Blood Meridian: Part I - The Definitive Audiobook
Theworldwarmaster for 'The Kid'
(Rugged, light, playful tone of voice)
The novel’s protagonist - if it can be said to have one - is 'The Kid', but McCarthy shows us very little of 'The Kid's actions and thoughts.
Born in 1833 to a poor family in Tennessee, 'The Kid' has an innate “taste for mindless violence,” and by the age of fourteen runs away from home to lead a dissolute and vicious life. Early on he falls in with Captain White’s army during its unauthorized invasion of Mexico, which results in the army’s destruction and the kid’s imprisonment in Chihuahua City.
However, he is soon set free to ride with The Judge and Captain John Joel Glanton’s gang of scalp hunters, contracted by the Chihuahuan government to hunt the Apaches. 'The Kid' proves himself an effective killer, yet, unlike his fellow scalp hunters, he also retains a shred of his humanity.
He endangers his own life on several occasions to help and accommodate his comrades-in-arms, as when he removes the arrow from David Brown’s thigh when none else would, or spares Dick Shelby’s life in defiance of Glanton’s orders. For these small acts of mercy, the Judge accuses 'The Kid' of violating the gang’s amoral spirit of war for war’s sake, of poisoning its enterprise.
In 1878, at the age of 45, 'The Kid' (by then called 'The Man'), is discovered brutally murdered in a Texas outhouse after an encounter with The Judge.
*Recurring appearances*
- texan
- male young adult
- female teen
- male adult
- female young adult
- female adult
1. We better just hold up here for tonight. 2. Who with? 3. What would they come back for? 4. They wont come back. 5. I wish you had a knife on you ... There's meat here if a man had a knife.
6. Seen ye smoke. Thought you might spare a man a sup of water. 7. We could take the horses ... 8. We can get out as soon as it comes dark. 9. (Watches the flowing blood from Tobin's wound) Will it not stop? 10. Where is the judge? If I kill him, we can take the horses ...
