Fri 28 Oct 2022
CHARLES WILLEFORD – Cockfighter. Chicago Paperback House, paperback, 1962. Crown, hardcover (slightly revised), 1972. Avon, paperback, movie tie-in, 1974. Black Lizard, paperback, 1987.
If you’re still looking for the great American novel, this could be it.
George Washington wrote a letter to General Lafayette saying: “It will be worth coming back to the United States, if only to be present at an election and a cocking main at which is displayed a spirit of anarchy and confusion, which no countryman of yours can understand.†One may want to remember this point, which we may be in danger of forgetting.
Frank Mansfield is a cockfighter. He’s 32 and single. Cockfighting is his life. And his life’s goal is to win the Cockfighter of the Year award. He’s taken a vow of silence and will not speak again until and unless he wins the award.
The story is of the single-minded purpose and commitment of a man alone in the world but for the signal pursuit that he himself has freely chosen and the cockfighting community in which he thrives.
It’s a story of honesty, brutality and commitment. There are four things we can learn from a rooster: To fight, to get up early, to eat with your family, and to protect your spouse when she gets into trouble. Frank Mansfield has no spouse or family. But two out of four ain’t bad.
The honesty of the sport is impeccable as a peck of pecking peckers. A cock couldn’t throw a fight even if it knew how.
I’d last read this book in the mid-90’s and considered it a favorite. But sometimes it’s good to see if my assessments of yore hold true. And as old Heraclitius pointed out ‘you can’t step in the same river twice’ because you’ve changed and so has the river.
Well, if I loved the book before I love it even more now. This book is as good as it gets. It’s about cockfighting, sure. But more than that it’s about life, about commitment to something, never mind what the hell it is. And fighting for it with everything you’ve got, risking everything. Like Camus said, “A reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying.â€
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In 1974 was made into a movie starring Warren Oates, Harry Dean Stanton, and Charles Willeford. Directed by Monte Hellman (who also made the terrific Two-Lane Blacktop starring Dennis Wilson and James Taylor).
https://tubitv.com/movies/466939/cockfighter
October 29th, 2022 at 9:09 pm
The Camus quote is apt, because there is something of the same savage eye for the realities of life in Willeford’s work, a sort of base honesty that the reader can’t turn their eye from even when they want to.
Not perhaps the great American Novel, but likely the great American pulp novel.
October 29th, 2022 at 10:14 pm
Both book and film have been highly recommended to me from acquaintances I trust and admire for their good taste (as I do, all of you here).
But, I haven’t taken the plunge on this author yet.
No good reason; maybe just feeling that the pace of life speeds along too fast these days. Can’t seem to slow down to enjoy a meaty, chewy read.
October 31st, 2022 at 12:54 am
Charles Willeford is not an author you, I or anyone should decide to tackle before we’re ready for him.
October 31st, 2022 at 7:15 am
Excellent review of the novel here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2004/12/31/cockfighter-writer-wins-his-spurs/91820e3c-f653-410f-9986-8e30119c5e40/
October 31st, 2022 at 2:57 pm
Thanks for the link, Tony, Not only is this an excellent review, but there’s quite a bit of information about Mr, Willeford himself, including some from personal point of view, none of which I knew before.