Marc,
Re your comments below:
> None of Chandler's stories from the 1930s
originally
> featured Philip Marlowe
> as a character, but I think that the character
in
> most of these stories is
> indeed Marlowe in virtually every aspect but
name.
> Several factors outside
> of the stories themselves indicate that
Chandler
> would concur.
>
> For example, Chandler is well known for his
tendency
> to "cannibalize" his
> better stories for material in his novels.
Fredric
> Jameson calls this
> tendency of Chandler's a "deliberate,
self-conscious
> apprenticeship." There
> are examples of large chunks of text being
taken
> almost verbatim from the
> short stories and dropped into the
novels.
>
> Another compelling bit of evidence is that
after
> Chandler's Marlowe novels
> gained popularity, Chandler's publisher
proposed
> issuing a collected edition
> of the short stories, with the name Philip
Marlowe
> substituted for the names
> of the various protagonists; Chandler went
along
> with this plan, apparently
> without objection. Chandler's consent suggests
that
> he did indeed consider
> the short story detectives to be Marlowe
under
> different names (though the
> motivation could, of course, have been
primarily
> economic).
I cover this in the course. Another compelling point:
The first "Marlowe" story (that is, the first story
featuring a character who would later be referred to as
"Marlowe") introduces Marlowe's cop contact, DA's
Investigator Bernie Ohls, who is, except for Marlowe himself,
the most frequently recurring character in the "official"
series.
> Finally-and perhaps most important-is a comment
that
> Chandler made in a 1950
> letter to New York Herald-Tribune mystery
critic
> James Sandoe. Speaking of
> the use of Marlowe's name in the republication
of
> the short stories,
> Chandler observed that Marlowe "certainly had
his
> genesis in two or three of
> the novelettes." In this letter, Chandler
> specifically cited the story
> "Finger Man," published in 1934, suggesting that
his
> protagonist had not
> changed much between this story and THE HIGH
WINDOW,
> published in 1942.
> "Finger Man," Chandler's third published
story,
> originally featured an
> unnamed protagonist. This nameless detective
was
> later renamed Marlowe in
> the 1950 collection of Chandler's pulp fiction
THE
> SIMPLE ART OF MURDER.
Chandler was the one who made the changes when the stories
appeared in TSAM. Another point, when Chandler wrote "The
Pencil," the only short story originally written about
Marlowe, he added an accompanying forward in which he
referred to it as his first "Marlowe story in 20 years,"
suggesting that he did regard the character who was called
"Carmady" in BLACK MASK and "John Dalmas" in DIME DETECTIVE,
to be the same character.
> Still, I am disappointed that the recently
published
> collection of
> Chandler's complete short stories uses the
"revised"
> naming. I. too, prefer
> the original vision. It just seems more
pure.
I figure the way the appeared in TSAM is the way Chandler
wanted them remembered. Also I read the the TSAM versions
first.
JIM DOHERTY
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