Likewise, Chandler has a pessimistic attitude towards
organized society
and the class system, but he (or Marlowe) is not hopeless
about
individuals. In fact, Marlowe is a sucker for anyone who's
half nice.
He's not always a good judge of character, but he definitely
doesn't
hold the attitude that everyone is screwed up.
Even in Goodis, one of the darkest of the noir writers, there
is some
faith in people. This faith is almost always misplaced but
it's there as
a default assumption.
Real hopelessness would make hardboiled writing impossible.
There would
be nothing to drive the adventures of the hero (more
recently, the
antihero).
Regards,
mt
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