Lonesome Dove

Lonesome Dove

by

Larry McMurtry

Newt is the son of Maggie and Woodrow Call, although Call steadfastly refuses to acknowledge the boy. After Maggie dies, the Hat Creek Company universally adopts Newt and raises him together. Newt looks up to the Captain and idolizes Jake Spoon, who lived with his mother for a time when Newt was small. Newt wants nothing more than to grow up and earn his place among the men of the company. He doesn’t complain, and he’s a hard worker. Although he covets the Captain’s attention most of all, he’s closest to Deets, who becomes the closest thing to a father figure Newt has. Once Call starts hiring men for the drive, Newt also looks up to Dish Boggett as the kind of cowhand he himself wishes to be. Newt grows up on the drive, as he’s forced to confront and endure hardships like sand and thunderstorms and as he loses people important to him: his friend Sean O’Brien, his idol Jake, and his father figure, Deets. By the time they’ve reached Montana, he’s matured so much that he’s earned Call’s respect, and when Call leaves to take Gus’s body back to Texas, he leaves Newt in charge. After Gus tells Newt that Call is his father, Newt keenly wishes to be acknowledged, but he remains stoic—just like Call himself—when Call proves incapable of it.

Newt Quotes in Lonesome Dove

The Lonesome Dove quotes below are all either spoken by Newt or refer to Newt. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
American Mythology Theme Icon
).
Chapter 8 Quotes

The Captain was seldom really harsh with him unless he made a pure mess of some job, but the Captain never passed him a kind word, either. The Captain did not go around handing out kind words—but if he was in the mood to do so Newt knew he would be the last to get one. No compliment ever came to him from the Captain, no matter how well he worked. It was a little discouraging: the harder he tried to please the Captain, the less the Captain seemed to be pleased. When Newt managed to do some job right, the Captain seemed to feel that he had been put under an obligation, which puzzled Newt and made him wonder what was the point of working well if it was only going to irritate the Captain. And yet all the Captain seemed to care about was working well.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Newt
Page Number: 96
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 19 Quotes

He didn’t tell Newt all he knew. He didn’t tell him that even when life seemed easy, it kept on getting harder. Deets liked his work, liked being part of the outfit and having his name on the sign; yet he often felt sad. His main happiness consisted of sitting with his back against the water trough at night, watching the sky and the changing moon.

He had known several men who blew their heads off, and he had pondered it much. It seemed to him it was probably because they could not take enough happiness from just the sky and the moon to carry them over the low feelings that came to all men.

Those feelings hadn’t come to the boy yet.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Newt, Deets, Wilbarger
Page Number: 193
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 59 Quotes

The thought that Gus was dead began to weigh on Call. It came to him several times a day, at moments, and made him feel empty and strange. They had not had much of a talk before Gus left. Nothing much had been said. He began to wish that somehow things could have been rounded off a little better. Of course he knew death was no respecter. People just dropped when they dropped, whether they had rounded things off or not. Still, it haunted him that Gus had just ridden off and might not ride back. He would look over the cattle herd strung out across the prairie and feel that it was all worthless, and a little absurd. Some days he almost felt like turning the cattle loose and paying off the crew. He could take Pea and Deets and maybe the boy and they would look for Gus until they found him.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Lorena Wood, Newt, Blue Duck , Deets, Pea Eye
Page Number: 469
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 60 Quotes

“Because of Jake we lost ’em both, I guess,” Dish said. “Jake is a god-damn bastard.”

It was painful to Newt to have to think of Jake that way. He still remembered how Jake had played with him when he was a little child, and that Jake had made his mother get a lively, merry look in her eyes. All the years Jake had been gone, Newt had remembered him fondly and supposed that if he ever did come back he would be a hero. But it had to be admitted that Jake’s behavior since his return had not been heroic at all. It bordered on the cowardly, particularly his casual return to card playing once Lorena had been stolen.

