Spillane is a tricky one. You have to remember, he started
life writing comic books. Of all his books, my favorite is
THE DEEP, which is not a Mike Hammer story. His lack of any
sense of normal behavior make his books great escapist
material but very poor role models even for writers. He makes
James Bond seem absolutely plausible. His sexual attitudes
are what really disturb me. He has the most acute angel/whore
fixation of any writer I can think of. On the other hand, his
underlying homosexual themes are nearly classic. Read THE
ERECTION SET for a real head shaker in this department. I
think Spillane missed his true calling... as a Catholic
priest!
Patrick King
--- Doug Bassett <
dj_bassett@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I went through a recent tear on Spillane, reading
or
> rereading I, THE JURY; THE BIG KILL; VENGEANCE
IS
> MINE; KISS ME DEADLY; ONE LONELY NIGHT; MY GUN
IS
> QUICK; THE GIRL HUNTERS; THE SNAKE; and THE
TWISTED
> THING.
>
> Spillane is an odd duck. Truly. I think he's
easily
> one of the most influential writers of the
genre,
> and
> in a more general way I think he's an
important
> figure
> in post WW 2 American culture. But that
doesn't
> diminish the fact that a lot of his writing
paled
> for
> me this time around.
>
> I, THE JURY has a great beginning and a
great
> ending,
> but the rest of it is really a lot of vamping to
the
> finish. The beginning of ONE LONELY NIGHT is,
I
> think,
> the single best sustained piece of writing
Spillane
> ever did, but it soon descends into a lot of
cliched
> anti-Communism which, no matter how you feel
about
> the
> subject, feels like a real comedown in
intensity.
> VENGEANCE IS MINE is an extraordinarily
interesting
> book, and a cultural critic could have a field
day
> with it, but it's absurdly dated and certainly
has
> lost a lot of it's punch.
>
> Even the two books of his I like the best, MY GUN
IS
> QUICK and THE TWISTED THING can't be said to
be
> successful in terms of plot. You can guess
the
> villain
> in GUN by sheer process of elimination, and
THING
> gives away the game in the very title.
>
> The first thing I want to say about Spillane is
that
> he is a writer of moments. For all of his pose
as
> the
> consummate self-depracating tough guy
professional,
> he
> is in fact something of a Romantic -- by which
I
> mean
> his work, when it's good, is good due to
it's
> deliberately heightened pitches of emotion.
Nobody
> can
> sustain that kind of level over a length of
time,
> which is why even the best Spillane novels
have
> draggy
> patches. A Spillane novel builds to a peak --
it's
> also no accident that a lot of his best moments
are
> endings.
>
> (There is still a notion in some circles
that
> Spillane
> was some kind of grunting clodhopper, but
THE
> TWISTED
> THING I think is the final refutation of that. It
is
> a
> well-written and well plotted -- I think his
best
> job
> of plotting, actually. It covers a world
that
> Spillane
> mostly did not deal with and did it credibly. Of
all
> things, Spillane is actually quite good
at
> descriptions of nature.)
>
> The other thing I want to say about Spillane
is
> this.
> The hb novel has as it's engine a process
of
> uncovering. Generally, the protagonist reveals
the
> truth of the world, which is seen to be far
worse
> that
> what surface reality presents. Usually the truth
of
> the world is unconquerable: the hb
protagonist
> basically just makes his/her seperate piece with
it.
> (While conversely the noir protagonist is
subsumed
> by
> the "truth". But I saw there was a whole
discussion
> of
> that here already, don't want to open that
up
> again.)
>
> What Spillane did was take that uncovering to a
kind
> of poetic conclusion. Hammer is
constantly
> uncovering
> Hell, basically. And I mean that in the
religious
> sense of the term -- in MY GUN Hammer and his
bad
> guy
> are literally in flames screaming. (The books
are
> constant knocking out of the props of the
world:
> love,
> women in general, respectable old men,
children,
> etc.
> What's revealed is corruption, yes, but
corruption
> in
> a sin-and-damnation sense. Twisted thing,
indeed.)
>
> This is an extraordinary thing, I think:
the
> blending
> of the hb crime novel with what is really a kind
of
> religious revulsion.
>
> doug
>
>
> Doug Bassett
>
dj_bassett@yahoo.com
>
>
>
>
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