Horace McCoy (1897–1955)

"For the first week we had to dance, but after that you didn't. All you had to do was keep moving." (pg. 24)

A cracking short read, the great appeal of They Shoot Horses, Don't They? by Horace McCoy is its originality. Though conventionally hard-boiled in style and unremarkable (though certainly capable) in pace, character and dialogue, the book is so unique an idea that, as a jaded long-time reader, I was thankful for every minute of it.

The central metaphor – mirrored in the title – is show more absolutely exquisite. The book follows two depressed, directionless young people during a time of acute economic hardship, humiliatingly reduced to competing in an exhausting dance marathon merely to find their next meal. This becomes, in McCoy's hands, a metaphor for the grind of modern, moribund life, where you are herded into things you find demeaning and are expected to jump for a few scattered coins, and they work you and work you and when you eventually, inevitably, drop down exhausted and defeated they take you out and shoot you like a horse with a broken leg. Without ever over-explaining it, McCoy laces every line of his short novel with the implications of this metaphor, and the result is a literary experience that is entirely effortless.

Indeed, the book is almost accidental literature; McCoy was a pulp crime writer embittered by his life – having been whacked in the face by the Great Depression – who had hit upon the idea for the novel while working at one of these dance marathons (unfortunately, they were real). When the French existentialists (quite rightly) praised it as a kindred spirit to their school, there's an element of elevation rather than discovery.

That said, it is – for us – discovery; the book is a hidden gem and incredibly relevant for a contemporary generation that has faced two historic recessions in little over ten years, and all during a time of social and cultural disconnect. They Shoot Horses, Don't They? reminded me, in some ways, of the 2019 Joker movie, in that it tells a sad and necessary story about social and economic hardship in an appealing and original way. Bitter pills never tasted so sweet. show less

The cover calls this "a lurid tale of dancing and desperation." How can you resist that?

It's hard to believe this was first published almost 75 years ago. The themes are all very contemporary, as is the bleak world-weariness of most of the characters.

One has to read between the lines a bit to get the full impact of some of the comments, but the meaning comes through well enough. I enjoyed the story structure, too, which has a very noir-ish reading of the narrator's verdict being read to him, show more interspersed with the main main narrative. This is not a spoiler in any way, since the reader is told from the very start how things come out.

Another reviewer here mentioned how this resonates all the more now that reality TV is giving people new and more outrageously shameful ways to become rich and famous. I quite agree. show less

In the background of the marathon dance events, organized so that money can be made on the suffering of others, during the time when people had nothing to eat (period post 1929) so were willing to do whatever necessary, we are told a story of a woman who is at the end of her strength, person slowly growing ever so bitter and cruel, and who, definitely being aware of it, decides that that is it and that life has no point. She is even bitter because she just cannot end herself, while suffering show more the very thought that extinguishing of her own life would not register anywhere. Everything she touches, or that touches her, just feels dirty,corrupt, even kind acts from people that do happen, but finally end up as misinterpreted or ignored by her. It is story of a person that from early age got chewed by the very society and then spit out, without that energy spark that should drive humans onward, left as if there is no future ahead (or to be more precise no future she wants, that she sees in various high society stories and glamor magazines (very disturbing elements here with modern social media)).

There are a lot of people like this in every age and time, even today, and some like to name them nihilists, but these are not intellectuals that seek oblivion of everything, all the while keeping themselves outside any harm.

These are ordinary people who could have normal lives but at some point decided that if they cannot have what they want then nothing matters, and they just made the headlong plunge into the black hole of emotions. They do not pretend for shock value to want to die - they actually want it. And times of crisis only underline the difficulties, and only exacerbate the negativity. In the end folks like this just take with them those that try to enjoy life as much as is possible, which is what happens to her dance partner. People who will try to help, feel the pain and then, through innate naivete or stupidity, might even try to help these depression-holes out of their misery. Only to end up with their own life destroyed in the process.

This is short read, but very difficult one. It is truly heartbreaking seeing someone willing to give up of this gift called life just because at the moment things do not go their way. Nobody knows how they would react in situations like this, and hopefully one will never know, but it is difficult to just see people ..... implode. Terrible.

Very interesting novel, I was aware of the movie but not the book. Difficult read, but it is more than obvious that it contains autobiographical elements. It is not quick read, starts slowly but then with each chapter (I especially like parallel sections from the trial to show the level of madness) accelerates into the spiral of darkness that can only end in one way. Very dark novel.

Recommended to people interested in societal extremes, and reactions of people under accumulated stress. show less

Waltzing with Absurdity

When your world falls down around you, when most of everything you believed true proves false, as happened to many in the Great Depression, then the entire idea of existence, of your existence can go from optimistic to hopeless, from rational (or at least somewhat rational) to completely absurd, in the sense of meaningless. With this in mind, you have a reasonable framework for understanding why Robert Syverten stands before a judge receiving his death sentence for the show more murder of Gloria Beatty. Here you have the bright eternal optimist, Robert, dancing with the ground-down pessimist, Gloria, both isolated in a ring of absurdity, the marathon dance ring (popular entertainment in the 1920s and 1930s).

Robert and Gloria meet by accident at a movie studio, where both have failed to land jobs as extras. Gloria persuades Robert, who is as down and out as she, to partner with her in a dance marathon down on a pier in Los Angeles. As the two get to know each other over the course of the five weeks they dance and walk together, readers learn about their lives.

Robert’s a farm boy who came to L.A. to become a director, a wildly optimistic pursuit as he has no training or film experience. However, he is stubbornly hopeful, always trying to look on the bright side of life.

Robert could not have found a more polar opposite to himself than Gloria if he had tried. She sees only the darkness in the world and openly and often tells him she wishes she were dead, that she would die, that once she had tried killing herself. Her parents are dead; she fled her relatives in West Texas, where her uncle attempted sexually abusing her. In addition, she is argumentative and pugnacious, calling for a married pregnant contestant to get an abortion, while herself having sex with one of the promoters to advance her chances of winning.

For five weeks, they live and dance in the confines of the dance hall. The audiences build and cheer them on, attracted by the promise of drama on the floor. Couples, pushed to and beyond their limits in derbies (extended periods of racing to avoid elimination), collapse, arguments and fights breakout, and, in the end, a fatal shooting (not Robert and Gloria’s) take place, ending the competition abruptly.

In other words, the pair, and the other contestants, exist in a pressure cooker of frustration, false hope, and fear of elimination and a return to an ever rougher, more unforgiving world. It’s enough to wear even an optimist like Robert to the nub, to the point where even the absurd seems reasonable. And the ultimate of that, Robert becoming the agent helping Gloria exit her dismal world of pain. Then accounting for his action with a remembrance of how his grandfather dispatched an injured horse they both loved, saying, “They shoot horses, don’t they?” By extension, why should suffering humans be treated any differently and allowed to linger and suffer? show less