Related Characters: Dish Boggett (speaker), Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Lorena Wood, Jake Spoon, Newt, Blue Duck , Sally Skull
Page Number: 471-472
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 67 Quotes

By the time it registered that they were really Indians, they had already cut off the steer and were driving it away, as the Captain sat and watched. Newt was almost afraid to look at them, but when he did he was surprised at how thin and poor they looked. The old man who was their leader was just skin and bones. He rode near enough for Newt to see that one of his eyes was milky white. The other Indians were young. Their ponies were as thin as they were. They had no saddles, just saddle blankets, and only one had a gun, an old carbine. The Indians boxed the steer out of the herd as skillfully as any cowboys and soon had him headed across the empty plain. The old man raised his hand to the Captain as they left, and the Captain returned the gesture.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Newt, Deets, Pea Eye
Page Number: 512
Explanation and Analysis:

And, as in the rainstorms, his misery increased to a pitch and then was gradually replaced by fatigue and resignation. The sky had turned to grasshoppers—it seemed that simple. The other day it had turned to hailstones, now it was grasshoppers. Al he could do was try and endure it—you couldn’t shoot grasshoppers. Finally the cattle slowed, and Mouse slowed, and Newt just plodded along, occasionally wiping the grasshoppers off the front of his shirt when they got two or three layers deep. He had no idea how long a grasshopper storm might last.

In this case it lasted for hours. Newt mainly hoped it wouldn’t go on all night. If he had to ride through grasshoppers all day and then all night, he felt he’d just give up. It was already fairly dark from the cloud they made, though it was only midday.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Newt, Deets
Page Number: 518
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 93 Quotes

“I like to keep Woodrow feeling that he’s caused a peck of trouble,” Augustus said. “I don’t want him to get sassy. But I wouldn’t have missed coming up here. I can’t think of nothing better than riding a fine horse into a new country. It’s exactly what I was meant for, and Woodrow too.”

“Do you think we’ll see Indians?” Newt asked.

“You bet,” Augustus said. “We might all get killed this afternoon, for all I know. That’s the wild for you—it’s got its dangers, which is part of the beauty. ’Course the Indians have had this land forever. To them it’s precious because it’s old. To us it’s exciting because it’s new.”

Newt noticed that Mr. Gus had a keen look in his eye. His white hair was long, almost to his shoulders. There seemed to be no one who could enjoy himself like Mr. Gus.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae (speaker), Newt (speaker), Captain Woodrow Call, Deets
Page Number: 756
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 96 Quotes

“I hope you won’t mistreat Newt,” he said.

“Have I ever mistreated him?” Call asked.

“Yes, always […] You ought to do better by that boy. He’s the only son you’ll ever have—I’d bet my wad on that—though I guess it’s possible that you’ll take to women in your old age.”

“No, I won’t. […] They don’t like me. I never recall mistreating that boy.”

“Not naming him is mistreatment […] Give him your name, and you’ll have a son you can be proud of. And Newt will know you’re his pa.”

“I don’t know that myself.” […]

“I know it and you know it […] Women are goddamn right not to like you. You don’t want to admit you ever needed one of them, even for a moment’s pleasure. Though you’re human, and you did need one once—but you don’t want to need nothing you can’t get for yourself.”

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call (speaker), Augustus McCrae (speaker), Newt, Maggie
Page Number: 798
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 100 Quotes

Looking at the Captain, Newt began to feel sadder than he had ever felt in his life. Just to on, he wanted to say. Go on, if it’s that hard. He didn’t want the Captain to go on, of course. He felt too young; he didn’t want to be left with it all. He felt he couldn’t bear what was happening, it was so surprising. Five minutes before, he had been pulling a yearling out of a bog. Now the Captain had given him his horse and his gun, and stood with a look of suffering on his face. Even Sean O’Brien, dying of a dozen snakebites, had not shown such pain. Go on, then, Newt thought. Just let it be. It’s been this way always. Let it be, Captain.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Newt, Deets, Pea Eye
Page Number: 836-837
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 101 Quotes

“I’ll put it to you once more, in the plainest terms, Mr. Call,” Clara said. “A live son is more important than a dead friend. Can you understand that?”

“A promise is a promise,” Call said.

