The Wire CuttersThe first novel to portray seriously nineteenth-century cowboy life, The Wire-Cutters was Moll__ E. Moore Davis's tour de force inspired by the Fence Cutting Wars fought by competing cattlemen and ranchers in Central Texas. First published in 1899, the novel introduced readers to a new kind of storytelling that prefigured an entire American literary genre--the Western--and predated Owen Wister's The Virginian (1902) and Andy Adams's Log of a Cowboy (1903), two novels widely regarded as the first Westerns by many unfamiliar with Davis's groundbreaking work. Considered among the best of the region's early fiction writers, Davis spent time as a writer and newspaperwoman in Texas and Louisiana, using both states as settings for her stories. Her body of work demonstrates the movement away from romantic conventions toward a storytelling that relied more heavily on realism. Davis' Texas based novels especially reveal a writer whose sharp ear for regional dialect, abundant sense of frontier humor, and keen grasp of historical detail drive a narrative that is grounded in observable and shared experience. Centered around the destructive fence-cutting war waged against ranchers by cattlemen whose herds were cut off from water, The Wire-Cutters recreates the colorful vernacular and often quirky personalities of the cowboys, the rich folk culture of the region, and the particulars of daily life on the Western frontier. Now, with a foreword by Lou Halsell Rodenberger which delineates the historical and literary significance of this important but forgotten novel, The Wire-Cutters is available for the first time since its initial publication to literary and cultural scholars and historians, as well as to lovers of the Western novel and readers of Texana. |
Contents
| 1 | |
THE CHILD | 17 |
CAST OUT OF THE NEST | 32 |
FACE TO FACE | 39 |
HIS CHANCE | 55 |
A BAPTIZING | 69 |
CROUCHS WELL | 85 |
AN ARRIVAL | 103 |
IN PELEG CHURCH | 205 |
THE RED BANDA | 229 |
THE LAW | 253 |
PREPARATION | 264 |
THE TRIAL | 282 |
EASTWOOD PLANTATION | 293 |
MOTHER AND SON | 313 |
HELEN | 336 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
Abner Croft ain't arms Armstead asked Aunt Amanda Aunt Pauline Bagley beautiful Billy birth-mark Black Prince Blackmore brother cattle cheek child Coleman County Comanche County cried Crouch's Settlement dark David French Davis dear drew dropped Eastwood plantation eyes face father feet filly forward Francis French gate girl glance Green Parsons hand head heard heart Helen Wingate horse Jack Ransome Jellson Johnny Giles laughed leaving Leroy Hilliard liard lifted Lilla lips listen looked Margaret Ransome Marse Roy Mesquit Creek Milgrove Mollie mother never night Peleg Church pool prairie Ransome's Rassler Red Parsons returned Reverend David ride road rode Roper saddle seemed shoulder silent Skipton smiling stepped stood tell Texas thought Tom Roper tone turned Uncle Green Uncle Joe Wyatt voice wagon walked wife wire woman women words young Joe
Popular passages
Page ix - If all other books on trail driving were destroyed, a reader could still get a just and authentic conception of trail men, trail work, range cattle, cow horses, and the cow country in general from The Log of a Cowboy. It is a novel without a plot, a woman, character development, or sustained dramatic incidents; yet it is the classic of the occupation.
Page xv - thro' brush and brake' but saw very little game—no deer at all. We brought home some squirrels and partridges. The ride, thro' the fresh, dewy morning hours! Oh, that was worth something! Everything looked as if it were 'made over.