The Fictional Mythic West

Question for Discussion: What are some of
the characteristics of the Western Male hero
in the "fictional west"?

Reading: Lenihan, "The Western Forumula";
Marsden, "The Modern Popular Western";
Aquila, "The Pop Culture West"

Video: The Mythic West DVD: 1. The Hollywood Western
& 2. Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show

Response Paper: How does the Indian's mythic story
of the West contrast with the "Mythic American West"?
Do these Indians intentionally tell their story of the West in order to challenge every point of the Anglo-American story? Is the Indian's Mythic West a counter-myth to the Anglo-American Mythic West? (1-2 page paper due on Monday, Feb. 23.)
( See Anglo-American vs. Indian Stories on
the American West )

Major Western Writers

The Mythic West and the Turner thesis

Krugman, The American Economy is
on the Edge
As White so aptly wrote: "So powerful is the influence of this imagined West that its fictional creations and personas become symbols of the west, and real westerners model themselves after fictional characters." [2]
Wyoming certainly has identified itself with this western mythic image. It calls itself the "Cowboy State", claims to be what America once was, and asks tourists to come and "Live the Legend."
..... Rick Ewig, Give Them What They Want
Aquila, The Pop Culture West:
The West in American Popular Culture (in-class)
The West and Male Identity (in-class)
Appaloosa (2008): New American Western
Portrait of Daniel Boone as Western Pioneer
(early 1800s)
Picture of Leatherstocking from Cooper's
The Pioneers (1823)
Buffalo Bill as Western Hero in a
"Wild West Show" Poster (1880s)
Alan Ladd as Shane (1953)
Advertising Age: The Marlboro Man (in-class)
The Marlboro Myth: American
Cigarette Ads celebrate the Cowboy (in-class)
The Marlboro Man and Freedom:
Global Advertising of the American Cowboy
(in-class)
Give them What they Want: Wyoming sells
itself as "the Cowboy State" (in-class)
Wyoming Tourism Brochures
Reagan as Cowboy (in-class)
George W. Bush as Cowboy (in-class)
Cowboys at the Republican National
Convention in 2008
The Old West Lives On: Western Rodeos (in-class)
Cars named after Western Places,
Images, and Symbols (in-class)
Western Magazines (in-class)
Gunslingers and Outlaws
Wild West Show Posters (in-class)
Western Artists
The Charles Russell Art Gallery (in-class)
Frederic Remington Art Gallery (in-class)
Popular Western Novelists that
have shaped the modern West (in-class)
Classic Western Movies that
have shaped the Western Myth (in-class)
Great Western Fiction
Western Books I Loved
Western Fiction
Ten Best Western Novels
Marsden, The Modern Popular Western (in-class)
Lenihan, The Western Formula (in-class)
Jane Tompkins on the Western Hero (in-class)
The Cinematic Tour: The Mythic West
through Classic Westerns
Limerick on the Legacy of Conquest
Limerick on Real Westerners
The West Web

Lenihan, The Western Formula

"It was the motion picture medium that most fully realized the mythic power and dramatic complexity of the western genre after the quality of printed Westerns had steadily deteriorated during the late nineteenth century."

"The Western gave substance to the ideal of personal self-determination and responsible freedom that the realities of modern life and institutions seemed to deny."

"Because of the gun's centrality to the Western, the heroes were usually those who displayed an expertise at shooting quickly and accurately as well as the wisdom to shoot discriminately and justly. Behind whatever conflict evoked the hero's deeds of valor were the western badman and Indian-forces that could destroy civilization while challenging it to still greater victories and accomplishments. Surrounding the hero and giving purpose to his deadly encounters with evil elements were the ordinary people who, though the heart and promise of American civilization, were yet vulnerable in this extraordinary environment. "

"Shane (1953) remains the clearest and most self-conscious evocation of this western myth. Clad in buckskin, with a gun strapped high on his waist, Alan Ladd as the wandering gun-fighter Shane appears larger than life in comparison with the settler family that welcomes him into its home. Shane finds temporary repose from his violent past, as he works and socializes with the family and neighbors. Yet domesticity is as alien to his heroic nature as is the serene populated valley to the majestic but formidable mountains from which he rode at the beginning of the film."

"Aside from being badly wounded and hopelessly attracted to the married heroine, Shane has become once again the lone man of violence who can have no place in the good society. His sad departure that concludes the film reflects the classic Western's dichotomy between heroic, free individualism and the more enduring but constraining social order. The West (and the future of America ) belong to the peaceful, ordinary citizen-settler, but it could not have been won without men like Shane."

