Oftentimes characters in history achieve fame through their actions, or through the deliberate attempts of others. It is a mixture of both of these cases which brought fame to George Washington, because he was not only an excellent military commander and statesman, but he also had the help of men like Mason Locke Weems to spread a “gospel” in praise of him.
But for Billy the Kid the history works out differently. There are clear examples of how his fame increased without intention. One of these is seen in the story of William Sydney Porter under the pseudonym O. Henry. He wrote “The Cabellero’s Way” about a character named Cisco Kid. This story is contained within a larger collection of works regarding the Kid by Harold Dellinger, which is the book I acquired from the library and my source. In Dellinger’s introduction to the O. Henry story, he points out how the author was “no doubt affected by early stage productions about Billy the Kid”. So O. Henry created a character who was inspired by Billy the Kid. In the process of fiction, there is not a need to stick to the facts. So O. Henry could freely and without guilt do everything in his power to make an amazing character. The only trick is for the facts about the fiction to somehow seep back into the lore about the actual person. If this can happen, then legends can be made.
First it would be good to talk about some of the descriptions contained in the story (my page references will be to the Dellinger source which contains within it the O. Henry story). O. Henry begins by talking of the killings of kid, finishing his introductory paragraph by saying “therefore a woman loved him” (58). Fascinatingly, this establishes a mood connecting murder and love. It gives a Hollywood style glow to the reckless outlaw by attaching his image to romance. This theme of love continues, as O. Henry gives the following description of his Cisco Kid: “He knew but one tune and sang it, as he knew but one code and lived it, and but one girl and loved her” (64). This again is the stuff of romance. I especially like the sharpness of vision. A classic model of the hero is someone who can entirely fix his mind on a goal and block out everything else. In this sense the Cisco Kid becomes a man of fierce will both in love and in battle.
In addition to a sharp focus, O. Henry’s character is also simply good at what he does in love. “He was muy caballero, as the Mexicans express it, where the ladies are concerned” (68). So the killer is charming! I think that this contrast is another big part of the myth-making. A person emotionally unstable enough to murder is able to charm. And the same person who so callously ends life can put such an emormous value on the life of just one person, the woman he loves.
In a way, O. Henry created this character, this mixture of violence, quickness, short-temper and love. I argue that not only was this character inspired by Billy the Kid, but the character also gave back to the mythology about the real man. Being legendary is less about the actual facts than about a mythic aura. And so if a similar character (fictional or not) has such an aura, it can alter the way that the general public perceives a person, shifting from ordinary man to hero.
Dellinger, Harold. Billy the Kid: The Best Writings on the Infamous Outlaw. 1. Guilford, CT: Morris Book Publishing, 2009. 58-68. Print.