Re: RARA-AVIS: Re: The Chill by Ross Macdonald

From: JCC55883@AOL.com
Date: 18 Jan 2006


A similar/related scenario also plays itself out in THE WYCHERLY WOMEN ... where a daughter masquerades as her mother precipitating a freudian-esque case of mstaken identity. It would seem that that this was something MacDonald was attempting to "work out" in his fiction.

Also, in his introduction to THE CHILL (in one of the omnibus editions containing that work ... can't reall offhand which one??) MacDonald referred to THE CHILL as a "basilisk" of a book. The OED defines basilisk as: "a mythical reptile with a lethal gaze or breath hatched by a serpent from a cock's egg." Mistaken identity/identity crises all around ... apparently all of this was going thru the auhtor's mind. How related to his marriage, who knows. MacDonald, from little I know about him, was a compex guy .. probably why his fiction has the psychological depth it has.

                                                                       Jim de Rochester

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