The given adjective used to describe the 1960s is “tumultuous;” but what was it like for ordinary people unsuspecting that they were the actors on a shifting cultural stage? Larry McMurtry illuminates this in “Moving On.” The book doesn’t have much of a story arc—it’s solely focused on the relationship between two married people and the relationships that they have with others through, and eventually outside of, their marriage. And the intimate knowledge the reader is given of the marriage and the internal thoughts of the main character, Patsy, slows the story down and makes it hard to really like anyone, especially Patsy. But much like McMurtry’s other earlier novels, he gives a very specific and rare insight into how common people were dealing with seismic changes in the American fabric on a granular level, but probably was happening everywhere (we’d know for sure if we had more authors as gifted as McMurtry). That’s what makes McMurtry’s novels, in particular “The Last Picture Show (published in ’66),” “Moving On (’70),” and “All My Friends Are Going To Be Strangers (’72),” so valuable. His prose is so descriptive that he writes almost like an embedded journalist giving first-hand detailed accounts, describing things like the emerging prevalence of drugs and hippies not in a factual way, but as part of the changing landscape, as oddities suddenly appearing and irking McMurtry’s characters without his characters really understanding what’s happening. More importantly, he takes his observations and—in an absolutely, touched-by-God sort of way—translates that into an understanding of what his characters are feeling, communicating it tenderly to his readers. Patsy is struggling to accept her role as the young wife in an upper-middle class marriage. Never mind that she is beautiful, smart, charismatic, and knows all this about herself; she feels limited to the choices and successes her husband, Jim, has in his life. Patsy spends the first portion of the book trapped as a passenger in Jim’s car as he drives from rodeo to rodeo. Later she busies herself reading all of Jim’s books as he tries to be a literary scholar. As a result, Patsy cries, a lot, and Jim hates her for making his shortcomings apparent. She ends up taking a lover, not really because she desires him, but more because she desires something for herself. From the viewpoint of a woman in the 21st century, who has the freedom to date and even live with men without public scorn (at least in most circles) and the choice to pursue a professional career (provided there are jobs), Patsy’s adultery made it hard for me to root for her. I found myself being critical of her for not having more foresight into the kind of d-bag Jim would make as a husband and allowing herself to get pregnant. Reminding myself that this was pre-Women’s Rights and that people sometimes make bad choices, no matter what era, helped me through. More interesting were the parts that involved the rodeos and ranches. Cowboys don’t make the most likable characters because they tend to be macho pricks (see “Hud,” who Sonny in this book reminded me A LOT of), so it was nice having more rodeo misfits, like Pete and Peewee, who were involved in that world, but kind of uneasy about it. McMurtry is at his most loving when he is describing Jim’s Uncle Roger’s ranch. The passage that really struck me was his description of Roger’s neighbor, who wasn’t able to come to Roger’s funeral because he had to tend to a calf’s birth, and told Patsy that he arrived at Roger’s grave late: “The way he kept calling Roger Mr. Wagonner stabbed at her suddenly. Though he must have known Roger for years it was clear that he had never called him anything but Mr. Wagonner; and the thought of Melvin, in whatever kind of suit he could own, the blood of birth barely off his hands, alone at the filled-in-grave, hit her hard. It had the sort of poignance the funeral had utterly lacked. She went outside while Melvin finished sacking the oats, and dipped her fingers in the icy water of the watering trough. Her eyes and lashes were wet.” That’s more poetic than poetry.A book that, at first, seems like a collection of events in a failed marriage reveals the textures of change in ‘60s Texas. Frustrated wives, clueless academic men, rodeo (and societal) outcasts, isolated ranchers (of both genders), and seeking teenagers are stitched together here and show that people back then really aren’t that much different than people now.
