Dave Zeltserman wrote:
I'd like to refine Miker's definition in that the protagonist
is screwed of his own making. The odds may be stacked against
him, but he still makes the poor moral choice, fails in his
battle against his true nature, etc.
************** I agree. A bad choice dooms the protagonist.
This would seem to void out my description of noir as
pessimistic determinism, wouldn't it? If one declares
determinism to be the world of the noir character, then
there's no free will he can exert to make the choice that
seals his fate.
I think of pessimistic determinism as not absolute but
relative. In five card draw there's no reason that you can't
be dealt a royal flush right off the bat. But the chances
aren't very good. It is in this way that the environment
stacks the deck against the noir protagonist.
I can visualize the environment and its deterministic
influence as a road, and the character steers by his
decisions. The narrower the road, the more dire the
consequences of a bad decision. In the wrong environment,
like Maggie in Crane's novel, it's virtually impossible not
to make a catastrophically wrong decision. It's like going
full-throttle on an old Harley down a razor's edge.
In most noir novels, the road is narrow.
miker
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