tstock@concentric.net wrote:
> I am curious: what appeals
> to you about hard-boiled mysteries? Do you read only
hard-boiled or do you
> also like some cozies and some medium-boiled? I'm
not sure where the line
> is drawn, but suspect my preference is along the
medium-boiled lines, with
> occasional forays into hard-boiled.
I'm not sure where the line is drawn either. Is THE THIN MAN
hardboiled? Not very. What about Perry Mason, who started out
hardboiled, but softened considerably when he moved to the
slicks. Or Ross McDonald, who started out hard but got softer
and softer as Archer became less of a character and more of a
viewpoint. Or Rex Stout, who combined a medium-boiled
narrator, Archie Goodwin, with the classic cozy armchair
detective.
The line blurs a lot within a given writer's oeuvre, and
within a given series. It isn't even a matter of genre. We've
discussed hardboiled SF here, and plenty of mainstream is
hardboiled as well, like Hemmingway and James T. Farrell, not
to mention non-fiction like Jack Black's YOU CAN'T WIN and
Hunter S. Thompson's FEAR AND LOATHING IN LAS VAGAS. It's an
attitude, not a genre, and where the line is drawn depends on
the reader.
So why do I like hardboiled writing? Because I like the
attitude, which is mostly cynical and laughs at pretention
and stupidity, and because I like outsiders and holy fools
and strong plots and violent action and, in Tom Waits' great
phrase, "fast women, slow horses and unreliable sources." I
particularly like hardboiled writing from the twenties and
thirties, because at its best and often at its worst it gives
a true and entertaining picture of a period that facinates
me.
The very best hardboiled stories, it seems to me, are about
things that matter, like trying to hang onto a shread of
decency and integrity in a world that doesn't value either.
Even Richard Stark's Parker is an honest man, as honesty is
defined within his universe.
I don't read cozies, which as far as I can tell are not about
anything at all.
BobT
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