A Bloody and Barbarous God investigates the relationship between gnosticism, a system of thought that argues that the cosmos is evil and that the human spirit must strive for liberation from manifest existence, and the perennial philosophy, a study of the highest common factor in all esoteric religions, and how these traditions have influenced the later novels of Cormac McCarthy, namely Blood Meridian, All the Pretty Horses, The Crossing, Cities of the Plain, No Country for Old Men, and The Road. Mundik argues that McCarthy continually strives to evolve an explanatory theodicy throughout his work and that his novels are, to a lesser or greater extent, concerned with the meaning of human existence in relation to the presence of evil and the nature of the divine.

About the Author
Petra Mundik is a research assistant at Murdoch University in Perth, Western Australia. She has published articles, chapters, essays, and papers on Cormac McCarthy and is at work on a second book dealing with his early novels.

Reviews
Mundik's book tackles the challenging complexity and darkness of McCarthy's metaphysical vision and finds a consistency of vision throughout his novels that is both profound and--in all senses of the word--illuminating." - Lydia R. Cooper, author of No More Heroes: Narrative Perspective and Morality in Cormac McCarthy

"Petra Mundik has done readers and scholars of Cormac McCarthy's work a tremendous service by gathering together the disparate arguments about his spiritual vision and its sources and discussing them elegantly and exhaustively. This book is a stunning critical accomplishment." - Rick Wallach, editor of Myth, Legend, Dust: Critical Responses to Cormac McCarthy



Book Information
ISBN 9780826363343
Author Petra Mundik
Format Paperback
Page Count 432
Imprint University of New Mexico Press
Publisher University of New Mexico Press
Weight(grams) 333g