On Tue, 27 Feb 2001
billha@ionet.net wrote:
> Believe you are overreacting to Juri's comment. He's
not dismissing Chandler as
> a major influence, but suggesting there is an
alternative tradition that can be
> traced back to Cain. I, for one, would be interested
in hearing what this
> tradition might be, and what writers he (or anyone
else) would say are sons and
> daughters of Cain.
Thanks for backing me up with this one. I tried to argue
about this in the other mail I just sent. Let me add some
more thoughts:
a) the private eye genre slips too easily into the girl chase
and guns; Chandler already notified this and wasn't too
happy
b) the private eye genre slips too easily into the praise of
the private eye himself - look at Parker's Spenser. I tried,
but I just couldn't get anything out of "Looking for Rachel
Wallace": the first thirty pages are passed in what seems to
be only the appraisal of Spenser. He has a beautiful and
witty girlfriend whose only function in the book seems to be
there for him, always telling that although he has his
peculiarities, he's always the man! same goes for several
other writers, including almost any fifties and sixties
paperback writers (including and excluding Richard Prather at
the same time)
c) the private eye genre was modified into the mildly boring
spy genre through the works of Edward Aarons, Stephen Marlowe
and others (Donald Hamilton being the gem, and maybe Walt
Sheldon, but I have read too little from him)
d) the private eye genre is superficial and doesn't
necessarily have any involvement from the author, whereas
such writers as Goodis and Williams seem to be very deep in
their work
The line of authors that leads up here from James M. Cain
(and maybe others, Edward Anderson perhaps, but I haven't
read him, and W.R. Burnett) just is more interesting than the
egotistical private eye genre. Chandler's books aren't
egotistical (or if they are, he does so well I don't mind),
but his successors are. (Ross Macdonald excluded and Howard
Browne. Others, too, but you know how I feel about Parker and
other guys.)
Need to get to work.
Juri
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 28 Feb 2001 EST