Where Does 'All The Pretty Horses' Take Place?

'All the Pretty Horses' is a love letter to the Southwest. The end of an era for Texas is evoked through the depiction of ranchlands being sold off to be turned into cookie-cutter developments and a dying breed of cowboys. The ranches that Cole and his friend Rawlins end up in Mexico working on are sumptuous but hide corruption. The town of Encantada is like a setting from a folk tale – derelict, crumbling and the whisper of gossip and legend seems to hang in the air. Saltillo’s infamous prison seems to be steeped in history, with its drab tasks and dreary ambiance. The border between Texas and Mexico is not just a line on a map, it is a line between the hopes of our protagonists and harsh reality.

All the Pretty Horses is set in a huge, untamed space stretching along the US-Mexico border in 1949. At the beginning of the novel Texas cowboy John Grady Cole is feeling the adverse effects of change in the space of the ranch where he grew up. Traveling to Mexico on horseback with his friend L.tipo, the two young men make their way into the space of Coahuila’s huge, largely deserted Mexican ranches, followed by a long, arduous journey through the rugged space of Durango’s dirt roads. At Cortés’ vast hacienda much of the dramatic action of the novel takes place. Here the contrasts between the closed space of the heavily walled Mexican ranch and the largely unfenced space of the huge Texas ranches are stark. Both spaces of natural beauty and of danger and brutality are explored in depth throughout the novel, with much of the physical action taking place in the places where the two landscapes meet – border towns like Piedras Negras, and vast, open spaces of desert and of moon-lit night. In this, a geographical silent character to the novel, the spaces also influence the dramatic action of the story in many significant ways.

These places are not just settings for the story, they are also places of emotional journey for the characters. There is so much tension in the border towns like Piedras Negras and at the same time so much hardship in traveling through the rugged landscape. The novel portray the harshness of the characters’ journey through the harsh landscapes of the rural Mexico. The noveau situation of John Grady when he returns to Texas is also portrayed in the novel, depicting how a place can shape one’s identity and how one’s identity is shaped by the loss of illusion of a place.

Both Texas and Mexico try to claim the center of “All the Pretty Horses.” Cole’s search for a place to call home is driven by the dying of the ranches in Texas and leads him to the lawless places of Mexico. There the great haciendas shine like diamonds but bring sorrow and betrayal. In the prisons of Mexico men are either broken or hardened. The border between Texas and Mexico is not just a line on a map; it is a line between youth and wisdom, between romance and ruin.