RARA-AVIS: B.G. (Before Grafton)
michael david sharp (msharp@umich.edu)
Sat, 13 Jun 1998 12:24:03 -0400 (EDT)
Thanks to Kevin for mentioning the numerous talented women
crime fiction
writers of the 40s-60s. I just discovered Dolores Hitchens and
am really
really impressed. I've always been a fan of Craig Rice (who
incidentally
co-ghost-wrote the OTHER George Sanders novel, *Crime on My
Hands*); her
writing wasn't always great, but that's bec. she constantly
took chances.
She and Norbert Davis are two of the very few writers able to
infuse the
crime story w/ screwball comedy. Helen Nielsen's "Piece of
Ground" in
Pronzini/Adrian's *HB* is definitely worth a look -- very
Goodisesque.
Often critics or other authors said of these women that they
"wrote like
a man." Howard Hawks thought Leigh Brackett WAS a man when he
asked for
her as a screenwriter. What this means, generally, is that
"your writing
doesn't suck" or "you write tough." It's a shame that more of
the writing
by these women isn't still in print. Feminists have made a
point of
recovering "lost" or "unrecognized" or "marginalized" women
writers, but
women who wrote HB stories have not been the beneficiaries of
this
intervention, sadly. I have all sorts of theories about why
this is, but
I'll sit on them for now. M--
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Michael D. Sharp Email: msharp@umich.edu
Department of English Lang. and Lit. Phone: (313)
761-8776
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Fax: (313) 763-3128
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