The Half-Skinned Steer by Annie Proulx Analysis

In this Essay I will be giving a detailed analysis on Annie Proulx’s “The Half-Skinned Steer”, as well as explaining how the author created an emotional response from the reader by manipulating the five major elements of literature. This short story follows a man by the name of Mero and his travels back to his childhood home and state, Wyoming. On his way back and as an old man he finds himself reentering this world not only in person but through his memories as well. What Mero isn’t aware of when he reenters this world again is that this is where he inevitability dies. This causes an array of emotions from the reader when they finally figure out that Mero was born into this harsh world where he couldn’t survive and wasn’t able to escape it either. Through the use of imagery, metaphors, and other figurative language the author creates a realistic aspect for the reader where it seems like the reader is part of the story as well. Annie Proulx had the readers view this story in a beastly and vicious way by manipulating setting, character, and most prominent figurative language. 

Not only does Annie Proulx make the reader feel like they are a part of the story through the manipulation of figurative language and setting, but she also makes it feel like it’s timeless. She uses multiple elements from the five major elements to accomplish and create this feeling from the reader. She mostly uses character to give the feeling of timelessness, Mero is jumping between the present as an old man and the past as a young man and as well as connecting current events to earlier ones in his memories. “Yet everything was as it had been, the shape of the road achingly familiar, sentinel rocks looming as they had in his youth. There was an eerie dream quality in seeing the deserted Farrier place leaning east as it had leaned sixty years ago, the Banner ranch gate, where the companionable tracks he had been following turned off, the gate ghostly in the snow but still flying its wrought iron flag, unmarked by the injuries of weather, and the taut five-strand fences and dim shifting forms of cattle.” (Proulx. E). This line is a great example of how Proulx used Mero’s flashbacks making it seem timeless. This story was told mainly through flashbacks infact. This writing tactic isn’t just used to make the reader more aware of the connect and connect with the Mero more, but it reveals a very important factor about Mero. Mero seems to live in the past rather than the future. This actually places him in dangerous situations and leads him to his death, or what the readers assume is his death because the author never specified that he died. And for a character that was trying so hard to escape his childhood home only to come back and die in it makes it seem even more strange, it’s like Mero never even existed in the first place, taking us back to a very familiar theme of this place being timeless. The way its described how the past hasn’t changed from the present makes it seem so ghostly, for a place to have never changed after living a lifetime away from it makes it seem like there is definitely something wrong with it. The reader comes to an understanding as to why Mero disliked, could even say hated the ranch so much. 

In a way the reader feels as if they themselves are Mero, the style of writing this author used makes the reader feel like Mero’s thoughts are the readers thoughts. Another good example of creating emotion from the reader through the use, rather yet manipulation, of not only character but as well as figurative language is when Mero slowly dies from the cold.  Mero was a civilized man born into a harsh world in Wyoming, or so Annie Proulx makes the reader view this state in such a way through metaphors, symbolism, and other uses of figurative language, and for him to not be able to survive in or escape from creates a sense of fear from the reader and a sort of sympathy for Mero. “Yet he knew he was on the ranch, he felt it, and he knew this road, too.” (Proulx, E.) This line was written in such a way where it makes the reader feel the same nostalgic but horrific feeling Mero feels as wells. The author is clearly talented in her style of writing and fits perfectly into the southern gothic genre. Another way to look at his death is that it shows no matter how healthy you are, since he was a vegetarian and devotedly was active in Massachusetts, there is no prevail against the powerful forces of nature. This world seen as a beastly and vicious place from start to finish, even Mero’s death appeared in an image of an animal.  

Annie Proulx seemed to have a prominent theme with her use of metaphors, manipulation of figurative language, and this savage world expressed through the use of metaphors referencing animals. One of the first examples of this in the story is when Mero was introducing the reader to his fathers girlfriend. Mero describes her as a horse and has referenced not once, but multiple times, some characteristics of a horse when explaining her. “If you admired horses, you'd go for her with her arched neck and horsy buttocks, so high and haunchy you'd want to clap her on the rear.” (Proulx. E) In Mero’s mind he horse is seen as an animal with this great sexual desire and its seen as a very raw very beastly desire, so he relates the girlfriend to a horse because she sleeps with both his father and his brother. The reader concludes that when reading in between the lines they could see how he would think that such an animal with this beastly desire belongs in such a vicious place like Wyoming, more so the Ranch Mero grew up on actually. This would make the reader feel as though this world is so savage and so realistic that even the characters can be seen as animals, even though they are humans. This occurrence has happened to multiple characters, not just the fathers girlfriend. Like Mero’s nephew, Tick, and how Mero think of this kid as a literal insect. Not to mention how Mero didn’t even know he had a nephew until his trip coming back for his brothers funeral. This shows how disconnected and traumatic this savage place was to Mero. 

Its quite prominent how Mero feels about the ranch, he hates it. And because the writing style of Proulx makes the reader unknowingly feel and think what Mero feels and thinks, the reader also ends up hating the ranch as well. Its described as an unforgivable and hostile place, no plants were able to grow, weird things happened that no one could describe why, etc. “… cows couldn't be run in such tough country, where they fell off cliffs, disappeared into sinkholes, gave up large numbers of calves to marauding lions; where hay couldn't grow but leafy spurge and Canada thistle throve, and the wind packed enough sand to scour windshields opaque.” (Proulx. E) The imagery used written by Proulx gives a clear image to how this ranch is. Some could argue that the Corns family fate is intwined with the ranch, and if the reader takes a closer look at the story, it becomes obvious that it does. The family has tried many times to get rid of this ranch, but it always ends up returning to the Corn family. For example, Rollo ends up being in charge of the ranch and having animals that aren’t common in Wyoming showed off at the ranch. Though this was mentioned many times before, Mero, despite his efforts in trying to escape this place, ended up coming back to the ranch for his brothers funeral and ironically ended up dying there as well. 

All in all, this story had the reader feeling as though they were part of the story and could understand the context and importance of everything including the ranch through Mero’s flashbacks. The use of Mero’s flashbacks had such a large effect on not only the readers but gave us an insight of who Mero truly is and how he viewed life, and that’s through the past and not the present. This certain method of viewing life set himself up for failure, and eventually death. The irony is that no matter how hard the Corn family tried to remove themselves or escae from the ranch they ended up coming back and being involved with it again, and eventually ended up dying there too. Proulx, the author, had used manipulation of her style of writing, figurative language, and even characters to make the reader felt like this place was timeless, beastly, and vicious. They ended up feeling and thinking the same way Mero does about this place, and when Mero died so did the reader in a way. That bias the author created seemed to been have lifted from the reader after Mero died, and left the reader with a whole new point of view for the story. 

Citations 

Proulx, E. Annie. “The Half-Skinned Steer.” The Atlantic, Atlantic Media Company, 29 Dec. 2017, https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1997/11/the-half-skinned-steer/306168/.