From: "Mark Blumenthal" <
blumenidiot@21stcentury.net>
> Noted critic and author Edmund Wilson(To the Finland
Station, Memoirs of
> Hecate County) in a 1944 essay wrote, "Mr
Hammett...infused the old
formula
> of Sherlock Holmeswith a certain underworld
brutality which gave readers a
> new shudder in the days when it was fashionable to
be interested in
> gangsters; but beyond this, he lacked the ability to
bring the story to
> imaginite life.
Wow. I think Wilson got it almost all right 15 years after
the fact in 1944! He spotted the 19th century influence on
the plotting (Holmes), the realism that Hammett dropped on a
pulp scene which primarily published romantic adventure
fiction ("new shudder"). Also, Wilson clearly understood that
Hammett's precise, spare and detached approach to writing
represented something different. He decided it was different
bad instead of different good, though. So, he attributed
Hammett's approach to a LACK of ability when he could just as
easily have praised it as a ground-breaking effort on the
part of a literary genius. But that's only because he didn't
like the book. :-)
Thanks for a treat, Mark.
Greg Swan
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