Author of “The Road” which will be crowned with the Pulitzer Prize and adapted to the cinema, but also of the extraordinary “No Country For Old Men”, Cormac McCarthy, one of the most influential writers of his generation, died in the age of 89.
The one Stephen King describes as one of the greatest writers of his time is no more. American author Cormac McCarthy, who became a late success thanks to his iconic novels such as No Country For Old Men or The Road, died on Tuesday at the age of 89 from natural causes, according to his publisher.
Born in Providence in the State of Rhode Island in July 1933, Cormac McCarthy will know his first critical success with his first novel, The Guardian of the Orchard, published in the United States in 1965, which will allow him to live from his pen, with the support of the Rockefeller Foundation. In 1979, he moved to El Paso, Texas. A region that will deeply mark his literary work.
If McCarthy is a writer appreciated by the critics, his first books will make confidential sales: none of his first five works will exceed 3,000 copies.
In 1992, Cormac McCarthy published his sixth novel, Such Pretty Horses, the first volume of The Edge Trilogywhich will be adapted for the cinema in 2000. This book earned him wider recognition: carried by excellent critics, crowned with the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, it sold 190,000 copies in six months.
In 2005, he published his ninth novel, No, this country is not for the old man. Portrait of an America vitiated and plagued by the violence of the cartels, this extraordinary book will be brilliantly adapted by the Coen brothers barely three years later, and will be crowned by four Oscars, including Best Actor in a Supporting Role for the terrifying Javier Bardem as hitman Anton Chigurh.
Here again, below, the trailer of the masterpiece of the Coen brothers.
In 2006, Cormac McCarthy won the very prestigious Pulitzer Prize with his novel The roadwhich will sell 4 million copies when it is released in the United States, and will be translated into 48 languages.
This wandering of a father and his son in a post-apocalyptic America will also be powerfully adapted on the big screen under the leadership of John Hillcoat, with Viggo Mortensen in the role of the father.
Writer living rather recluse in his residence of Santa Fe, in New Mexico, feeling never or very little the need to explain his novels, Cormac McCarthy gave only very few interviews during his career.
He will make an exception at the time of the release of The roadgranting a interview with TV queen Oprah Winfrey. Writer ultimately not very prolific (barely 10 novels including a trilogy), chronicler of the America of the Appalachians and the dark and cruel Far West, Cormac McCarthy leaves a major imprint in literature.