“A promise is words—a son is a life,” Clara said. “A life, Mr. Call. I was better fit to raise boys than you’ve ever been, and yet I lost three. I tell you no promise is worth leaving that boy up there, as you have. Does he know he’s your son?”

“I suppose he does—I gave him my horse,” Call said, feeling that it was hell to have her, of all women, talk to him about the matter.

“You horse but not your name?” Clara said. “You haven’t even given him your name?”

“I put more value on the horse,” Call said, turning the dun.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call (speaker), Clara Allen (speaker), Augustus McCrae, Newt, Maggie
Page Number: 845
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Lonesome Dove LitChart as a printable PDF.
Lonesome Dove PDF

Newt Quotes in Lonesome Dove

The Lonesome Dove quotes below are all either spoken by Newt or refer to Newt. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
American Mythology Theme Icon
).
Chapter 8 Quotes

The Captain was seldom really harsh with him unless he made a pure mess of some job, but the Captain never passed him a kind word, either. The Captain did not go around handing out kind words—but if he was in the mood to do so Newt knew he would be the last to get one. No compliment ever came to him from the Captain, no matter how well he worked. It was a little discouraging: the harder he tried to please the Captain, the less the Captain seemed to be pleased. When Newt managed to do some job right, the Captain seemed to feel that he had been put under an obligation, which puzzled Newt and made him wonder what was the point of working well if it was only going to irritate the Captain. And yet all the Captain seemed to care about was working well.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Newt
Page Number: 96
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 19 Quotes

He didn’t tell Newt all he knew. He didn’t tell him that even when life seemed easy, it kept on getting harder. Deets liked his work, liked being part of the outfit and having his name on the sign; yet he often felt sad. His main happiness consisted of sitting with his back against the water trough at night, watching the sky and the changing moon.

He had known several men who blew their heads off, and he had pondered it much. It seemed to him it was probably because they could not take enough happiness from just the sky and the moon to carry them over the low feelings that came to all men.

Those feelings hadn’t come to the boy yet.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Newt, Deets, Wilbarger
Page Number: 193
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 59 Quotes

The thought that Gus was dead began to weigh on Call. It came to him several times a day, at moments, and made him feel empty and strange. They had not had much of a talk before Gus left. Nothing much had been said. He began to wish that somehow things could have been rounded off a little better. Of course he knew death was no respecter. People just dropped when they dropped, whether they had rounded things off or not. Still, it haunted him that Gus had just ridden off and might not ride back. He would look over the cattle herd strung out across the prairie and feel that it was all worthless, and a little absurd. Some days he almost felt like turning the cattle loose and paying off the crew. He could take Pea and Deets and maybe the boy and they would look for Gus until they found him.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Lorena Wood, Newt, Blue Duck , Deets, Pea Eye
Page Number: 469
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 60 Quotes

“Because of Jake we lost ’em both, I guess,” Dish said. “Jake is a god-damn bastard.”

It was painful to Newt to have to think of Jake that way. He still remembered how Jake had played with him when he was a little child, and that Jake had made his mother get a lively, merry look in her eyes. All the years Jake had been gone, Newt had remembered him fondly and supposed that if he ever did come back he would be a hero. But it had to be admitted that Jake’s behavior since his return had not been heroic at all. It bordered on the cowardly, particularly his casual return to card playing once Lorena had been stolen.

Related Characters: Dish Boggett (speaker), Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Lorena Wood, Jake Spoon, Newt, Blue Duck , Sally Skull
Page Number: 471-472
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 67 Quotes

By the time it registered that they were really Indians, they had already cut off the steer and were driving it away, as the Captain sat and watched. Newt was almost afraid to look at them, but when he did he was surprised at how thin and poor they looked. The old man who was their leader was just skin and bones. He rode near enough for Newt to see that one of his eyes was milky white. The other Indians were young. Their ponies were as thin as they were. They had no saddles, just saddle blankets, and only one had a gun, an old carbine. The Indians boxed the steer out of the herd as skillfully as any cowboys and soon had him headed across the empty plain. The old man raised his hand to the Captain as they left, and the Captain returned the gesture.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Newt, Deets, Pea Eye
Page Number: 512
Explanation and Analysis:

And, as in the rainstorms, his misery increased to a pitch and then was gradually replaced by fatigue and resignation. The sky had turned to grasshoppers—it seemed that simple. The other day it had turned to hailstones, now it was grasshoppers. Al he could do was try and endure it—you couldn’t shoot grasshoppers. Finally the cattle slowed, and Mouse slowed, and Newt just plodded along, occasionally wiping the grasshoppers off the front of his shirt when they got two or three layers deep. He had no idea how long a grasshopper storm might last.

