#jack schaefer

[chloegraceartist]

Shane based on that one cowboy book “Shane” by Jack Schaefer.

Book cover reference below!

My sis saw this book when we were shelving the juvenile section at our library. It’s too perfect— so I had draw my lil pixel guy as a cowboy.

[gregorygalloway]

Shane premiered at Radio City Music Hall in New York City on 23 April 1953, installing a special 50 feet wide by 30 feet high screen in order to show off the films widescreen format.

A.B. Guthrie Jr. adapted Jack Schaefer’s 1949 novel, with George Stevens directing and producing. Stevens had wanted Montgomery Clift in the title role, but when he proved unavailable he selected Alan Ladd. He also cast Jean Arthur, who had not made a film in more than 3 years, but had worked with Stevens twice before: on The Talk of the Town (1942) and The More the Merrier (1943), for which she received an Academy Award nomination. The 52-year-old Arthur retired from film after Shane (the only color picture in almost 100 screen appearances) and concentrated on theater.

Shane was a commercial and critical success, and was nominated for 6 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actor (Jack Palance and Brandon De Wilde). Loyal Griggs received the Oscar for Best Cinematography.

[rain-drenched-streets]

“in the moonlight I could make out the inalienable outline of his figure receding into the distance. Lost in my loneliness, I watched him go, out of town, far down the road where it curved out to the level country beyond the valley. There were men on the porch behind me, but I was only aware of that dark shape growing small and indistinct along the far reach of the road. A cloud passed over the moon and he merged into the general shadow and I could not see him and the cloud passed on and the road was a plain thin ribbon to the horizon and he was gone.” -Shane, Jack Schaefer

[reverie-quotes]

He rode easily, relaxed in the saddle, leaning his weight lazily into the stirrups. Yet even in this easiness was a suggestion of tension. It was the easiness of a coiled spring, of a trap set.

— Jack Schaefer, Shane

[wordsformurder]

10 for 30 - Shane, by Jack Schaefer

Let me preface this by saying that I don’t like Westerns. The movies, I mean. I’ve always disliked the artless good guy/bad guy dichotomy, the stupid lone cowboy thing, the racist and sexist under (over) tones that galled me even as a kid, watching with my dad. They were dumb and lazy.

That dislike transfered to written Westerns, somehow. (Overindulging in MASH in  ym formative years might have had something to do with it.)

@tigriswolf has been lowkey pushing Shane at me for years and I resisted, because Western (sorry, babe). Then, she did it again for my 10 for 30 project and this time, I had to.

First of all, it’s short. I was surprised when it came out of the box. 164 pages, only. I started reading it on my break at work and let me tell you, I did not get any more work done that shift.

The narrative PoV is genius. It’s a grown man, retelling the story of how Shane came to his town from his then child perspective. And there is so much going on that the reader can make sense of, but little Bob, the narrator, obviously can’t. So he just puts things out there and leaves them for the reader to pick up and that hindsight-innocence, that simple, childish way of looking at the world, is both heartbreaking and beautiful.

Shane told from an adult’s perspective would be about a bad man trying to play at being good and finally going back to his roots. It’d be dumb and lazy, the way all those Westerns of my childhood were. But it’s not. It’s clever and beautiful and incredibly kind.

I’d tell you about my favorite parts, but it’s too short for me to do that without giving a lot of stuff away. Just read it.

I love that book. I will reread that book. And I still won’t read any other Westerns, because after this one? None of them are going to measure up.

10/10, will read again and again until the cover falls off.

[slreads]

NEW YEAR'S, CHRISTMAS, ETC. | BOOK HAUL PT 2

This is the long-awaited (to me, at least) second part of my Christmas book haul...even though it's February. I just kept buying books and then waiting for them to get to me, and that's how I ended up with so many books. Sorry!

Please subscribe and follow if you’re interested!

[bookmarkquotes]

'What a man knows isn't important. It's what he is that counts' -Jack Schaefer | Visit Bookmark Quotes for more inspirational quotes.

[theoscarsproject]

Shane (1953). A weary gunfighter attempts to settle down with a homestead family, but a smoldering settler/rancher conflict forces him to act.

This is a solid western, but it really proves to me that the genre, generally speaking, isn’t my thing. Still, there are some good shots, strong performances and a compelling throughline that works well throughout. Check it out if you like a Western, but otherwise you can probably give it a miss. 7/10.