The major characters of Chapter I are John Grady Cole, his best friend Rawlins, his parents, and his grandfather. But the sidekick Blevins, the landscape (as noted by others), and the horses are also major players in the story. McCarthy’s descriptions of the land, vegetation, and wildlife impart to the novel a tone and texture that frames the events and the characters.
The theme of nature is strong. The sense of place imbues the characters, especially John Grady, with a masculinity that makes them larger than life and certainly more significant than labels like “cowboy” or “macho.” John Grady is talented and skilled—lucky enough to be doing what he was born to do. When John Grady rides, he is one with the horse. This ease is seen clearly when he takes one foot out of its stirrup, leans over on the other side, and picks up Blevins’ hat, never slowing his horse and always maintaining the gait.
John Grady loves the land, and the first great tragedy of the story is the fact that his family’s ranch will be sold after his grandfather’s death. In analyzing the causes of the sale of the ranch, we see a changing world where a horse culture is dying. World War II is one of the villains of the story, because it has left John Grady’s father unable to take charge not only of his own life and marriage, but also of the ranch.
John Grady’s mother is an actress playing at a theater in San Antonio in a play that disappoints John Grady because it tells him nothing about the way the world “was or was becoming.” His mother is determined to get rid of the ranch, and she refuses to let John Grady lease it or become any part of it. All of the Mexican workers at the ranch will have to leave as well.
In this chapter, we find out that John Grady’s parents are only recently divorced, although they have been separated for nearly John Grady’s entire life. His mother may have planned to sell her father’s property after his death all along. We know that the lawyer John Grady consults says there is nothing to be done, and that same lawyer had warned John Grady’s father about signing the divorce papers because he knew that to do so would be to give up his rights to the land. So both of John Grady’s parents may be partially responsible for the outcome.
But we must also wonder about the role of John Grady’s grandfather in the unfortunate conclusion to the family ranch. We know that he defended both his son-in-law and his daughter—the daughter in fights against gossipers and the son-in-law when he was reported missing in the war. How could such a man with so much caring for his family, of whom everyone is so fond, not plan for the ranch’s future? Was he unable to plan for the future because he was paralyzed by the deaths of his seven younger brothers? Did he not know what to do with his land because he had no sons? He must have known his daughter would not keep the ranch, and how could he not see his son-in-law’s problems and weaknesses? Did it occur to him to provide for his namesake, his grandson John Grady? Perhaps fatalism plays a role in the grandfather’s indifference. Often, one hears a defeated, aging person say, “Well, I don’t care what happens to this ranch, or farm, after I die.” The Grady family story is a warning to others that if you love the land, you must plan for its future. The American Dream isn’t just about acquiring land and fortune and assuming that it will be passed down as one wishes to the next generation. The land, and ownership of it, is a trust; providing for its future is as important as proper grazing techniques and keeping up the fences. Indeed, the American Dream should not just be about providing money for one’s heirs. The greatest legacy would be to save the land for future generations’ contented enjoyment. Apparently, Grandfather Grady did not have the vision to do this.
So Chapter I begins not only with a wake and a funeral in the cold of winter shortly before Christmas, but also with the impending loss of the ranch. The significance of the ranch is not its size; what matters is that it carries the entire history of John Grady’s family, from the moment his great grandfather first came to America. John Grady tries valiantly to save the ranch. He hitchhikes to San Antonio to observe his mother, to try to understand her and find a way, then, to change her mind. He talks, not only to the lawyer, but to both of his parents, to no avail. Now the ranch will be acquired by an oil company, or worse, and who knows what will become of it.
Another significant loss in John Grady’s life is the marriage of his parents. His father tells him that he and John Grady’s mother shared a love of horses and says he thought that was enough. Obviously, and unfortunately, it was not. The freedom with which John Grady’s mother leaves her family to pursue acting—and a younger male companion—is very unusual for the era. This loss of his parents’ marriage—and of a cohesive family—prophesies the great fracture that would occur in American life with shocking percentages starting about 20 years after the novel takes place. More importantly, it foreshadows problems with which John Grady will struggle in his own life. Rawlins tells John Grady that women aren’t worth it, but John Grady replies, “Yes, they are.” However, even with his optimism about women, the problem of love and making a workable relationship are ones that John Grady will struggle with in the last half of All the Pretty Horses and Cities of the Plain, the third of McCarthy’s trilogy and the sequel to John Grady Cole’s story.
After the somewhat bizarre funeral of his grandfather, with the lawn chairs blowing about and the minister’s words lost, John Grady Cole saddles his horse in the evening’s long shadows and rides one of many solitary rides, to the western edge of the ranch where he imagines a past with painted ponies and riders of the lost nation, pledged in blood, as he dreams the scene. He thinks that when the wind is in the north he can hear them, the breath of the horses and their hooves shod in rawhide. He pictures in his mind a complete scene, from dogs and children and women to the giant serpent-like marks in the sand from their dragging travois poles. He hears their song and mourns their short and violent lives.
Although the negative themes of death, loss of family and love relationships, and a change in the land are critical in All the Pretty Horses, some positive themes do hold their own. The first of these positive themes is friendship. The bond between Rawlins and John Grady extends beyond their similar problems with their families; they are complements to each. John Grady is the more skilled, honorable, and idealistic of the two — and probably the brightest. But Rawlins gives him perfect dialogue, not only in their discussions of life and death, but in their undertakings. Rawlins is the realist, the survivor, who is always slightly cynical. He tries to moderate John Grady’s excesses, and even if he does not succeed, they always consult each other when solving a problem. John Grady and Rawlins have been successful in their journey and survived and reached the place they were searching for. McCarthy says, “The vaqueros knew them by the way they sat their horses and they called them caballero.” This is significant, because “caballero” is the highest designation for a cowboy or rider. “Caballero” has connotations of hero, just like the American best use of “cowboy.” And the word derives from gentleman, which adds to the distinction in Spanish culture. A vaquero is also a highly skilled horseman or cowboy, but not quite as highly regarded, yet superior to a trainer of horses. In the United States, “cowboy” often has a higher designation than “wrangler” or “horse handler,” but now sometimes it has a derogatory meaning. Not so with caballero and vaquero. So, by making this long trip and by how they sit their horses, the Mexican vaqueros have given high praise to John Grady and Rawlins by calling them “caballero.”
Above all else, All the Pretty Horses is an adventure story. It is this journey, started in Chapter I, that helps both of the young men to mature. John Grady begins the story as the 16-year-old boy who arrives at the ranch dressed in a black suit, trying to be grown up for his grandfather’s funeral. When he views the body, he says, “That was not sleeping,” as though he were a child who has been told that death is a sleep and who must grow up and face what death really is.
