Re: Re[2]: RARA-AVIS: Broadly speaking
RMINOT@aol.com
Tue, 25 Aug 1998 13:57:42 EDT
Yes, there are many examples of characters working within
institutions that
can be construed as hard-boiled in a noir setting. I really did
try to
explain "noir" and "hard-boiled" as best I could, so don't want
to repeat
myself except to reiterate that if we confine our protagonists
to private
eyes, we're in deep trouble. They are a dying breed, because in
real life
they are becoming obsolete, except for those very institutional
bureaucrats
who work for big agencies behind computers and , for divorce
cases, hire
sleezebag photogs. So, for those of us who have already read
and reread all
the great hardboiled writers and would like to discuss
hard-boiled and noirish
in a contemporary setting, why not include new crime novelists
whose poin of
view is that of the killer (and a serial killer is really iften
just a killer
who gets away with it) or that of an FBI profiler, or even the
victim? Must
we read only new crime novels set in the past (or great oldies
Out of the
Past)? After all, the very reason the French adored American
hard-boiled
fiction by Chandler, Hammett, MacDonald, Cain, et al, was
precisely because
these authors were writing about the real world, about their
times as opposed
to the cozy English mystery writers. Is it simply because
Harris doesn't
steep his prose in attitude, but keeps it dry, well-researched,
and well-
plotted--or what? And why not O'Connell? And yes, Rendell, not
Vine? I find
the atmospheres of these writers very noir, indeed. All who
agree, say aye.
Thanks.
Reeves Minot
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