Horseman, Pass By

McMurtry’s debut novel was a sensation when published in 1961. Here was a contemporary Western showing the conflict between the then current generation with the values of the Old West still prevalent at the time. The novel was made into the movie Hud, starring Paul Newman in the titular role.

McMurtry’s novel, however, is narrated by young Lonnie Bannon, grandson of an old-time cattleman, Homer Bannon. Hud is the son of Homer’s second wife, and he is in constant conflict with the old man about how the ranch operates. When a plague hits the herd, decisions no rancher wants to make are forced upon the Bannons. Lonnie is caught in the middle; torn between his love and admiration of his grandfather and the old man’s principles, and show more his fascination with the exciting, unscrupulous and dangerous, step-uncle, Hud.

Boy, but McMurtry can write a scene! I could feel the grit, taste the cold drinks, hear the bellow of cattle, and smell the dung at the rodeo arena. (It probably helped that I had just attended a rodeo in real life.) His characters come alive on the page. They are not particularly likeable, but the reader gets to know them through their actions and reactions. Each one, even those appearing for the briefest of scenes, is fully fleshed out. show less

Horseman, Pass By is the first Western novel written by the recently deceased American writer Larry McMurtry. It was published when he was just 25 in 1961. This modern western portrays life on a cattle ranch from the perspective of young narrator Lonnie Bannon. Set in post-World War II Texas (1954), the Bannon ranch is owned by Lonnie's grandfather, Homer Bannon. Homer's ruthless stepson, Hud, stands as the primary antagonist of the novel, who desires to inherit the ranch from Homer by any means. The novel inspired the film Hud, starring Paul Newman as the title character.

This novel helped to elevate the western from it's pulp status to one of literature. Horseman, Pass By is about many things: toxic masculinity (in the character of show more Hud), the influence of modernity on an old way of life and making a living, and it's a warm yet melancholy coming of age tale. Lonnie, our 17 year old teenage narrator - grows up quick on the ranch between Hud's cruelty and his grandfather's old-school ways yet he longs to escape his situation, to escape the small town Thalia. His grandfather Homer is portrayed as an aging, stubborn rancher who is attached to his way of life and does not want to let go of his ranch, despite Hud's forceful insistence and his sickly cattle. Hud - is a womanizer, a drunk, and the threat to Homer's way of life. He is our villian - who is consumed by greed and lust. At the end of the novel we are supposed to view Homer - in one pivotal scene - as if he too was just one of the sickly cattle on the ranch. And it is suggested that it is the humane thing to out him of his misery. Homer's way of life is strong-and can only be killed violently - so it is a fitting end that he meets.

Horseman, Pass By is a beautiful, violent, melancholy, atmospheric novel. It's a tough, nostalgic narrative of a young man growing up in Texas.

It's pure poetry. Larry McMurtry was a master of his craft. show less

Larry McMurtry's first novel is a rather remarkable slice of Texas life in the relatively modern era. HORSEMAN, PASS BY was made into a popular movie, HUD. But the novel is darker than the film, which nudged one character's moral character slightly toward the sympathetic and shoved another character into an entirely different race. Paul Newman, at the height of his coolness and fame when HUD was filmed, played the title character with menace, anger, and plenty of moral turpitude. But he also played him cool, with a radiant charm that almost succeeded in overcoming the darkness at Hud's heart. It is unlikely that Newman would have ever taken the role of Hud had it been certain to follow precisely in the book's depiction. It's just as show more unlikely that the film itself would have been made had it been a requirement not to water it down. In the movie, Hud is an anti-hero, and Newman in the role became the pinup boy for such types. In HORSEMAN, PASS BY, Hud is more than an anti-hero. He is largely despicable. At one point in the book, he commits an act so outrageous and horrifying that it is hard to imagine how anyone ever thought of making a movie with Paul Newman out of the book. But the rest of the book is reflected rather well in the film, and there is the same taste of loneliness, isolation, and desperation in both, a reflection of the harsh life in the North Texas ranchlands. Hud's father Homer faces obstacles every day in running his cattle ranch, but the discovery of one dead heifer catapults him into the greatest challenge of his life. His grandson Lonnie, the book's (and film's) viewpoint character, loves his grandfather and the ranch, but yearns for some inchoate desire he can't quite define. McMurtry is a master at the dialogue of these cattle folk, people identical to the ones he grew up with in North Texas in a town very much like Thalia, the town he focuses on in this and several other books. It's a moving and affecting ride through the lives of some hard people and some harder hearts. show less

I’m not a Western fan, folks, but the last few Westerns I’ve read, including this one, have gone straight to the top of my Best Books Read list. Oh my. And I swear to you that not only do I not like Westerns, I am not a lover of horses or guns either, so how-in-the-world has this happened?

What a story. What a writer. What a great book.

Even if it is a Western.

Originally called "Horseman, Pass By" this is a short, and searing novel which deals with the small horizons, mental and moral of the inhabitants of the Great Plains of America. It climaxes with a rape, and the reactions of the town and family of the local high school hero. Unpleasant because it is quite well done. I read the novel before the date of this reprint, but, I think when the film adaptation was current.

I've seen the movie Hud so many times that it probably colored my perception of this book too much while I was reading it, and I'm sure I would have enjoyed Horseman, Pass By more if I had never seen the movie which was adapted from it; that said, I still enjoyed it a great deal. McMurtry's a terrific writer and his concise yet often aridly poetic prose captures the feel of coming of age in a small western town in the mid-20th century perfectly.Those who come to the book after having seen the movie will probably be shocked by the book's portrayal of the Hud character. In the movie, the titular character of Hud is a charming, likable (no doubt the benefit of being portrayed by the charismatic Paul Newman), although entirely show more self-interested rapscallion. In Horseman, Hud is something closer to a sociopath--a charming cad, still, but colder, more vicious, and even more indifferent to the feelings of other human beings. It makes the character as portrayed in the book a lot harder to take, but like the movie, the book isn't really about Hud so much as it is about Lonnie, and his Granddad, and their relationship to each other and to the changing West.I highly recommend both the book and the movie, but I have to admit that as fine as Horseman, Pass By is, the images from Hud are what is going to stick with me. show less

Horseman, Pass By is the title of Larry McMurtry's debut novel [1961], set in the dry barren flatland of West Texas. It is also part of the epitaph I saw above William Butler Yeats tombstone in my ancestral homeland in Sligo, Ireland. Both are elegiac summations of lost times and vanished lives. I learned soon enough reading this world-weary novel that it is the first volume of what is now known as The Thalia Trilogy, Thalia being the small town that centers the three novels. I also realized one chapter in that my novel was also the movie with Paul Newman in the title role, Hud. (The third part of the trilogy is also the Oscar winning The Last Picture Show.) I cannot discuss the plot very well because in doing so, I would be revealing show more the spoilers that encompass most of the story. Let's just say it is narrated by one teenager, Lonnie, as he recounts the hardscrabble lives around him, his life on his grandfather's ranch, and the abundant toxic masculinity surrounding this small-town Texas of the 1950's. The story is beautifully written. Let me leave you with this, a dancehall during the week of the rodeo: "...and on the dance ​floor the dancers hugged and swirled in the blue darkness and the smoke. The only ones who weren't having a good time were a few lonesome-looking cowboys at the bar....the jukebox flared up and played hillbilly dance music the rest of the time I stayed. It played old songs by Hank Williams and Ernest Tubb and Kitty Wells, and it was cold, cold hearts in the darkness with dancers bumping into each other and going to dance some more....It was no more work and no more lonesome and all the honky-tonk angels living it up." show less