chat is that true?
>>25261483How did you interpret it?
>>25261515I thought the Judge just wanted to kill and rape
>>25261483>because the devil would never-ever follow good men around to corrupt themthe internet's free, you can just say things and people will also just say things to the things you say because that's also free
>>25261483The Judge is not evil. He is morally reprehensible, but he is not evil. He is the logical end result of Blood Meridian's central theme of freedom. The Glanton Gang (including Glanton himself) are all men liberated from something: prison, slavery, the church, whatever. They operate in a region where rule of law has failed due to the government(s) also failing, so they are free to do whatever they like. Even in this their base urges kind of funnel into amorality (scalp hunting) not because they're all psychos who love doing it but because in the absence of civilization the only thing waiting for an unoccupied, unproductive man is dehydration in the desert (or worse if injuns find you.) The Judge is the guy who embodies this freedom the most as he sups deeply of every single source of freedom such an environment offers, even the really bad kind that a decent person concerned with morality (or at least law) would never approach. To imply the Judge is the Devil would imply he is beholden to something (no pun intended), the punishment of God. Yet Blood Meridian repeatedly shines a light on the absence of God in a place were no one can effectively enforce law, order or any sort of decency that may stem from order. This isn't what the Devil actually does biblically and a guy like Corncob who does tons of research would understand the difference between a layman "I create evil, I am the source of all evil" chaotic-retard Satan and the actual character in Scripture. It's like people who think Anton Chigurh actually has a code of ethics when he doesn't, he is just a sophist who will say any old shit if it means he can inch himself closer to what he actually wants and enjoys, murder. Kind of like the Judge, who is not Satan.
>>25261483What's with this drawing of the judge that keeps showing up? It's not even a picture book. Who made it and why?
>>25261797I like this interpretation, though I disagree with your point about the Judge. He's not just abnormally evil, he's also abnormally clever, nothing about him is normal and that's why he's so different from the rest of the characters. In a sense, he's like the physical embodiment of this ethos you describe in the Glanton Gang.
>>25261833The Judge is certainly weird and comes off as supernatural to the point where he is using cannons as sidearms, but at the same time this is more akin to wild west mythos than any concrete implication he is Satan, a demon or some wholly preternatural entity.
I thought it was a sendup of white supremacy. Glanton starts out as a killer of non-whites who looks down on Indians as savages. And Mexicans he doesn’t rate as much more civilized. By the end the gang are robbing and killing whites.They’re just as savage and uncivilized
>>25261842>to the point where he is using cannons as sidearmsI was thinking about that part when it say that he learned Dutch in a single day.>but at the same time this is more akin to wild west mythos than any concrete implication he is SatanI think that's the point yes, he's an abstract mythological figure, but ambiguous enough. It is not wrong to compare him to the Devil, though it does not capture him entirely and I think that was precisely the point.
>>25261872>I thought it was a sendup of white supremacy.That would be the case if the indians and the mexicans were portrayed as righteous in any way, whereas in the book they are as savage as Glanton's gang itself. It's more about Hobbes' state of nature than any kind of neo-progressive stance about oppressed communities.
>>25261880>It is not wrong to compare him to the DevilIt's wrong in many ways if you're talking about the reader doing that. In-universe it's understandable since no one living out there is reasonably very educated, they probably do just equate anything evil or unusual/foreign with the Biblical devil (and not even accurately since, again, they probably aren't educated on the Bible for the most part.)
>>25261901Well, but besides the Judge himself, Tobin was probably the most educated from the bunch, and despite doing "evil" things himself, he was horrified with the Judge particularly and said explicitly that he's some kind of devil. You could argue that he's assuming that because he was a priest, and that's fair, but I don't think his thoughts should be dismissed entirely because he's got that bias, since I don't think he means it lightly either.
>>25261933christkekes can always be dismissed
I assumed that he was intended to be seen as the devil from the beginning, when the travelling preacher says holden is the devil himself while holden accuses him, leading to his lynching. The characterization of holden by the honest preacher right at the beginning of the book is probably instructive
>>25261701>the internet's free,My internet costs about $16 a month
>>25261483lmao that’s not point of the Judge and McCarthy would laugh at that moralistic interpretation
>bad character is... le devilNo.
>>25261483What. The Devil isn’t allowed to hangout with random people?
I thought the Judge was the Gnostic God not the Devil
>>25261483He’s The Kid’s angel and devil on his shoulders ;)
>>25261842What about his ongoing struggle with the priest for the kid's soul? What about him making offers for men's most valued posessions? not to mention the child murder and deliberate destruction. It's more than just self serving self interest>>25263522then explain oh enlightened one
>>25263762>What about his ongoing struggle with the priest for the kid's soul? What about him making offers for men's most valued posessions? not to mention the child murder and deliberate destruction. It's more than just self serving self interestWhy?
>>25263787What does he care what the kid does? Why does he want to win him over?
I read this book a long time ago. Was the gang really that evil from the start ? They just started as scalp hunter before becoming mad ?
When he came back down through the dark to the barn the five horses were standing under the pecan trees at the far side of the house. They hadnt been unsaddled and in the morning they were gone. The following night she came to his bed and she came every night for nine nights running, pushing the door shut and latching it and turning in the slatted light at God knew what hour and stepping out of her clothes and sliding cool and naked against him in the narrow bunk all softness and perfume and the lushness of her black hair falling over him and no caution to her at all. Saying I dont care I dont care. Drawing blood with her teeth where he held the heel of his hand against her mouth that she not cry out. Sleeping against his chest where he could not sleep at all and rising when the east was already gray with dawn and going to the kitchen to get her breakfast as if she were only up early.Then she was gone back to the city. The following evening when he came in he passed Estéban in the barn bay and spoke to the old man and the old man spoke back but did not look at him. He washed up and went to the house and ate his dinner in the kitchen and after he’d eaten he and the hacendado sat at the diningroom table and logged the stud book and the hacendado questioned him and made notes on the mares and then leaned back and sat smoking his cigar and tapping his pencil against the edge of the table.
>>25263854I think Glanton was stated to have a wife and kids, either alive or murdered by Indians can't rememberThey all have some backstory though it is
>>25262101not an argument but ok
