Name: Riders of the Purple Sage
Rating: 3 (12 reviews)

Zane Grey

Mormon elders in the town of Cottonwoods pressure the widow Jane Withersteen to remarry so that her lands and herds will remain in their control. Gradually they frighten away most of her cowboys, and rustlers steal away her cattle, but the gunfighter Lassiter stands by her as the inevitable confrontation draws near.

A Novel

Riders of the Purple Sage

Riders of the Purple Sage tells the story of Jane Withersteen and her battle to overcome persecution by members of her polygamous Mormon fundamentalist church. A leader of the church, Elder Tull, wants to marry her. Withersteen gets help from a number of friends, including Bern Venters and Lassiter, a notorious gunman and killer of Mormons. She struggles with her "blindness" to the evil nature of her church and its leaders, and tries to keep Venters and Lassiter from killing the adversaries who are slowly ruining her.

Western Classic

Edwin Lang

A Canadian commentator said recently that we live in a matriarchy. This is probably true to some extent in most democratic societies and although the female characters in Zane Grey’s Riders of the Purple Sage tend to be strong and intelligent it is Grey’s men who inhabit this fictional world that is, at least for a male (but apparently also for the female) reader, intelligent, engaging and complex. I found Riders of the Purple Sage a perfect and satisfying little story in every way, and although obviously fiction, thought-provoking and fascinating. Zane Grey leaves nothing out, and by the end there is no thread left dangling. On the surface I found it to be primarily a simple tale of good and evil, a classic Western, taking place in the late 19th century (1871ish) Utah - Mormon country - in the wild-west town of Cottonwood bordering I believe on the State of Wyoming, and a seemingly excruciatingly beautiful countryside. I found the story a universal one though, in its grappling with the meaning of life, relationships, the problems of faith (what Lassiter calls Jane Withersteen’s ‘blindness’), suffering and in the case of Riders at least, the existence of evil. In fact I found evil to be so ever present and powerful in Riders that I had had a hard time overcoming the dread of it all and initially getting into the story, even in spite of Jim Lassiter’s miraculous arrival and Jane Withersteen’s strength of character. Even religion widely seen as a salve, as is so often the case, corrupted and corrupting. Zane Grey also seems to develop only the good characters. Although this seems unfair (to the evildoers as I am sure they and we could argue that they have as rich and complex lives as do the do-gooders) I like the imbalance. I believe that life is too easy for those who do evil: perhaps I have been too upset by watching the House of Cards (British and American versions) but tell me please that Frank Underwood / Francis Urquhart of the House of Cards is not having a whale of a time playing the game of planning someone’s demise. Being and doing evil seems a slippery and rather enjoyable slope that makes travelling that road so easy and rewarding. In Zane Grey’s Utah Bishop Dyer and Tull are such people and are, as is usually the case, in the ascendant. There is an episode in which a (bad) character is wounded, severely but not yet mortally, and he fires his gun willy-nilly into a crowd of bystanders in a vain attempt to strike his assailant – it is that ability to strike out so cavalierly regardless of consequences that makes these men (and woman) such monsters. Jim Lassiter although feared and widely held to be ignominious is the fundamentally flawed but good and vulnerable man, as is Bern Venters, and their road is a difficult one, and their run of the race requires every bit of humanity, intelligence, grit including an ability to fight the inner demons that seem to tempt them to be men no better than the villains victimizing them. I don’t think this is a moral tale but while it could certainly be studied as such it struck me as being a universal story, that say the Syrians fleeing their regime, or the Iranian fleeing theirs, or a Congolese fleeing theirs might recount in much the same way. Sometimes in the face of evil there is nothing to do but put one’s life on the line, fight and survive as best one can, and flee. There is a moment in House of Cards where Frank Underwood, in a one-to-one interview with a reporter, proclaims passionately that he gives his total and unequivocal support to the President, believes in the honesty and integrity and wants in his work only that which is best for the United States and one is uplifted to hear his loyalty, the authenticity with which he proclaims his allegiance to the country and the President – but as viewers we know: Frank Underwood has done everything he could to undermine the President, to make him a candidate for impeachment, but the lie is so smooth, and it seems something that is impossible to counter. Even God seems to flee from the protagonists in Riders, and one exists, albeit barely, on the basis one one’s patience, faith, hope, grit, and if lucky with supportive friends: the costs nonetheless are exceedingly high. Another theme that I found enriching the story was the transformative effect of love, that I think is common in both men and women and culturally agnostic, and which I believe adds to the book’s continued appeal: that is, when one finds love one’s independence becomes secondary. That the other matters, whether child or partner, and in some sense one’s past and plans become almost obsolete in the glare of that new found relationship. Because of the book’s immense popularity and continued interest in Zane Grey’s writing, it is easy to over-analyze. I did not for example like the Introduction (written by Princeton’s Lee Clark Mitchell) which basically focuses on the presence of sex in Riders: even the landscape is sexually evocative. It seems that in 1912 USA those in power were uncomfortable with the emergence of women in the workforce, free and wanting more freedom, including freedom in their sexuality and dress. And it seems that Zane Grey (according to a recent biography) enjoyed women, many in the Biblical sense. Nonetheless I think at its core Riders is a simple and rewarding tale of good and evil, of life-giving, loving and supportive relationships and overall idealist, and is something that everyone can enjoy because that struggle and that desire are universal wants. It is just that in this case the place is in the Wild West and the villains are Latter Day Saints. And a friend of mine said men and woman are meant to be equal but are never meant to be the same. I think this 1912 novel got that separation right. There is a revitalizing animus in participating in the protagonists valiant efforts fighting (evil) and their growing friendships and love. It is a fun and enjoyable story. Edwin

After inheriting a southern Utah estate from her Mormon father, Jane Withersteen becomes the victim of a cruel frontier law.

Charles Frederich

Terrific story, great imagery, and just general western awesomeness by one of the founders of the genre.

Micah

Christine

A master of narrative momentum and suspense, Zane Grey sweeps readers into his stories and makes them feel that things are out of control, that boundaries are being burst. In Riders of the Purple Sage, the most famous novel of the American West, Grey creates a hero of epic proportions, a villain of legendary evil and a world in which the landscape is rendered with such force that it seems to express thoughts and feelings, to become a character in its own right. Indeed, Riders of the Purple Sage derives much of its depth and power from passions whose forbidden and overwhelming nature cannot be expressed by human beings and are therefore embodied in the natural world. In his depiction of the relationship between Lassiter, the hero, and Jane Withersteen, Grey breaks other literary barriers: Jane, modelled on the heroines of the nineteenth-century novel, must come to terms with the values expressed by Lassiter - the harsh, "masculine" values of the twentieth century. Their struggles together represent the tumultuous changes society itself was confronting.

Will Vunderink

Abbe Castillo

Michael Cowell

Sophie Gatchell

Half Yeti, All Man

Lisa Stephenson 

Read the novel that shaped the genre of Western novels in America. Riders of the Purple Sage by Zane Grey stalls the story of a woman's battle to overcome persecution by members of her polygamous Mormon church. This complex novel is an classic tale of romance, adventure and the wild west. This Xist Classics edition has been professionally formatted for e-readers with a linked table of contents. This eBook also contains a bonus book club leadership guide and discussion questions. We hope you’ll share this book with your friends, neighbors and colleagues and can’t wait to hear what you have to say about it. Xist Publishing is a digital-first publisher. Xist Publishing creates books for the touchscreen generation and is dedicated to helping everyone develop a lifetime love of reading, no matter what form it takes

Riders of the Purple Sage A Novel

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