What If: An Alternate Imagining of Lonesome Dove

 

I love Lonesome Dove. I read the book when it first came out, when I was in high school. Four years later the miniseries came along, and I loved that, too. The novel, of course, became just one part of a four-part cycle of novels, which I think compare to Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales when it comes to encapsulating the mythology of the American frontier. Years ago, I came across a fascinating story about the writing of the novel by Larry McMurtry, and it has stoked my imagination ever since. Maybe you've heard it before.

In 1971, McMurtry and the young director Peter Bogdanovich were fresh off adapting McMurtry's novel The Last Picture Show into a screenplay, and then a critically acclaimed movie. They wanted to follow it up with something even bigger: an original screenplay for an epic traditional western that would star three of the biggest names in the history of Hollywood westerns -John Wayne, James Stewart, and Henry Fonda. It would be an elegiac western, a swan song about three aging cowboys facing their own mortality and the passing of their way of life. McMurtry and Bogdanovich co-wrote a treatment of the proposed screenplay -that is, a comprehensive overview of the story and the characters, essentially writing out the story in prose form which could then be hashed into a screenplay with all the dialogue. It was called Streets of Laredo.

Stewart and Fonda signed on to the project as Gus McCrae and Jake Spoon... but Wayne balked. One source says that he felt the character of Woodrow Call was "too much of a hardass" and might be bad for his image. Another says that Wayne felt the story was too elegiac, like it was the actors saying goodbye to the West, and might impact the success of his future westerns. Maybe it was both. Maybe, as this is John Wayne, he felt it was too "revisionist," though that is speculation on my part. It is worth pointing out that many of Wayne's best, most electrifying performances came when he was being a cold, somewhat cruel, hardass... Red River and The Searchers, for example. It is also worth noting that, five years later, Wayne did star in an adaptation of a very elegiac western novel (Glendon Swarthout's The Shootist), which wound up being the perfect capstone to his career.

Regardless, without John Wayne's participation the project fell apart and languished for years. McMurtry eventually bought back the rights to the treatment so he could write it as a novel (with a different title), and -one Pulitzer Prize later -the rest is history. 

But I've always wondered.

Most people couldn't imagine anyone other than Tommy Lee Jones and Robert Duval as leads to an adaptation of Lonesome Dove. However, Wayne, Stewart and Fonda would have been outstanding in the roles that were, in a way, literally created for them. It is worth pointing out that all four novels in the cycle were adapted as TV miniseries -as well as a non-McMurtry-approved sequel called Return to Lonesome Dove -so, actually, there have already been five actors to play Woodrow Call.

I am going to interject what will probably be an unpopular opinion. I would give anything if someone like HBO, Prime, or Netflix would re-film the entire four-novel saga using the same set of actors throughout, for consistency's sake.

All this has set me thinking -for years -what it would have been like had the whole saga been produced with the originally envisioned Hollywood icons in the lead roles. For my own diversion -I'll do anything to avoid actual work -I have put together imaginary casts for them all. I am envisioning each novel adaptation coming at an appropriate time in the actors' lives, and have used actors from around that time to fill out all the supporting roles.

It occurs to me that AI could be used in the not-too-distant future to actually do this -but that would not only require an enormous number of permissions, but would be entirely too creepy in both a moral and "uncanny valley" sense.

But I can daydream.

A Liberal Dose, January 5, 2022 "January 6: A Day That Will Forever Live in Infamy"

 

A Liberal Dose

January 5, 2023

Troy D. Smith

“January 6: A Day That Will Forever Live in Infamy”

 

Tomorrow marks the second anniversary of one of the low points of American history. A lot of people who supported Donald Trump might not want to think so; they may wish people would stop talking about it. They may change the channel, especially when news programs show the actual (and shocking) footage of that day. They may say everyone is exaggerating the violence of that event -or that it should not count as an insurrection, because only a handful of people died.

But guess what. History teachers are still talking about Shays’ Rebellion (1786) and the Whiskey Rebellion (1791). Only nine people died in the former, and only four or five in the latter. We do not talk about them because of the magnitude of death and destruction that occurred, but because of the magnitude of their historical significance. Shays’ Rebellion led indirectly to the drafting of the U.S. Constitution. The Whiskey Rebellion demonstrated (to the country and to the world) that the government created by that Constitution had the authority, will, and power to suppress violent actions against the Constitution, the government, and the law. All three of which, by the way, perfectly describe the insurrection of January 6, 2021.

