Thanks Jims (D. and B.), Al and Miker for helping me think
about this.
To me, it's not so much about saying noir (or hardboiled, or
any genre) is just atmosphere, or that they are just
character or even that they are both just the sum total of
atmosphere and character. They're something else, the
synthesis of the clash between character (in particular the
protagonist) and environment.
So in the case of Chandler, there's the world Marlowe
operates in - the city of L.A. and its people, icliques,
industries, institutions, buildings, mores, justice,
morality. There's its architecture large and small, of the
streets and of the soul. But there's also the world of the
work overall - the world that is the synthesis of the
conflict between the protagonist and the city and society
he's operating in - the world created by the book in our hand
- a world created by the author but existing in (and in
active partnership with) the reader's imagination.
I know I feel different - better, much less bleak - after
I've read a Chandler or a Hammett than after I put down a
Goodis or Woolrich. My world, at least, isn't so dark and
sinister - its less noirish. Another way of putting it is
that to me Chandler's world may be noirish in its
atmospherics (and even, though I'm less sure about this, its
intent) but not ultimately in its effects. If a thriller
doesn't thrill, then what is it? Similarly, if a noir doesn't
leave you feeling dark and sinister, what is it?
-- # Plain ASCII text only, please. Anything else won't show up. # To unsubscribe from the regular list, say "unsubscribe rara-avis" to # majordomo@icomm.ca. This will not work for the digest version. # The web pages for the list are at http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/ .
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 14 May 2004 EDT