Dear Mike,
As I said in one of my first postings, James M. Cain told me
on a number of occasions that he did not consider himself a
hard boiled writer; that he hated being listed along with
Hammett and Chandler, etc. because his primary interest was
not in crime or violence, but in passion and the relationship
between a man and woman (usually a strong, untrustworthy
woman) which might lead to crime and violence.
More importantly, despite his "hard boiled" short fiction
("Baby in the Ice Box"), Cain was proud of his scope as a
novelist. There is corruption in Mildred Pierce, but whatever
"crime" exists is less important than the driving force of
Mildred's character.
Also look at Serenade, the C Major novel, the New Orleans
historical saga
(Carnival?). Cain had many interests--music and opera among
them; history; etc. that he developed into major elements of
his novels. Even Butterfly, which has a kind of Tobacco Road
white trash quality resonates with an intelligent, simmering
sexuality that sets him apart, in my opinion, from the
classic Black Mask hard boiled writers.
As a novelist, in my opinion, Cain's literary talent far
excelled the typical Black Lizard novelists, who often brings
in the same kind of late 40's to late 50's tawdry sexuality.
Love those paperback covers from that time period---see Hard
Boiled America.
Cain's versatility as a narrator, and the breadth and variety
of the novels he produced (let alone the quantity) should be
acknowledged before he gets dumped in with any "category" or
any group of novelists--like Chandler and Hammett. Cain felt
his talent was maligned and limited by critics who made easy,
commercial observations to sell books to the public.
I love Hammett and I love Chandler. I like a lot of Jim
Thompson. But none of these authors ever wrote in the variety
of styles, on the variety of themes, in the variety of
locales that Cain did. This is not meant as a value judgment.
It is a factual observation.
Point One: Some novelists are "hard boiled" because that is
primarily the way they wrote--and it doesn't mean they were
necessarily good novelists.
There are plenty of mediocre to terrible hard boiled novels
out there.
Which brings me to my Second Point: It may be a better
critical paradigm to look at each work, rather than classify
each author.
Some novelists I would not classify as "hard boiled
novelists" even though they wrote some great hard boiled
novels (Donald Westlake as Richard Stark/James M. Cain)
I wouldn't want to call The Thin Man a hard boiled novel.
Hammett invented something new in that work. Although Hammett
might be called the father of all hard boiled writers--except
that Carroll John Daly made his entrance a year ahead of
Hammett in Black Mask --that doesn't mean that The Thin Man
is a hard boiled novel.
Enough said.
Keith
keithdeutsch@earthlink.net
Mike Cunningham wrote:
> My memory is not what it used to be but did Mildred
Pierce have any crime
> in it? I simply can't remember. It seems to me some
of Cain's stuff was
> more melodrama than crime,
-- # 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 2b29 : 26 Apr 2000 EDT