Except, in the case of the January rebellion, it was the president himself who instigated, encouraged, and allowed the violence directed against both his own executive branch (in the person of his vice-president, who came within a hair’s-breadth of assassination) and the whole legislative branch. The House Select Committee investigating the attack, who have recently released their interview transcripts, uncovered a breathtaking array of evidence that our authoritarian ex-President intentionally stirred up his fervent followers to stop the Constitutionally mandated certification of the election, or at least delay it long enough for some of his other schemes with the same purpose to come to fruition. One of the most frightening disclosures of the transcripts is that the Pentagon refused to send troops in to quell the riot out of fear that, if they were that close to the action, the president would illegally order them to help the rioters overthrow the government chosen by a majority of the American people. Fittingly enough, Trump started his presidency with a warning of “American carnage,” and ended it by delivering it.

On the day itself, my pro-Trump friends were uncharacteristically quiet. It was virtually impossible to defend the carnage while it was unspooling live on television. I believed at the time they were overcome by shame, and maybe (hopefully) they were. Within a few days, though -following the Trump doctrine of denying that the past happened -they were minimizing or excusing the whole thing.

But the truth is -and this is why January 6 will be talked about by historians for centuries to come -that day (like the Whiskey Rebellion) was a major testing of constitutional democracy. It could have gone very differently -and if Trump had installed the type of hyper-loyal-constitutionally-averse-authoritarian staff he no doubt would install in a second administration, it would have.

For those of us paying attention, the months leading up to the 2022 midterms were almost as frightening. A whole slew of Trump-backed candidates were on the slate who, had they won, would have been situated to change the results of the next election in Trump’s favor. Thankfully, almost all those candidates in swing states lost, demonstrating that Trump was losing some of his influence. This, in turn, led to the Republican establishment finally feeling emboldened to buck The Orange One, and the conventional wisdom now is that Trump will not be favored to win the nomination this time.

But he wasn’t favored to win the nomination in 2016, either. Many thought it was impossible for him to do so, or to win the general election. He has enough devoted followers to get the Republican spot. It’s still an urgent necessity that we remember January 6.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Dec. 29, 2022 "9/11 and the Unraveling of Hegemony"

 

Note: this is the 4th in a 4-part series. There are links below to the previous parts.

PART ONE

PART TWO

PART THREE

A Liberal Dose

December 29, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“9/11 and the Unraveling of Hegemony”

 

Last week I closed by describing several CIA/state department actions in the 1950s that many citizens might find shocking or disturbing. Helping overthrow democratically elected governments in second-and-third-world countries in order to install brutal dictators who were friendly to U.S. foreign interests… this seems like the opposite of what we imagine ourselves to be. It is not my goal, in telling you these stories, to “run down America” or solely to focus on the negative. My goal is to help you understand the present. Frankly, unless you know the story about the Shah of Iran and Mohammed Mossadegh, it is impossible to understand just why people in Iran have hated us so much in the past.

Now I’m going to tie it together in the present. Notice that the U.S. trained and equipped Ho Chi Minh when his Vietnamese guerrillas were fighting our enemies the Japanese in WWII. You doubtlessly know that we also trained and equipped Saddam Hussein when he was fighting our enemies the Iranians in the 1980s, and Osama bin Laden when he was fighting against the Soviets in Afghanistan (also in the ‘80s.) Whether we fought with or against any specific group often depended on our national interests at the time -which a hegemon must protect even more than countries normally do.

Let’s talk about Afghanistan. The Soviets invaded them in 1980 and fought there for almost a decade- it was a quagmire for them, roughly equivalent to our own experience in Vietnam. Muslim fighters from around the world went there to help the Afghans resist. They were called mujahedeen, “fighters for righteousness,” engaged in jihad. And we trained and equipped them, because they were fighting communist Russia. Heck, if you recall, they were the good guys in Rambo III.

Now, there were a lot of factors in the collapse of the USSR… but this was one of the major ones. Stuck in an unwinnable war, forced to stretch their own resources, losing support of their citizens at home, their economy collapsing… this set the stage for the Russian people to rebel. The mujahedeen helped topple a superpower.

Here comes the heavy part.

What is hegemony? Being globally dominant financially, militarily, and politically. What did Osama bin Laden attack on 9/11?

The World Trade Center. The Pentagon. Washington, DC (though that one was foiled by brave passengers).

The attacks were deeply symbolic of destroying American hegemony. And what was bin Laden’s goal? To do the same thing to the U.S. he had done to the USSR: entice us into a series of unwinnable wars which would cause us to overextend our resources, thus crippling our economy and hopelessly dividing our citizens, turning them against the government and leading to our collapse. This would be a speeding up of the natural process of hegemony: once you get it, you start losing it, by virtue of the things you have to do to hold on to it. I’m still not sure it didn’t work, just in slow motion for the past twenty years.

