True Grit

For all intents and purposes, Rooster Cogburn is a villain. By his own admission, he is a thief and a killer. He abuses alcohol and leaves a string of broken relationships scattered across the United States. Between former wives and estranged children, there are few people left in the world who are willing to love Rooster. He does not even love himself. Mattie meets Rooster at his nadir. While he is given the authority of a US marshal and tasked with tracking down criminals, his particular approach to law enforcement is barely distinguishable from banditry. The only thing that separates Rooster from the outlaws who he pursues is his badge and even that was gained under false pretenses. Rooster seems subconsciously aware of his degradation. He drinks heavily and wastes his days playing cards. When he does appear in court to defend himself, he treats the law with open contempt. He loathes any legal system that would have him as a representative, all while assuring himself and others that his brutal methods are the only way to bring justice to an unjust world. Rooster does not adhere to the same laws that he enforces, nor does he care for the institutions that he supposedly represents. He has more in common with the men he pursues, and he loathes the changing nature of a world that has left him behind. Rooster is lost and without purpose, so he clouds this sense of alienation with drink and delusion.

To Mattie, in The Search for True Grit, this dissolute character is exactly what she needs. She frames Rooster’s attitude and behavior as true grit, a framing that suits Rooster’s particular view of himself. To the young, somewhat naïve Mattie, Rooster’s viciousness is commendable. He is a weapon that she can wield against the man who killed her father. To the young girl still struggling to process her grief, Rooster’s violence is a cathartic expression of what she wants to do to Chaney. To Rooster, Mattie’s demands are unreasonable, her goals are absurd, and her pay is low. Yet she offers him something invaluable. Rooster is unmoored from his sense of self and drifting into degradation and depression. A young girl arrives and offers him a mission. She views him as a hero, a man with true grit, and the only person who can bring justice to her world. Mattie offers Rooster more than just a mission. She offers him more than a purpose in life. She offers him redemption.

In spite of this unexpected offer, Rooster still struggles with Mattie’s demands. He knows his past. When he shares his stories with Mattie, he does so on his own terms. His version of events is starkly different from those hinted at by Stonehill or LaBoeuf. Rooster does not tell Mattie about his time fighting for the Confederate Army in the Civil War. He does not tell her about the atrocities that he likely committed nor the terrible things that he has seen. Yet he tells her a great deal. He tells her about his past and his mistakes. When he shares these stories with Mattie, he is daring her to judge him. He prompts and prods at her hero worship, attempting to find out just how much she venerates him. In this sense, Rooster’s autobiographical ramblings become a form of confession. He tells Mattie his sins in the hope that she can offer him something like atonement.

During the journey, Rooster begins to drift further from his own desire for redemption. The journey is tough, and he slips back into his intoxicated self-loathing. Rooster fails to capture Chaney, thereby denying himself his shot at redemption through Mattie’s assignment. At the novel’s end, however, he finds his redemption. Rooster charges down Ned’s gang, playing out one of his tall tales in real life. He shows actual bravery, a display which is rewarded by the assistance of LaBoeuf, who shoots Ned to save Rooster’s life. LaBoeuf symbolically shows that Rooster’s life is worth saving. Next, Rooster saves Mattie from the pit. He rescues the little girl in his own particular way, then sets off on his journeys again. Mattie recounts his life, which is filled with more tragedy and immorality. Through their time together, however, Rooster has proved himself worthy of redemption in Mattie’s eyes. He may not achieve redemption, but proving himself worthy of Mattie is cathartic enough for the old man.

Tom Chaney also goes by the name Theron Chelmsford. He killed Mattie’s father, Frank Ross, as well as a state senator and his dog in Texas. He arrived on the Ross farm with a history of criminal action and took advantage of Frank’s good nature only to steal Frank’s money and life, then escape into the Indigenous territory. Chaney’s most striking feature is a black mark across his face. For a Christian narrator like Mattie, this mark is an allusion to the biblical story of Cain. The son of Adam and Eve, Cain slew his brother Abel and was marked by God for his sin. Chaney’s mark is a symbol of that same sin carried with him across the country. When Chaney disappears into the Indigenous territory, he is going where good, lawful men will not follow to become a living representation of Violence Beyond the Border.

Chaney embodies many sins. As well as a murderer, he is known to be a gambler and a drinker. This is not unique among the characters of True Grit. The outlaw Ned is a killer, as is Rooster. Even Rooster himself is a heavy drinker and a gambler. Yet these men live by a code, however shoddily assembled, that they will not break. Rooster and Ned have some form of morality, whereas Chaney does not. Instead, Chaney constantly blames his problems on others. He refuses to take responsibility for his actions, choosing to believe instead that everyone is against him. He blames the world for the problems of his own creation. Even when Mattie tracks him down, he cannot imagine why she would pursue him because he sincerely believes that he was not responsible for her father’s murder. He may not want to have killed Frank, but the murder happened, and there is nothing that can be done about it now, he seems to believe.

Mattie wants Chaney to hang. She wants him to be executed for his sins, particularly for the sin of killing her father. On three occasions, she fires a gun at him. On the first attempt, she hits his side. On the second, her gun misfires. On the third, she injures Chaney but is thrown backward into a pit of snakes. The pursuit of a sinful man like Chaney robs Mattie of her innocence and very nearly of her life. Rooster, a man without Mattie’s innocence, intervenes and saves her from the snake pit. Instead, Chaney is cast down in her place. Chaney dies away from the narrative, with his body eventually recovered and hauled back to Texas by LaBoeuf. Chaney does not live long enough to be held accountable for his sins, but his death is punishment enough for Mattie. His death satisfies her sense of justice, even if it becomes secondary in a narrative sense to the bond that emerges between Mattie, Rooster, and LaBoeuf.