else could generate so much sympathy for a melon-humping hayseed dork like Gene Harrogate? Or any other of the motley assemblage with whom Suttree inexplicably chooses to fraternize.

I don't want to ruin any surprises, so I'll just assure you that Suttree's immersion in debauchery and desolation is not for its own sake. The book has a heart. The book has soul to burn. This is just the best damned novel I've read in years. Maybe ever. Relish it.


Where have you gone, my blue-eyed son?   February 21, 2002
Matthew P Jung (Quarry Bay Hong Kong)
11 out of 14 found this review helpful

At some point in the adult or even young life, individuals undergo a period of inevitable self-doubt, wondering hypothetically, 'wouldn't it be great if I could just rid myself of all of this and live on a boat somewhere, in a place where no one I know now would ever find me?' or 'God take this pain away from me for I can't take it anymore!' Welcome to the life of Cornelius Suttree, the man who gave up the Matrix for a cragged houseboat in poverty-stricken Knoxville, where the river from which he hauls duck-billed catfish oozes, does not flow. Here the blind stagger and prophecize, junkmen and railroadmen or men who once were railroadmen philosophize on hopelessness (eg. God wouldn't have brought Lazarus back from hell, so he must have been sent back to the living world from heaven, and having seen heaven, how could he ever be happy again?), and black witches from their windows overlooking the gray, stinking city where decrepid youths poison bats with strychnine in order to exchange their stinking black corpses for cash at the local infirmary offer you your fate for a beer...or something like that. Suttree lives the simple life of a riverman, dabbling in catfishing, turtle-dining, and drinking down viscous moonshine - but this is not just a dark story of a man who has lost all hope for the world, though in it nothing goes as we, the readers, would like it to go. The book is an extremely slow read: it can take weeks and even months if not for its darkness then for its implicit requirement for the reader to thumb through his Oxford English Dictionary at least once per page. God, the beauty of the English language CANNOT be lost on the reader when McCarthy is at the pen. By the end of this swelling novel you are trapped in a world of characters, whom McCarthy goes to great lengths to develop. More importantly, you wish for an ending, in the same way you do when watching "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship..." But what you are confronted with is rather a continuance, as in an important court case. The question is, can the reader find triumph in continuance as opposed to his usual search for the happy ending or just an ending, period? The answer: there is no ending, there never is. But there can be dignity, even in chosen poverty. The book is ultimately a tale of dignity and integrity in a land of hopelessness. Can you bear this?