In 1988, Henry Kissinger said, “peace requires either hegemony or balance of power. We have neither the resources nor the stomach for the former. The only question is how much we have to suffer before we realize this.”

Hegemony is not permanent. What happens when it is gone? Either a return to balance of power, or a new hegemon. The question is, can Americans do what Brits have been forced to do since their empire collapsed- be content to be ONE OF the main countries, but not THE main country. If you haven’t noticed, older Brits are still having a hard time dealing with this. And who would be the main country then? That is a justifiably scary question.

Regardless, though, it does not help to bury our heads in the sand. It is very important to use history to understand the present and the future.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

 

A Liberal Dose, Dec. 22, 2022 "How America Became the Global Policeman"

 

This is part 3 of a four-part series.

Read Part 1 HERE

Read Part 2 HERE

A Liberal Dose

December 22, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“How America Became the Global Policeman”

Last week, I ended with a reference to two-time-Pulitzer-winning journalist Walter Lippman’s words in his 1947 book Cold War. He warned that the West’s penchant for seeing everything through the lens of communism-vs.-capitalism, without considering specific circumstances, would cause dangerous blind spots in national policy. In particular, he warned that the biggest challenge the West would face in coming decades would be a global surge in nationalism.

Remember, when a country gains hegemony they have to constantly be involved in issues all around the world in order to protect their (suddenly greatly expanded) national interests. It is like a pipeline in which a constant flow must be maintained, with no leaks or kinks, in order for it all to work. It is no accident I use a pipeline as an analogy, because in the 20^th/21^st century control of oil has been one of the foremost resource considerations for maintaining hegemony, first by Britain and then by us. Remember, also, third world countries tend to be controlled by first-world countries… in order to take their resources.

So when third world countries want to end foreign influence over their resources -perhaps by throwing off the yoke of colonialism and declaring their independence, or simply by taking over national control of their resources and cutting out foreign investors -it creates a kink. It obstructs the flow. It endangers the financial primacy of the hegemon; it conflicts with that hegemon’s national interests, even though it concerns a different nation who want to control their OWN interests. This is what Lippmann meant about nationalism being a challenge -all those formerly colonized countries around the world declaring their independence during the twenty years after the end of WWII, and trying to prevent outsiders from controlling their economies and resources. Of course, the Soviets were always willing to cheer such actions on and offer help, caught up as they also were in the Cold War mentality of East vs. West. But those third world countries were not necessarily looking at it that way- they were promoting their own national interests, as countries do.

In 1952 the people of Iran kicked out their dictator, the Shah, who had been closely allied with the U.S. and Britain. They elected a new leader, Mohammed Mossadegh, who announced he was going to nationalize the oil industry -cutting out American and British companies and putting the Iranian government in charge of their own resources. One year later he was overthrown in a coup orchestrated by the CIA and MI6. He was sent to prison, where he died three years later, and the Shah was put back into power… and the oil flowed freely to the west.

In 1950, Juan Jacobo Arbenz Guzman was fairly elected the leader of Guatemala. Generally considered a moderate, he did give land to peasants and nationalized the fruit industry. The United Fruit Company, based in the U.S., decried that as socialism… and soon the CIA engineered a coup, after which he was replaced by a dictator who protected the interests of American companies. Twenty years later, similar CIA actions put the brutal dictator Augusto Pinochet in charge of Chile.

Vietnam was a colony of France, and was brutally occupied by Japan during the war. A resistance movement, led by Ho Chi Minh, was funded and trained by the OSS (forerunner of the CIA). The Vietnamese thought that, when Japan surrendered, they could declare independence -but were instead returned to France. Despite being communist, Ho appealed to America for help, but we did not want to interfere with our French allies. So he turned to the Soviets and China for support -and eventually drove out the French. We took France’s place, not realizing that -communist or not -the real goal of Ho and most Vietnamese was nationalist. They didn’t want to spread communism -they just wanted their country back.

We would have huge problems for decades in Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America due to these 1950s actions.

To be continued.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Dec. 15, 2022 "WWII and the Rise of American Hegemony"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 15, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“WWII and the Rise of American Hegemony”

 

Note: this is part 2 of 4. Part 1 can be read HERE

Last week I introduced a brief series of columns on the subject of hegemony. If you missed part 1, I will give you a quick review. Hegemony is when one among a cohort of powerful countries, usually as a result of being the least damaged in a catastrophic war, gains influence over the others by being dominant militarily, politically, and economically. This requires the hegemonic power to become a “global policeman,” engaged in wars around the globe to protect their national interests. The United Kingdom of Great Britain achieved hegemony during the Napoleonic wars, and held it for about 125 years. In that time, “the sun never set on the British Empire” and London was the financial center of the world. At the same time, in order to preserve that hegemony, the U.K. fought wars in Afghanistan, South Africa, Burma, Egypt, China, India, the Crimea… and the list goes on and on. Nonetheless, they maintained their hold and by the end of WWI in 1918 were at the height of their power.

It all started to unravel with WWII and the beginning of the Nazi bombardment of Britain in 1940. The major cities of England were pounded into rubble and they lost many of their colonies to the Germans and Japanese. Most of those colonies were regained with the surrender of the Axis powers, but Britain was terribly weakened and within a few years after the end of the war many of their largest and most lucrative colonies around the world declared independence and broke away.

The Axis Powers (Germany, Italy, and Japan) were also pounded into rubble. Most of the other major world powers were also greatly damaged as the war unfolded on their own doorsteps: France, Russia, China… virtually all of Europe and Asia. Only one major combatant emerged relatively unscathed: the U.S.A. Yes, a lot of service members died -though a much smaller percentage of the population than in the other major countries -but, other than Pearl Harbor, there were no major battles fought on American soil. By the end of WWII, the U.S. had replaced the U.K. as the leader of the Allies and the “free world.” This was demonstrated in the summer of 1944 when representatives of all the allied nations met in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire, and voted to change the basis of international currency exchange from the British pound to the American dollar. It was further cemented two years later when the new United Nations organization was headquartered in New York City. By the late 1940s, America had military, political, and financial dominance. The Soviet Union was a rival superpower during the Cold War, yes, but only the U.S. had hegemony. To prevent the Soviets from wresting that hegemony away, for the first time in American history a “military industrial complex” developed and a large standing army was maintained during peacetime, which has been the norm ever since.

U.S. government policy toward their former WWII allies the Soviet Union started to gel right after the war ended. In February, 1946, U.S. Ambassador to the U.S.S.R. George Kennan sent President Truman the famous “Long Telegram” outlining the belief that communist powers were ideologically incapable of coexisting with capitalism, and that therefore communism must be “contained” and not allowed to spread to other countries. Following the “Truman Doctrine,” the U.S. from that point forward would always side with anti-communist factions no matter the circumstances. This often led to tunnel vision, with many Americans thinking all communist countries were a united monolith with the same international goals. It also led to constant involvement in foreign wars.

In 1947, Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Walter Lippmann wrote a book called Cold War which warned that putting every single political event in the framework of capitalism-vs-communism would cause western governments to miss the true underlying issue… nationalism. Doing this in the 1950s would lead to catastrophe in the 1960s.

To be continued.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, Dec. 8, 2022 "What Is Hegemony? Understanding the Modern World"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 8, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“What Is Hegemony? Understanding the Modern World”

 

After several columns in a row that have been primarily about the current political climate, I’ve decided to go out on a limb and do a deep historical dive in order to provide a broader perspective on the big picture. As I am wont to do from time to time, this will be a multi-part undertaking. Actually, the topic I want to expound on usually requires a one-hour classroom lecture to cover -and it is something students have usually never heard of or thought about before. Nonetheless, putting it all into context can make a lot of things about the past century make a lot more sense.

The topic is hegemony: what it is, how it works, and what it means for us in the 21^st century.

Much of what I will discuss is based on the work of the late Thomas McCormick (one of the foremost scholars of diplomatic history), who refined the earlier work of Yale economic historian Immanuel Wallerstein (us academics have to cite our sources, you know).

By the way, at this point I usually show a picture of Jiminy Cricket dressed as Uncle Sam, as a way for students to remember how to pronounce the word: Hegemony Cricket. Let’s start with a dictionary definition. “Hegemony, n.: leadership or dominance, especially by one country or social group over others.” In modern, international terms, this does not necessarily mean a country that militarily conquers everyone else. Rather, it is one country in an international community of countries that, due to a special set of circumstances, develops primacy to the extent that the other countries defer to it, either out of respect or fear. This has only been possible in the modern era (that is, since Columbus, when the possibility of global interconnection arose).

Before Columbus, McCormick and Wallerstein wrote, there were two types of societies/economies: Subsistence (hunter/gatherers) and external (kingdoms and empires). The European discovery of the New World, motivated by desire for trade, led to global capitalism. This led to the establishment of first, second, and third-world countries, with the first-world being the most powerful. Third-world countries mostly were used to provide resources to the more powerful ones. And when subsistence or external systems encountered the capitalist system, they were always absorbed by it. It’s sort of like encountering the Borg or a zombie horde- resistance is futile. Native Americans, for example, got drawn into the trade system, as did Africans, Pacific Islanders, and others, and became dependent on trade goods, transforming their cultures- and ended up losing their resources as a result.

