RARA-AVIS: Ah! Back on topic! or Sgt. Rock, P.I.

Kevin Smith (kvnsmith@colba.net)
Sat, 26 Dec 1998 13:33:41 -0500 >Actually, you're the only one on the multiple lists to which this was sent
>to have absolutely no class whatsoever and to complain ... so much for your
>"...just about any." Rather ironic too when you stop to think about it ...
>the heroes of the hard boiled fiction which we like are typically military
>veterans.

Hmmm...let's see, there was Mike Hammer, the only one I can think of who
was particularly proud of his military service, and makes a point of
mentioning it. And what a well-adjusted example of manhood he was. Has he
finished painting those steps with blood, yet?

Of course, there are several others who served (McGee, Spenser, Elvis Cole,
John Cuddy), but there's probably even more who didn't (Marlowe and Spade
come to mind), so I'd really have to disagree with the idea that "the
heroes of the hard boiled fiction...are typically military veterans."
There's certainly far more common shared characteristics than military
service, nor would it a distinguishing characteristic.

And I'm sure, that as we move into a hard-to-romanticize era of pushbutton
videogame warfare, we'll see less and less of them proudly boasting of
their military career, as though it's some kind of proof of righteousness
or manhood.

I think a big part of it in the forties and fifties was that giving a
character a background in the military was a common way, and a quick
shortcut, to showing them as "worldly" men, men not unfamiliar with
violence or death. But by the sixties, and right up to today, in the
absence of "good" wars, which seem to be have been replaced by an endless
series of nasty little police actions, insurrections, civil wars and other
localised atrocities, hardboiled protagonists who are veterans of the
military tend to be rather disillusioned, morally ambivalent about their
experiences, and less likely to boast about them.

**************************************************
Kevin Smith
The Thrilling Detective Web Site
http://www.colba.net/~kvnsmith/thrillingdetective/

This month: New fiction by Burl Barer and Kim Sellers,
and a look at the 1998 Private Eye scene in our P.I. Poll.

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