Two sheepherders diddling each other. And their sheep are no longer nervous, but the rams are sweating it out.
I like Ms Proulx’s books not because of the characters or the plots but because she’s spent much of her life roaming the same turf I have — Vermont, Quebec, Newfoundland — and she’s got a tremendous ability to capture the essence of the land, and in particular the way a harsh terrain shapes the character of its people.,,, she did a better job than most liberal progressive artsy types do of accepting country folk as they are. “I lean toward realism, not myth,” she says.”
Wow, this is a superb description of what McMurtry does. In fact, this is EXACTLY what McMurtry does, in his essays (especially about Texas) and also in Lonesome Dove.
Super realistic, very human.