--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Michael Jeter"
<michael.damian.jeter@...> wrote:
>
> Could someone define ¨soft - boiled¨ detective?
>
A detective who is not a hardboiled character. Actually, there is
hardboiled (Marlowe), midboiled (George Harmon Coxe's reporter
investigators, for example) and softboiled (any number of amateur
detectives, including Miss Marple, as mentioned). But the boiledness
is applied both to the characters and to the situations. A softboiled
detective could find himself in a hardboiled world. It's possible, as
it is possible for Marlowe to land where pearls are a nuisance.
Best
mrt
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 17 Aug 2008 EDT