The Big Sky: Marias Pass

Along toward the middle of the day, beyond where even a trickle of water ran, Boone climbed the last lift to the divide. One way the land pitched down to Oregon, to the Flathead and Clark’s Fork and the Columbia and the western sea; the other, it fell off to the Marias and Missouri, to Blackfoot country and Red Horn’s band and Teal Eye carrying his young one in her. It was strange that a man could go off and leave a part of him living behind him and have no power over it and no say-so but only the knowledge that there was a live piece of him that wasn’t with him. (295)

Guthrie, A.B., Jr. The Big Sky. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 2002.

About the Book

The Big Sky

Published in 1947, The Big Sky was Guthrie’s attempt to portray a truer version of the west than had been written up to that point—starting with Boone Caudill, the story’s violent and alienated anti-hero. Guthrie may have aimed to de-romanticize life in the West but over 60 years later the title of his best known work has been used for tourism campaigns, and is plastered on ski resorts, microbreweries, and hundreds of other businesses across Montana.

The movie version of The Big Sky hit the big screen in 1952. The film was directed by Howard Hawks and starred Kirk Douglas and Elizabeth Threatt.

A few years later, A.B. Guthrie himself wrote screenplays for two iconic western films: Shane, starring Alan Ladd and Jean Arthur; and The Kentuckian, starring Burt Lancaster.

While the settings in The Big Sky clearly reference actual locales, it is understood that the book—including its places—is ultimately the product of the author’s imagination. The intent of this literary map is to enrich the reading experience by interpreting those places, not to render them literally or definitively.

About the Author

A.B. Guthrie Jr.

Born in Bedford, Indiana in 1901, Alfred Bertram Guthrie Jr. spent much of his childhood in Montana and earned a degree in journalism from The University of Montana in 1923. He later settled into a 20-year career with the Lexington Leader in Kentucky, working as a reporter and then executive editor. After retiring from the newspaper business in 1950 Guthrie spent the next forty years in Choteau, Montana until his death in 1991. Over the course of his career he wrote over a dozen novels as well as a work of autobiography, and collections of poetry and essays.