"Warshaw defines the Western in terms of its hero, a lone man of honor, whose six-gun, tempered with his sense of justice and rectitude, wins the West on behalf of society. Although the hero acts in the interests of society, he acts alone and by his own code of honor. Matters of plot, secondary characters, and perspective merely provide background for the exploits and character of the hero."

Marsden, The Modern Popular Western

"Over the last seven decades the American Western story has fulfilled more social and cultural functions for its audience than has any other American story form. Indeed, the Western can be seen as a record of
America's national self-awareness."

"The popularity of the television Western peaked in 1958–59, when twenty-four adult Westerns were on prime time television each week, including seven of the top ten shows in the Nielsen ratings. With over fifty million Americans watching Westerns every night of the week, Westerns had become the most popular mass-appeal story formula ever created. From that pinnacle, Westerns slowly lost their appeal for television audiences until 1975, the first year in the history of network television that not even one Western series was included in the prime time schedule."

"By 1956, the number had declined to seventy-eight. And in the entire decade from 1965 to 1975, only about two hundred Westerns appeared on movie screens, an average of less than twenty per year.15 Part of the decline in Western film production is traceable to the fact that television began presenting the type of kiddie action Westerns that earlier had been produced as low budget B movies . 16 Mainly, however, it simply reflected less audience interest."

"The only real rival to John Wayne's personal popularity as a Western hero during the 1960s and '70s was Clint Eastwood, whose Westerns, like Wayne's, reaffirm the ideals of the traditional Western. Eastwood's American films are known for their violence, which stems from the macho power of his tight-lipped heroes. "

"The modern popular Western, like its early predecessors, views the American West as a “golden age” which did not allow spiritual or physical weaknesses among the survivors. The heroes of the modern Western, however, can be philosophers on the range, men used to wrestling with ideas as well as
cows..."

"While other writers like Jack Schaefer, whose Shane helped to elevate the Western paperback to new levels of respectability, deserve serious analysis as well, perhaps the most representative author of the mainstream popular Western tradition is the best-selling and prolific Louis L'Amour, who has been ranked by Saturday Review as the third top-selling writer in the world . 34 L'Amour clearly believes in a responsible and responsive West populated by the restrained and civilized."

"Where early or “classic” Westerns had affirmed the European-American taking and taming of the West, modern Westerns often did not. Radio and television Westerns such as Gunsmoke sometimes suggested that pioneering could mean no more than a slow death on a barren prairie. Movies often explored the negative side of the settlement of the West, such as the pathology behind much outlaw violence and the racism at the heart of the Indian wars. Even Western novels, the form that most strongly retained the values of “classic” Westerns, moved in the direction of stronger characterization and a closer fidelity to historical accuracy."

"During the early '80s, Western-style bars and cowboy clothes were a billion-dollar fad. On television, ads for chewing tobacco, gum, beer, aftershave lotion and numerous other products all ride into American homes on the shoulders of popular Western heroes. The continuing presence of these images suggests the remaining, latent attraction of the popular Western. When the national mood changes and is again receptive to frontier stories, it is not unlikely that a third significant period of popular Western storytelling will engage America's national imagination. "

Aquila, The Pop Culture West

"For over two centuries the West has been an extremely popular and profitable subject of popular culture. It has been marketed through numerous books, songs, illustrations, movies, television shows, and other mass-produced products.' Although western images in popular culture have varied greatly, one thing has remained constant. Whether fact or fiction, story or place, the "pop culture West" has struck a responsive chord in audiences of every generation. "

"Literary scholars Frank Bergon and "Zeese Papanikolas explain, "More than other American regions, the West eludes definition because it is as much dream as a fact, and its locale was never geographical. Before it was a place, it was a conception.”

"At the same time there has always been a dark side to the mythic West. Although the West offered the potential for immeasurable success, it also held the possibility of abysmal failure through dashed hopes, broken dreams, financial ruin, or even tragic death at the hands of brutal bad guys or unrelenting forces of nature. Well-known tales about Custer's Last Stand, Billy the Kid, the James gang, and the Dinner party lurked in the shadows as reminders of the nether side of the mythic West. This West of the imagination reflected the tensions within American culture between civilization and wilderness, the past and progress, realism and nostalgia, and ultimately, between good and evil. "

"By the 1800s all the ingredients for the making of the pop culture West were in place. Building on earlier traditions, popular forms of expression continued to deal with frontier heroes, settings, and American Indians. This time, however, the focus was on the lands west of the Mississippi . "

