Just before the rara-avis server crashed down, Fred Zackel
talked about the
first person vs. the third person narrative. This was my
comment but it
was lost in cyberspace. So, here it is again:
I think the third person narrative is more hardboiled than
the first person
one, as you can see in the fine example of Dashiell Hammett's
THE GLASS KEY
and THE MALTESE FALCON, Paul Cain's THE FAST ONE, and Raymond
Chandler's
first mystery story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot."
Of course, you should write how characters feel only by their
actions and
talkings, not by getting into their brains. If you read
above-mentioned
masterpieces, you will get my drift. Chandler tried to do the
third person
narrative in his first story, but he must have found it very
hard to
accomplish. He soon started to write in the first person
narrative.
These days, so-called "hardboiled" gumshoes talk too much,
brood too much,
express their feelings too much, and justify or rationalize
their actions
too much--to pad books? I know they have feelings but please
don't say it,
just act it out and let readers think how they feel.
Real hardboiled detective stories is too tough to write.
There are very
few writers practicing the real McCoy.
Jiro Kimura
*********************************************
Jiro Kimura
Kanazawa, JAPAN
e-mail: jkimura@nsknet.or.jp
The Gumshoe Site (http://www.nsknet.or.jp/~jkimura/)
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