| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 33.4

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| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 33.4 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in Words and Pictures. By Thom Ross. (Golden, CO: Fulcrum Publishing, 2001. 96 pp. Illustrations. $19.95, paper.)

Artists are different from you and me; well, from me anyhow. Thom Ross is an artist with an arresting style and a distinctive vision, and it is inevitable that this review will also indulge in a bit of art appreciation. First of all, this splendid little book is one that can fairly be judged by its cover. On it, below the bright red letters of the title, nine cloaked figures face each other in two semi-circles. We look down (from the roof of Fly's Boardinghouse?) as the Earp gang surges forward. The Clanton gang is brought up short, the harsh sunshine casting dark batwing shadows beneath them. How can we help but open the book and dig in? 1

In his artful foreword, Paul Andrew Hutton likens the classic showdown in Tombstone to other (mostly martial) "images seared into our collective consciousness by subtle but constant repetition" (p. 6). Ross's work, he continues, is "historically realistic while still artistically abstract." It achieves its historical realism through Ross's passion for the details and for the inherent drama. Ross himself writes that normally realistic treatments of historic events "always seem somewhat dull to me, almost lifeless" (p. 10). A happy consequence is this lively and non-typical work of history and art. . . .

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