In this case it lasted for hours. Newt mainly hoped it wouldn’t go on all night. If he had to ride through grasshoppers all day and then all night, he felt he’d just give up. It was already fairly dark from the cloud they made, though it was only midday.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Newt, Deets
Page Number: 518
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 93 Quotes

“I like to keep Woodrow feeling that he’s caused a peck of trouble,” Augustus said. “I don’t want him to get sassy. But I wouldn’t have missed coming up here. I can’t think of nothing better than riding a fine horse into a new country. It’s exactly what I was meant for, and Woodrow too.”

“Do you think we’ll see Indians?” Newt asked.

“You bet,” Augustus said. “We might all get killed this afternoon, for all I know. That’s the wild for you—it’s got its dangers, which is part of the beauty. ’Course the Indians have had this land forever. To them it’s precious because it’s old. To us it’s exciting because it’s new.”

Newt noticed that Mr. Gus had a keen look in his eye. His white hair was long, almost to his shoulders. There seemed to be no one who could enjoy himself like Mr. Gus.

Related Characters: Augustus McCrae (speaker), Newt (speaker), Captain Woodrow Call, Deets
Page Number: 756
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 96 Quotes

“I hope you won’t mistreat Newt,” he said.

“Have I ever mistreated him?” Call asked.

“Yes, always […] You ought to do better by that boy. He’s the only son you’ll ever have—I’d bet my wad on that—though I guess it’s possible that you’ll take to women in your old age.”

“No, I won’t. […] They don’t like me. I never recall mistreating that boy.”

“Not naming him is mistreatment […] Give him your name, and you’ll have a son you can be proud of. And Newt will know you’re his pa.”

“I don’t know that myself.” […]

“I know it and you know it […] Women are goddamn right not to like you. You don’t want to admit you ever needed one of them, even for a moment’s pleasure. Though you’re human, and you did need one once—but you don’t want to need nothing you can’t get for yourself.”

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call (speaker), Augustus McCrae (speaker), Newt, Maggie
Page Number: 798
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 100 Quotes

Looking at the Captain, Newt began to feel sadder than he had ever felt in his life. Just to on, he wanted to say. Go on, if it’s that hard. He didn’t want the Captain to go on, of course. He felt too young; he didn’t want to be left with it all. He felt he couldn’t bear what was happening, it was so surprising. Five minutes before, he had been pulling a yearling out of a bog. Now the Captain had given him his horse and his gun, and stood with a look of suffering on his face. Even Sean O’Brien, dying of a dozen snakebites, had not shown such pain. Go on, then, Newt thought. Just let it be. It’s been this way always. Let it be, Captain.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call, Augustus McCrae, Newt, Deets, Pea Eye
Page Number: 836-837
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 101 Quotes

“I’ll put it to you once more, in the plainest terms, Mr. Call,” Clara said. “A live son is more important than a dead friend. Can you understand that?”

“A promise is a promise,” Call said.

“A promise is words—a son is a life,” Clara said. “A life, Mr. Call. I was better fit to raise boys than you’ve ever been, and yet I lost three. I tell you no promise is worth leaving that boy up there, as you have. Does he know he’s your son?”

“I suppose he does—I gave him my horse,” Call said, feeling that it was hell to have her, of all women, talk to him about the matter.

“You horse but not your name?” Clara said. “You haven’t even given him your name?”

“I put more value on the horse,” Call said, turning the dun.

Related Characters: Captain Woodrow Call (speaker), Clara Allen (speaker), Augustus McCrae, Newt, Maggie
Page Number: 845
Explanation and Analysis: