Thursday, March 28, AD 2024 5:43am

Requiescat In Pace: Charles Portis

 

You must pay for everything in this world one way and another. There is nothing free except the Grace of God. You cannot earn that or deserve it.

Mattie Ross, True Grit

Charles Portis, the author of True Grit has died at age 86.  He joined the Marine Corps during the Korean War.  He came out a sergeant in 1955 and began to work as a reporter.  He left journalism in 1964,  He wrote the novel True Grit in 1968.  The movie version that earned John Wayne his best acting Oscar came out in 1969.  The good remake came out in 2010.  Portis shunned the literary limelight, living in Little Rock, Arkansas, believing his work should speak for itself, and it did and does.  I trust Saint Peter will find work for a skilled penman.

 

On his deathbed he asked for a priest and became a Catholic. That was his wife’s religion. It was his own business and none of mine. If you had sentenced one hundred and sixty men to death and seen around eighty of them swing, then maybe at the last minute you would feel the need for some stronger medicine than the Methodists could make.

Mattie Ross, True Grit

 

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Ernst Schreiber
Ernst Schreiber
Tuesday, February 18, AD 2020 12:10pm

The 2010 remake is the exception that proves the rule: never remake a John Wayne movie.

See also the corollary: never remake a Harrison Ford film.

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