Lonesome Dove
Robert Duvall as Augustus (Gus) McCrae
I wrote a Top-10 Books post recently. Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry was (is) my number one. Yesterday, I finished reading it for at least the fourth time and got as much pleasure from it as from the first three times. Very close to the book’s end is a quote that’s always stuck with me. It’s not profound, but it stirs my emotions. It expresses the feeling of saying goodbye for what may well be the last time.
“So long boys,” he said. “Look for me south of the Brazos if you ever get home.” Then he touched Sugar with his spurs and was soon only a black spec on the snow.”
I am a slow walker; always have been, always will be. So this quote struck me.
“I like to walk slow,” Po Campo said. “If I walk too fast I might miss something. [p. 371]
I am most happy when my walking is in some forest or field where I can be all alone and enjoy the silence.
“He had known several men who blew their heads off, and he had pondered it much. It seemed to him it was probably because they could not take enough happiness from the sky and the moon to carry them over the low feelings that came to all men. [p. 193]
Gus McCrae, one of the two main characters and one of my heroes, dies from an infection that sets in after he was shot in the leg with an arrow. He loses one leg and is told by the doctor that unless the other leg is also taken, he will surely die. Gus decides that some things for him are worse than death.
“You don’t get the pint [point] Woodrow,” Augustus said. “I’ve walked the earth in my pride all these years. If that’s lost, then let the rest be lost with it. There’s certain things my vanity won’t abide.” [p. 795]
My words are far from a book review and don’t at all capture the striking dialogue that is one of the book’s strength. There few quotes are the ones that I remember most after my many reading of Lonesome Dove.