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RARA-AVIS: Hammett in The Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction
On Thu, 16 Jan 1997, "M. Taboada" <taboada@math.odu.edu> wrote:
>BOOK REVIEW
>
> "The Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction", Edited and introduced by Maxim
> Jakubowski, Carroll & Graf, 1996, xii + 586 pages, softcover, U$S 9.95,
ISBN
> 0-7867-0300-8
>
>CONTENTS:
>
>TOO MANY HAVE LIVED - Dashiell Hammett
[SNIP]
>Dashiell Hammett's missing-person story, "Too many have lived", originally
>published in Black Mask, marks Sam Spade's first appearance and, though
>not one of Hammett's best, will no doubt be of interest to his many fans.
>The writing is lean, the dialogue precise, and every word is at the
service
>of the action in the purest hardboiled manner made famous by the author.
Um, not so, Mario. Spade's first appearance is "The Maltese Falcon",
serialised in *Black Mask* in five episodes, September 1929 - January 1930.
The text was revised (slightly) for publication as a novel the same year.
The short story "Too Many Have Lived" was published in *American
Magazine*, October 1932.
FWIW, Richard Layman finds little of value in the three Sam Spade short
stories (which all date from 1932): 'They are lazy, inadequately developed
pieces. "A Man Called Spade" is a reworking of "The Tenth Clew" with less
movement and a less plausible explanation of the detective's solution to
the crime ... "Too Many Have Lived" is a simple blackmail story ... "They
Can Only Hang You Once" is a rewrite of "Night Shots" which had appeared in
Black Mask eight and a half years earlier ... Spade is reduced to just
another wise-cracking detective, and the stories are padded for length.'
(Layman, *Shadowman*, 1981 pp.137-138)
Eddie Duggan
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Maltese Falcon FAQ http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/ejmd/0.htm
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