'Brokeback Mountain' is set in the beautiful, wild landscape of Wyoming thirty years ago where cowboys lived much as they had done for generations. Hard, lonely lives in unforgiving country. Jack Twist and Ennis del Mar are two ranch hands - "drop-out country boys with no prospects, brought up to hard work and privation, both rough-mannered, tough spoken" - glad to have found each other's company where none had been expected. But companionship becomes something else on Brokeback Mountain, something not looked for, something deadly.
In this story, Annie Proulx tackles death, sex and the gruesome with black hilarity. It is stark, stern, philosophical and funny.
