Lonesome Dove at 40: McMurtry, Mythmaking and the American West
Whether ingested via the Emmy-award winning miniseries or in its enormous novel form, a steady diet of Lonesome Dove forms a key staple of any Texas upbringing. Released in 1985, Larry McMurtry’s masterpiece won enormous critical and commercial acclaim for its depiction of a cattle drive from Texas to Montana, earning him the state’s second ever Pulitzer Prize in 1985.
Much to the horror of any Texan reading this, I first ingested Lonesome Dove in a Jersey City hotel room in 2023. Having already completed “Tommy Lee June” by watching a different entry to his filmography every day of that very stressful month, my best friend and I chose to get through October by doing the same thing with Robert Duvall. As Lonesome Dove (1989) was their exact midpoint, we sat and watched the first two episodes.