This is an early McMurtry novel, a long, rambling story with young Patsy Carpenter at the center of a large cast of characters that includes graduate students, ranchers, rodeo cowboys, a Hollywood writer, Haight-Ashbury hippies, and wealthy Texans - both new and old money. Written in the late 1960s, and published in 1970, "Moving On" is interesting for its attempt to capture the subtly shifting moods of its central characters instead of focusing on action and storyline. As page follows page, McMurtry describes his characters' feelings of self-assurance, annoyance, boredom, frustration, and sexual tension. And often moods degenerate into tears - Patsy's in particular.There's more than a bit of Henry Miller in much of the novel, as characters attempt to match up their levels of sexual passion, often finding that they are rarely feeling the same thing for each other at the same time. Seduction is often unsuccessful or unsatisfying, a rendezvous full of romantic promise may turn into an argument leaving both parties exhausted. A pass made after several drinks at a party or over a milk shake at a soda fountain may elicit an exchange of bitterness and barbed recriminations. A married couple talks openly of their infidelities. A wife accuses her husband of being neglectful, while she routinely meets a colleague of his for sex.For readers who like action and narrative development, this book will seem very slow going. For some, the many shifts of mood and ironies of thwarted intentions will make the story seem flat and the central characters unfocused. By contrast, the marginal characters, especially an old widowed rancher, a rodeo clown and his young barrel-racer girlfriend, and a teenage bronc rider spring from the page fully realized. A few scenes are pumped up with melodrama (a professor's wife breaks down in front of the girl her husband has tried to seduce; a champion rodeo cowboy refuses to accept that a ranch-owning woman he's been bedding is growing tired of him; a pregnant young woman is rescued from a drugged existence with a sinister boyfriend). But the most crisply vivid and emotionally honest scenes involve the death and burial of an old man in the nearly treeless prairie northwest of Dallas. They're simple and understated like the country folks who people these pages.McMurtry says that this novel emerged from an image of a young woman in a car eating a melted chocolate bar. What follows that image is one thing after another, until we reach the end almost 800 pages later, and that same woman, now divorcing her husband, feels a kind of independence that may never surrender itself to another man. Some readers will find this ending worth the trip; others may find themselves, like McMurtry's characters, in a somewhat different mood.
What do You think about Moving On (1999)?
If you enjoy the Terms of Endearment/Evening Star series of books by Larry McMurty, you will enjoy this book. This story centers around Patsy, Emma's best friend from Terms. Emma and Flap make brief appearances through out the book. But, the main focus is on Patsy and the relationship she has with her first husband. It's a very enjoyable journey through cowboy country in the form of rodeos, a perfect demonstration of Patsy's introspection, and a wonderful glimpse into the inter workings of a new marriage.
—Amanda
The Amazon.com reviews for this book say that nothing happens in this book, but that is totally untrue. It's a long meandering portrait of a marriage falling apart. It's main character Patsy Carpenter is not particularly likeable, but I came to sympathize deeply with her. Many many many people have said that she cries too much, but I entirely disagree. I think it's a nuanced, incredibly well-observed rendering of a real woman, more so than almost any other male writer I've ever read. She is not all women, all women do not cry so much, but she is herself entirely.This shouldn't be a huge surprise. Larry McMurtry has always written women--people, really--incredibly well. Just look at his masterpiece, Lonesome Dove. It doesn't matter if a character is in that book for a second or all 800 pages; from the moment they come on stage, every character is perfectly him- or herself.At times Moving On was disturbing, because it so very well captures that alienation that one can feel in a long-term, intimate relationship, those moments that happen even in good relationships, where you look at the other person and think, for a moment, "Who are you?" He also captures the pain of those relationships falling apart, even when it's better that they do, the ugly realization that someone is better off without you, is even a better person without you. Highly recommended.
—linnea
Next to Lonesome Dove, this is McMurtry's best book in my estimation. I think it was his second book. I read it forty years ago and decided to reread it. I liked it then and I liked it now. It's about a failing marriage in the 1960's. It takes place mostly in Texas and revolves around rodeo characters and graduate students at Rice. I've read almost everything by McMurtry. His books generally fall into two categories - very very good or very very bad. (I recommend 'Walter Benjamin at the Dairy Queen' for an introspective look at his own work) 'Moving On' is in the very good column.
—William Ramsay