The natural order among first-world nations in a global capitalist system is to have a balance of power: several first-world nations competing, providing checks and balances, with no one on top for long. Think of colonial history, when the English, French, and Spanish were all jockeying for power for centuries, going back and forth.

Hegemony occurs when, usually due to war or catastrophe, several of those nations are seriously damaged but one is relatively unscathed, putting them on top. This happened in the early 1800s with the Napoleonic wars. France and Spain, and most other major European countries, were devastated -but England, which had no fighting on its shores and who led the victory over Napoleon, was unscathed. This led to Great Britain gaining hegemony, which requires three things: military, political, and financial dominance. For well over a century, “the sun never set on the British Empire.” Britain was THE world power. Thing is, the moment you gain hegemony you start losing it- because you have to strain your economy by engaging in wars all around the globe to protect your national interests and stay on top. You become the “global policeman.” Britain managed it… until WWII, when things changed in a big way, leading to a new nation having -and struggling to maintain- hegemony and the global policeman role.

To be continued.

 

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE

A Liberal Dose, December 1, 2022 "Heartfelt Convictions Over Party Lines"

 

A Liberal Dose

December 1, 2022

Troy D. Smith

“Heartfelt Convictions over Party Lines”

 

As the title I chose for this column indicates, it is a Liberal Dose -specifically, a reaction to the events of the day (and from history) from a left-leaning perspective. As Will Rogers famously said, I am not a member of any organized political party: I am a Democrat. I am the faculty adviser of the TTU College Democrats. I am also the faculty adviser for the TTU Students for a Democratic Society. It should come as no surprise, therefore, that I tend to support Democratic policies and candidates, which MOSTLY align with my own values. However, there are some areas where I am farther left than the Democratic Party, and some areas where I am not quite as far left as some of my friends. I thought I would spend a little time this week talking about some of the areas where I do not align perfectly with the average Democrat.

My biggest complaint with the Democratic Party is how cozy they are with Wall Street and big business in general. Not as much as Republicans, maybe… but darn close. I am reminded of the old joke that Republicans will outright mug you, and then Democrats will pick your pocket while they console you afterward. I am pro-labor, pro-union, pro-working class, anti-bigshot. Wall Street is not as political as some make it out- they do their best to buy off both parties, and leaders of both parties make it easy. That is why I voted for Bernie Sanders the last two presidential primaries. Incidentally, Thomas Jefferson insisted a whole new capitol city be built (Washington) instead of keeping the capitol in New York City… because the government was literally too close to Wall Street.

I think both parties are too quick to engage in military options, especially the use of drones. I believe that force, sadly, is sometimes a final and necessary option -but, too often, it is the first option and it is used for political expediency. By both parties. That said, unlike many on the left, I support the military. I just happen to think that they are too often used -and expended -for politics or for national gain rather than in defense. For that matter, unlike some of my own friends, I do not call for abolishing the police, nor for defunding them in the sense of doing so completely. I AM in favor of reform in the sense of better training. I believe that many police forces have become too militarized, in tactics, equipment, and outlook, rather than thinking of themselves as servants and defenders. Many act like they are soldiers patrolling an enemy warzone and become escalators instead of de-escalators. We are lucky in Sparta and White County in that regard, though in the past that was not always the case across the board. Sheriff Page has made great strides in the right direction. I do not personally know our present police chief, but longtime previous chief Jeff Guth is the most honorable, upstanding man I know, and Chief Goff seems to be of similar caliber.

Finally, I am a gun owner. You could say I’m a gun guy. Unlike some on the left, I believe it is a fundamental right to have a gun to defend your home and family. On the other hand, that doesn’t mean there should be no regulations regarding what type of guns civilians should be allowed access to, nor does it mean you need three handguns and an AR-15 just to go to the Sparta Taco Bell. There should also be reasonable background checks.

That’s just a few things -I could make this a whole series of articles. Point is, there is no cardboard cutout liberal who aligns with everything the party does, any more than there is a cutout conservative. We should start seeing the variety and nuances in each other. And maybe in ourselves.

--Troy D. Smith, a White County native, is a novelist and a history professor at Tennessee Tech. His words do not necessarily represent TTU.

 You can find all previous entries in this weekly column HERE

A list of other historical essays that have appeared on this blog can be found HERE

Author's website: www.troyduanesmith.com

The author's historical lectures on youtube can be found HERE