Product Description
Set in 1885, The Ox-Bow Incident is a searing and realistic portrait of frontier life and mob violence in the American West. First published in 1940, it focuses on the lynching of three innocent men and the tragedy that ensues when law and order are abandoned. The result is an emotionally powerful, vivid, and unforgettable re-creation of the Western novel, which Clark transmuted into a universal story about good and evil, individual and community, justice and human nature. As Wallace Stegner writes, [Clark's] theme was civilization, and he recorded, indelibly, its first steps in a new country.
From the Trade Paperback edition.
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 I didn't appreciate it years ago ( danielgreatlakes )
Nearly twenty-five years ago, this book was on my "required summer reading list" when I was a student transitioning from ninth grade into tenth. I vividly remember loathing the experience of slowly plowing through this book. Even the old version of the cover, with the yellow background and dangling noose, brought back the memories of spending nearly an entire summer loathing this novel. Ever since then the title held a place in my memory as the single most boring, painful reading experience of my life.
Fast forward twenty-five years, and the other day I found myself with a few spare minutes in the local library, looking over authors like Dickens, Steinbeck, and Melville, and my mind wandered back to required reading lists. I had remembered the title THE OX-BOW INCIDENT, but not the author, but after a quick search "Walter Van Tilburg Clark" flashed across the screen, and I again cringed at the recollection of that name. I went to the shelf out of morbid curiosity, and the paperback was jutting out. I picked it up, read the first page and thought, "I'm going to give this another try. There must be some reason it was on my reading list."
I read it in three days, staying up until 1:30 in the morning last night to get to the end. How can a book can go from being one of the worst reading experience of one's life to being one of the most enjoyable? I am convinced more than ever that some books should never be on required reading lists, but should rather be discovered and enjoyed when you're at a place in life where you can appreciate them. Enjoying this once-hated book so much all these years later has made me want to go back to the other books from those days and give some of them another chance. (Maybe THE JUNGLE won't be so dull now that my primary focus isn't trying to impress girls. Maybe THE GREAT GATSBY is worth another look. Will BILLY BUDD hold my interest, I wonder?)
This review says more about me than about the book, but if there is anyone out there who, like me, was forced to read classic literature before they were ready for it, don't be afraid to go back to even your most hated high school reading experience and give it one more try. THE OX-BOW INCIDENT is a great novel. There's a sentence I could never have imagined writing even one week ago.
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 An American classic and a classic Western
THE OX-BOW INCIDENT is a classic tale. It also is a classic Western, and because the Western is so central to American culture, THE OX-BOW INCIDENT surely is more important -- more "classic", if you will -- for Americans than for others. To be sure, at times the writing is somewhat dated, but that "flaw" is negligible. The cast of characters (at least 20) is very finely drawn, with only one (the uncouth town drunk Monty Smith) tending overly towards a stock portrayal. By and large, the psychology underlying the characters is astute. And there is some very fine writing of scenes, especially the one a quarter into the novel of the weather changing and the storm coming on. But the reason to read the novel, even if you have seen the movie, is for the story. It was powerfully presented in the movie, but is even more powerfully presented in the book.
My one and only complaint or reservation has to do with the last chapter. It is superfluous. I suppose that the two additional deaths contained in that chapter and Davies' "confession" tend to make the book more of a Greek tragedy, but that's not really necessary: this is a quintessential American tragedy, and it doesn't need any retribution or retrospective moralizing.
An aside on the subject of lynching, which is at the dramatic center of the book. Like the Western, lynching is a peculiarly American phenomenon. It is a blot on our history, but one we should remember, not repress. The best book documenting the horrors of lynching in America -- a book that should be much more widely known and circulated -- is "Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America."
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 plain bad
I'm sorry, I just found this book just a bit short of silly. And I am a western fan. The character development was shallow and the story line predictible while at the same time unrealistic. If you want a book on philosophy there are ones that are much better.
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Classic novel about mob justice ( bonesteeldavid )
The inhabitants of a ranching community get up a posse to go after a band of rustlers who are thought to have stolen cattle and committed a murder. The small number of men who try to act reasonably and thoughtfully are easily swept aside by those who are ruled by their passions, leading to disastrous results.
Walter Van Tilburg Clark is a wonderful writer who has produced a powerful novel that succeeds in every way. His simple, evocative language brings the Old West to life. His characters speak with distinctive, authentic voices. Most importantly, the novel is very astute about mob psychology as it depicts the ebb and flow of the men's passions through the final tragedy in the pitiless morning sunlight to the aftermath of guilt and regret. This classic story still has much of value to say about the danger of retribution unchecked by law.
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Tink-tink-a-link went the meadow lark ( horacekohanim )
Off hand I can only think of a few Western novels that have transcended their genre to become classics, and share with the world what all great art does; that being a universality of it's story and relevance no matter when or where. Shane, The Searchers, The Lonesome Dove books and certainly much of Frank Norris and Cormac McCarthy's work. I know there is more than these, but I am not a constant Western reader.
Having said this, The Ox-Bow Incident joins that bunch, as a compelling novel of hysteria, aggression, moral confusion, the Outlaw spirit, American masculine relationships and the folly of vengeance and vigilantism.
While other reviews may describe the story, I'd rather point out that it is a fairly simple one, simply presented and concluded. What stands out though is the characters and the depth to which Clark creates them. Sure there are standard cowboys, tough and grim-faced, but most of the characters suffer, whether in confusion, drunkeness, cold, moral despair, aimlessness, boredom or even arrogance, bullishness and myopia; territory I don't associate with Western lore/myth.
The lesson of The Ox-Bow Incident is timeless, and most important today, whether it be on a schoolyard, in gang territories, our criminal justice system itself or geo-politcs.
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