I've noticed that in noir crime novels of the 40s and 50 by
white novelists (Goodis, Chandler, Woolrich, Hammett) that
African-American and Puerto Rican characters have only minor
roles, especially of a positive nature, even though the
downtown honky-tonk or ghetto areas loom large in the
stories. I may be simply wrong on this, and I know Goodis
gave some important roles to Puerto Ricans (Eddie's first
wife in
_Down There_, the gang in _Street of No Return_). I was
wondering what the requirements of the publishers had to do
with this. They might have had templates regarding race, as
they had regarding allowable use of four-letter words, sexual
explicitness, and extreme violence. Perhaps the publishers
thought their readership was not interested in ethnic
minorities other than Europeans. Does anyone know if the
paperback or hardback publishers had such templates regarding
race? Are any archives available, other than for New American
Library?
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