In the beginning (Chapter One) of "The Big Sleep," Chandler
has Marlowe
describing a stained-glass window of a knight in the process
of rescuing
a a woman tied to a tree. Throughout the novel, the image of
a knight
kept returning. Marlowe, like a knight of old, follows a code
of honor
(his own) which compels him to seek justice and protect his
client from
harm. By this, I mean that (in terms of "The Big Sleep"
alone)
everyting he does, he does out of loyalty to General
Sternwood. It
occcured to that Marlowe identifies himself with knights and
ancient
codes of chivalry and honor. However, Marlowe is also unlike
those
ancient knights in that he is so "innocent" about the world.
There is a
scene in Chapter Twenty-Four, where this is shown. Marlowe
says, or
thinks rather, "The move with the knight was wrong. I put it
back were
I had moved it from. Knights have no meaning in this game. It
wasn't a
game for knights." On the surface, this passage refers to the
chess
game Marlowe has been playing, but I see it as a symbol of
the world
Chandler has created. Marlowe began working for General
Sternwood in
the role of a knight. His job is to discover who is
blackmailing the
General and put a stop to it-- thereby saving the honor of
the Sternwood
family. This is very much like what a knight did, defending
the honor
of King, Queen, country, and any fair maid who needed
defending. The
further involved Marlowe gotm however, he realized that the
people he
had to deal with were so corrupt that he could no longer
continue to be
a simple knight. He would not play the game they were playing
if he was
a knight.
At the end of the novel, howver, marlowe tries to step back
into the
role of knight when he decides not to tell the General abut
Carmen's
role in the disappearance of Rusty Regan, whom the General
liked. His
wish is to protect the dying man from the evils of the world
around him.
This is a very chilalrous action. Would it be possible to
saym then,
that Marlowe is a "modern day" knight? Or is it possible that
Chandler
is being ironic, and that he is saying that Marlowe is not at
all a
knight, but just another part of the "nastiness" of LA?
********
Debbie Chilson
dlchilson@hotmail.com
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