An Existentialist Interpretation Of No Country For Old Men

Cormac McCarthy,as a master who is keen on exploring the problem of life and death,is highly rated and admired in the contemporary American academic circle.In No Country for Old Men,one of his representative works,the borderland between the U.S.and the Mexico is cursed by the threatening environments with brutal violence and naked killing.However,after an intensive reading,the author finds this work is essentially corresponding to some basic concepts of existentialism,which discusses the absurd and alienated experiences of the characters faced with the indifferent and hostile world,but they all exert great efforts to pursue a meaningful life or to strive to have an authentic existence despite of living in such a bleak and chaotic world.Therefore,this thesis attempts to analyze No Country for Old Men for three aspects from the perspective of existentialism.Firstly,it deals with the absurd living environments of the characters in No Country for Old Men.Apart from the indifferent nature,the society is also hostile,which is hard for the characters to live through.Secondly,it analyzes the absurd and alienated experiences of the characters in such a bitter and meaningless world.Thirdly,it mainly reveals how the protagonists strive to pursue a meaningful life despite of living in so violent and unreasonable a world,such as Moss' consciousness of his own limitation and his desire to transcend thispredicament,Bell's loyalty to his job as a sheriff before his resignation and Chigurh's faithfulness to his promise—for he puts his whole heart to take back the lost money for his owner.In a word,those characters living in such an indifferent and hostile world would be extremely easy to get alienated not only from themselves but also from others.However,they all strive to pursue a meaningful life or to realize their self-values.As a result,however,only Moss finally realizes his self-actualization among the three of them.