"Dime novels became extremely popular during and
after the Civil War. These inexpensive, disposable volumes capitalized on the public's insatiable appetite for sensational, action-packed stories about the American West. Cranked out by the hundreds by experienced hack writers such as Ned Buntline or Prentiss Ingraham, and mass produced by publishers such as Beadle and Adams, these books focused on either historical figures such as Buffalo Bill and Kit Carson or fictional characters such as Deadwood Dick or Seth Jones. "

"Public interest in the American West was furthered by popular illustrators. E O. C. Darley gained wide recognition for his sketches illustrating Parkman's Oregon Trail and various editions of Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales. Painters such as George Catlin, Karl Bodmer, Albert Bierstadt, Frederic Remington, and Charles Russell reinforced and often shaped public attitudes toward the West through their popular paintings of Indians, cowboys, landscapes, and other images of the mythic West. Currier and Ives prints brought images of the West to millions of Americans. For example, the popular 1866 Currier and Ives lithograph The Rocky Mountains: Emigrants Crossing the Plains, based on a painting by Fanny Palmer, could be found hanging in hotels, saloons, and homes across the United States..."

"The popular culture West expanded its audience through live performances of cowboys, Indians, folksingers, and other western-influenced entertainers. William F. Cody, better known as "Buffalo Bill," develped the most successful live western act."

"In 1883 Cody secured financial backing to produce a traveling show, "Buffalo Bill's Wild West," which at various times featured sharpshooters, cowboys, stagecoach holdups, shoot-outs, battles with Indians, buffalo hunts, and other exciting episodes associated with the mythic West. According to scholar Don B. Wilmeth, the Wild West show "evolved in part from the `specs' (or spectacular pageants) of the circus, the old traveling menageries, early exhibitions of cowboys skills and Indians dating from the 1820s, and the numerous plays, novels, and cheap popular literature of the nineteenth century."

"The dawning of the twentieth century ushered in a "Golden Age" for the pop culture West. The new era began with the publication of Owen Wister's Western novel The Virginian (1902), which pulled together all the elements of popular culture West. The book, which firmly established the Western as a literary genre, featured the nameless, self-reliant western hero/cowboy, as well as the climactic show-down between the good guy and bad guy.27"

"The Golden Age of the pop culture West lasted until the early 1960s and produced numerous pop culture products, including classic Western novels by Max Brand, Clarence Mulford, Zane Grey, and Louis L'Amour; Western movies with stars such as William S. Hart, Tom Mix, Buck Jones, Randolph Scott, and John Wayne; "singing cowboys" such as Gene Autry and Roy Rogers; and popular television shows such as Gunsmoke, Have Gun Will Travel, Maverick, Wagon Train, and Bonanza."

"The mythic West demonstrated that Americans could succeed if they remained true to the spirit of the Old West. Like mythic westerners, Americans had to retain their self-reliance, independence, and sense of mission and adhere to the morality inherent in the code of the West. At the same time the myth taught that all problems could be solved through cooperation, action, and dedication to the nation's quest for truth, justice, and the American Way. These lessons provided the ideal unifying myth in an era when national crises demanded consensus. "

"The pop culture West provides evidence to study continuity and change in the western myth, demonstrating that the myth is still very much alive in modern America, albeit in altered form. Many experts have focused on the unique qualities of America s mythic West, stressing its particular setting, identifiable story, and unmistakable characteristics."

"Western writer Shirl Henke recently commented on the staying power of the western myth: "The West is a dream, the freedom to begin again. As such it is the stuff of primal myth and will never be defined absolutely. I do not believe it accidental that Star Trek has become a classic. Its opening line says it all: `Space, the final Frontier."

"America 's ever-changing face is mirrored in the birth and growth of the pop culture West. The emergence of the pop culture West in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries reflected industrialization, urbanization, immigration, technology, the rise of mass culture, and other forces that gave birth to modern America. Ironically, at the very moment when those forces were establishing the pop culture West in the American mind, they were bringing to a close the real frontier West. But if the West's frontier phase was over, the pop culture West continued to mirror historical trends of the twentieth century. Its changing images revealed corresponding shifts and tensions in American politics, society, and culture and reflected important issues and events."

"The pop culture West offers glimpses of America 's
self-identity, providing insights into American values, beliefs, and actions. It shows where Americans have been, where they are, and perhaps, where they are headed....Although the frontier may be closed and the geographical West may be settled, the mythic West continues to exist in the thoughts, dreams and popular culture of the American people."