I wanted to make my own impact on this "how old"
conversation, even when it's clearly overdue.
I was born in 1972 in a leftist family. As a teenager
everyone considered me strange and to add more strangeness to
my identity I started to read William Burroughs and stuff
which I really didn't understand. I was more at home with
Agatha Christie (now I find her really tiresome) and Rex
Stout. And then I read Kari Levola's youngster novel "Roof
Hawk", in which the main character admired Marlowe and
Archer. I dug these up in the library and found out that my
father was a very avid fan of hardboiled writing, since in it
the American society got what it deserved: harsh criticism. I
read all the Chandlers and almost all the Macdonalds
("Zebra-Striped Hearse" is one of the best hb novels I've
ever read) and all the Hammetts. Luckily they were
translated.
And after that I dropped the whole issue to dig Chandler and
fellows up from time to time. I read Kaminsky and Andrew
Bergman, but got tired of the pastiche-like quality of them.
I got blown away reading Jim Thompson's "Getaway" - it was
translated when the Peckinpah film was a hit - but haven't
since been so deeply touched by Thompson. It seemed that
there were only Chandler, Hammett and Macdonald (and James
Cain with two novels), and no one else. (This is a sentiment
that still overcomes me at times - I just can't stand James
Lee Burke and John Wessel.)
Then came James Ellroy and my enthusiasm for the genre woke.
After reading
"American Tabloid" in English (it's translated now and it
felt much better), I wanted to understand the evolution of
the genre, since Ellroy seemes to try to explain everything
in the US society with the pulp and hardboiled ideology of
willing dames, fast cars and powerful guns and greed, lust
and revenge. I started to read Woolrich (pretty tiresome at
times), Richard Stark, Day Keene, W.T. Ballard, Frederick
Nebel and stuff and so I got around doing my critical
bibliography of American pulp/hb translated in Finnish
paperbacks. And I've found great writers - Wade Miller (I
just finished "Dead, She Was Beautiful"), Gil Brewer, Stark
and so on. And thanks to this list I've found some new
authors - there seems to be no end. Mike Barry and Alan
Caillou have been published here... My list of authors seems
only to be extending.
Juri
jurnum@utu.fi
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