They Shoot Horses Don't They? - Horace McCoy

THEY SHOOT HORSES DON'T THEY? - HORACE MCCOY

According to Simone de Beauvoir, They Shoot Horses Don't They? By Horace McCoy is one of America's first existentialist novels. Not that it's ever presented or even typically read as such but once you think about, it's clearly true. In fact, in some ways it's even on a par with one of the greatest existentialist novels ever written, that being Albert Camus' The Outsider.

In Camus' book the main protagonist for no apparent reason kills an Arab on the beach, saying only that it was 'because of the sun'. In McCoy's book the main protagonist for no other reason than 'she asked me to', kills his dancing partner.

'Ain't he an obliging bastard?' says a policeman whilst arresting him 'Is that the only reason you got?' To which the reply is simply 'They shoot horses, don't they?'

Gloria, the girl who is killed by her partner, is the classic exponent of the 'why kill time when you can kill yourself' school of thought. As revealed throughout the book she is all too aware of the absurdity of life and the apparent futility of existence, stating right from the start: 'It's peculiar to me that everybody pays so much attention to living and so little to dying. Why are these high-powered scientists always screwing around trying to prolong life instead of finding pleasant ways to end it? There must be a hell of a lot of people in the world like me – who want to die but haven't got the guts.'

To all the people around her, Gloria is nothing more than a consistently gloomy person but actually it's much more than that because Gloria has conviction on her side. All the evidence points her to the idea that she would indeed be better off dead. From her broken childhood, the grinding poverty of everyday life, to her ending up as a contestant in a dance marathon where couples literally dance until they drop, the winners being the last ones standing.

This is the world of the Marathon Dance Craze that Gloria has found herself in, the 1930s near-equivalent of any number of today's reality TV shows where people come and watch other poor and somewhat desperate people physically and metaphorically tear themselves apart for the entertainment of others and the lure of a cash prize. Round and round the contestants waltz or more often just shuffle until they can shuffle no more, all promoted by various businesses only too happy to use the contest and individual contestants to advertise and promote their brand.

'I'm tired of living and I'm afraid of dying,' Gloria says at one point, essentially declaring that she's stuck at the end of her tether with no discernible way out. 'This whole business is a merry-go-round. When we get out of here we're right back where we started. I wish I was dead. I wish God would strike me dead.'

According to Albert Camus, suicide is not a legitimate act and rather than trying to escape from life it's important to remain within it, utilizing creativity and rebellion as a rebuke against the absurdity of it all. For Gloria, her creative and artistic leanings are to be found in her desire to be an actress but through no fault of her own she's locked out of her Hollywood dream due to being unable to get onto the books of the big casting agency that all the studios go to when looking for extras.

Her rebelliousness, however, is unfettered and shows itself to good effect when she confronts some members of The Mother's League for Good Morals who are seeking to close down the dance marathon due to it being 'a degrading and pernicious influence in the community'.

It's interesting that whilst Gloria herself hates the dance marathon and all it stands for, she takes a stand when others try to close it down on moral grounds: 'You're the kind of bitches who sneak in the toilet to read dirty books and tell filthy stories and then go out and try to spoil somebody else's fun,' she tells them 'Do you ladies have children of your own? Do you know where they are tonight and what they're doing? Maybe I can give you a rough idea. While you two noble characters are here doing your duty by some people you don't know, your daughters are probably in some guy's apartment, with their clothes off, getting drunk.'

The women of the Mother's League are aghast at Gloria's outburst: 'Young woman,' one of them says 'You ought to be in a reform school!' To which Gloria replies 'I was in one once. There was a dame just like you in charge. She was a lesbian...'

They Shoot Horses Don't They? ends, of course, in tragedy when Gloria gets her wish and her partner shoots her dead. It's how the book starts and it's how the book ends. At the moment of her death, however, Gloria is relaxed, comfortable and for the first time – smiling.

There is no real great lesson being imparted in these pages and neither no philosophical treatise, but rather it's just a snapshot of a certain time and place in American history that still echoes down the ages. It's probably just by accident that there are existentialist themes running through it but it's a happy accident that launches the book into a whole other territory, taking the reader with it and dropping them there to ponder life's complexities as the leather runs smooth on the passenger seat.

They Shoot Horses Don't They? is a strange book but even stranger is that it was made into a film in 1969 starring Jane Fonda in the role of Gloria, which also in itself stands as an accidental paean to existentialism and the idea that in the midst of winter there is within us an invincible summer.

John Serpico