No Country For Old Men Character Analysis

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The Fall of the Hero and Villain in No Country For Old Men
Llewelyn Moss is one of the main characters in No Country For Old Men, by Cormac McCarthy. Llewelyn Moss gets himself into a great amount of trouble when he discovers a drug deal gone wrong that eventually leads to the death of multiple people including himself. Through crime and murders, Llewelyn finds himself on the run and comes face to face with what can be described as one of the most evil killers. As the reader discovers the rite of passage of Llewelyn Moss, the reader discovers the mistakes and consequences of the mistakes done by him. Being on the run and being the cause of the deaths of people, Llewelyn can still be seen as the outlaw hero as he fights against true evil.
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Llewelyn Moss’s rite of passage in No Country For Old Men is discovering the case of money and making the decision to run off with it. When Llewelyn first realizes what he finds the narrator states, “He sat there looking at it and then he closed the flap and sat with his head down. His whole life was sitting there in front of him. Day after day from dawn till dark until he was dead. All of it cooked down into forty pounds of paper in a satchel” (p. 18). Discovering the money allowed for Llewelyn to have opportunities he never thought were possible to him. Although being in possession of the money only lead to being on the run on eventually the death of him and his wife, having the money allowed for him to live a new life style filled with rush and adrenaline. This allowed for Llewelyn to chase the “American dream.” As professor Covell states, living in America is only a small part of the dream, the full dream comes along when the individual makes it happen for themselves. And in Llewelyns case, living out the American Dream came more possible for him when he discovered the money. Before the money, Llewelyn was a Vietnam war veteran, and currently not doing much for his life, discovering the money allowed for him to imagine a world of opportunity. While taking the money led to know immediate good, it allowed for Llewelyn Moss to be the outlaw hero of the story. Llewelyn takes money that belongs to a drug cartel and uses it to go against a well known murderer. While he does technically steal money and manages to get a good amount of people killed, Llewelyn uses dirty money to help the general good by attempting to take down the antagonist that is overall doing all the danger and harm throughout the

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