Since he probably won't mention it, George Pelecanos has a
review of the new Hammett biography, A Daughter Remembers,
and the LoA collection of his short stories in today's
Washington Post. Two papragraphs:
"He is credited with creating the tough, unsentimental and
reportorial style of fiction known as hard-boiled. Never mind
that hard-boiled pulp practitioners like Carroll John Daly
had preceded him in Black Mask, or that Hemingway was
developing his own brand of muscular, rhythmic, stripped-down
prose at the same time. Hammett wasn't the first realist in
crime fiction, but he was the first to bring it up to the
level of violent art."
and
"He invented an entire genre of literature, as unique to this
country as blues and jazz, and just as lasting. Raymond
Chandler said that Hammett
"did over and over again what only the best writers can ever
do at all. He wrote scenes that seemed never to have been
written before." What a legacy."
The whole review can be read at:
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A64899-2001Nov8.html
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