Re: RARA-AVIS: French Noir - J-C Izzo


Philip Benz (Philip.Benz@wanadoo.fr)
Fri, 18 Jun 1999 14:50:13 +0200


Mark sez:
<< Except for Echenoz, none is particularly contemporary, though. >>

My thoughts exactly: Simenon has been round the track a few times. I discovered a noir bookshop in Valence last week and realized there are
*hundreds* of titles in French "serie noir", though many must be decidedly on the pulpy side, and many must be only marginally noir, since police procedurals and many other sub-genres are lumped into this category.

I think Izzo hit a chord with me, not only because I lived in Marseille for 3 years (at about the time his stories are set), but especially because the seedy, currupt atmosphere of Marseille with multiple waves of immigrants, grasping and corrupt politicians and many rival mafia-like groups lends itself so well to the genre.

Cheers, --- Phil Lyc饠Astier, Aubenas, France

--
# To unsubscribe, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to # To unsubscribe, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to majordomo@icomm.ca.
# The web pages for the list are at http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/.



This archive was generated by hypermail 2.0b3 on Fri 18 Jun 1999 - 07:54:58 EDT