Degradation of Today's Society in No Country for Old Men
The Degradation of Today’s Society in No Country for Old Men
Society today has become certainly different from the old, laid-back peaceful traditional days. Traditional qualities like honesty, respect, and discipline are slowly phasing out as time progresses. Cormac McCarthy supports this claim in No Country for Old Men by explaining how today’s society has taken a turn for the worse and how a new wave of evil has swept over the land, washing away the old values. McCarthy utilizes Sheriff Bell to represent the law and order, good morals, and honesty with which society was so rich with before the apocalyptic wave of evil (represented by Chigurh) took over. In addition, McCarthy also uses Sheriff Bell’s several monologues describing how the old values of the country he grew accustomed to are inevitably dissipating right in front of his eyes and how there is simply “no country for old men” because Bell’s old values do not function in today’s society. Through the use of Sheriff Bell and Anton Chigurh in the novel, McCarthy describes how today’s society has been struck by an unstoppable wave of corruptive evil and has suffered a continual degradation of old traditional values and morals that leave the older generations in disarray as the society they once knew is fading away. Cormac McCarthy generates Sheriff Bell, as a vital character in the novel, to represent the peaceful dying out morally rich society and provide his insight as well as the author’s to describe how the escalating violence and the new wave of evil rushing will corrupt and rob future generations of a promising morally straight society. Sheriff Bell, a West Texas small town sheriff for 41 years and a decorated Vietnam veteran who has seen it all, describes how the society he grew up in has taking a sharp turn for the worst. Mark busby comments that “the most sympathectic and human of all the characters, is the sheriff of Terell County, Ed Tom Bell” (Busby 1). Bell consists of all the “old school”
Society today has become certainly different from the old, laid-back peaceful traditional days. Traditional qualities like honesty, respect, and discipline are slowly phasing out as time progresses. Cormac McCarthy supports this claim in No Country for Old Men by explaining how today’s society has taken a turn for the worse and how a new wave of evil has swept over the land, washing away the old values. McCarthy utilizes Sheriff Bell to represent the law and order, good morals, and honesty with which society was so rich with before the apocalyptic wave of evil (represented by Chigurh) took over. In addition, McCarthy also uses Sheriff Bell’s several monologues describing how the old values of the country he grew accustomed to are inevitably dissipating right in front of his eyes and how there is simply “no country for old men” because Bell’s old values do not function in today’s society. Through the use of Sheriff Bell and Anton Chigurh in the novel, McCarthy describes how today’s society has been struck by an unstoppable wave of corruptive evil and has suffered a continual degradation of old traditional values and morals that leave the older generations in disarray as the society they once knew is fading away. Cormac McCarthy generates Sheriff Bell, as a vital character in the novel, to represent the peaceful dying out morally rich society and provide his insight as well as the author’s to describe how the escalating violence and the new wave of evil rushing will corrupt and rob future generations of a promising morally straight society. Sheriff Bell, a West Texas small town sheriff for 41 years and a decorated Vietnam veteran who has seen it all, describes how the society he grew up in has taking a sharp turn for the worst. Mark busby comments that “the most sympathectic and human of all the characters, is the sheriff of Terell County, Ed Tom Bell” (Busby 1). Bell consists of all the “old school”