Everything in a society is politics and politics is
everywhere… especially in the HB/Noir lit. Because of its
constant fight against corrupted power, distorted justice,
death and murder admitted as a daily fact, the best of this
lit is politics by essence. It often carries the implicit
denial of the auto-justification of power
(under any form) by its existence ( which for the holders is
something that should be admitted as a natural law, that
nobody could contest, against which nobody could be allowed
to fight); this stand is pure politics. No matter if power is
just the cop controlling a neighborhood, the administration
of a city or even a state, a corporate violating elementary
rights of the persons, the cynical rich people, or a cold
blood killer … you will find them all, and more, as "the evil
opponent" in HB/Noir stories.
And I agree with Juri : the opposite kind of vision of the
world, like in the cosies and pure whodunits, is a firm
political stand of… conservatism. Murder therein is the
disturbing element that a "hero" has to solve in order to
restore the "balance" of the society. Nobody wants to change
something in the society nor in its organization with this
kind of lit… Even if the murder is only like a game in some
of them, it's still politics, because these games freeze
their cardboard society in prejudices and ready-made ideas,
and never question its order.
E.Borgers Hard-boiled Mysteries http://www.geocities.com/Athens/6384
and more
At 11:03 15-07-03 +0300, you wrote:
>Kevin (hi Kevin!):
>
>> Cozies and
>> amateur sleuth mysteries (particularly those
labelled as
>> "traditional") tend to closed worlds, and spy
fiction and thrillers
>> too often reduce politics to the cartoon
level.
>
>Those are also political stands. It's extremely
political to try to shut out
>all the politics. And in the end, in spy stories and
cozies, we have an
>amazing amount of sexual and textual politics to be
dealt with.
>
>> So, some of my favourite "political" crime
authors, just off the top
>> of my head:
>
>Great list - but no Dashiell Hammett! "Red Harvest"
and "The Glass Key" are
>surely political.
>
>Juri
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