Kerry,
Re your comments below:
> Yeah, I understand your argument Jim. I
just
> disagree with it. And I accept
> that by your definition I am wrong. I can live
with
> that. I don't have to
> agree with it to value it.
On what basis do you disagree with it, other than the
"Lewis Carroll" basis of "When I use a word, it means
precisely what I want it to mean, no more no less?"
Apparently, original usage doesn't matter. Apparently, COMMON
usage doesn't matter. If it doesn't mean what you want it to
mean, you'll simply use it the way you want to, anyway. Have
I got that right?
> Criticism and categorization are as creative
as
> the original writing itself. There is no
ultimate
> authority to appeal to,
> in noir or anything else. That (according to
my
> definition) is exactly the
> point of noir. Just because someone is the first
to
> come up with a term
> doesn't mean that's the end of the
discussion.
If the term is still used substantially the same way as it
was originally used, and it is, that pretty much IS the end
of the discussion. Does "movie," for example, mean mean only
films that have live actors in it, thus eliminating
animation? Of course not, and for anyone to say that those
who include cartoons in the broader rubric are wrong, just
because s/he doesn't think including cartoons is particularly
useful for his/her purposes doesn't "extend the discussion,"
it simply uses the word incorrectly.
> And don't give me this BS about you not caring
how
> many angels dance on the
> head of a pin. You care passionately. You
can't
> leave this discussion
> alone, by your own admission. You just don't like
it
> when someone comes up
> with a different number than you do.
I've stayed out of the discussion for the better part of
year, and the issue has come up plenty of times in that
period, believe me. And if you don't check the archives. I
wasn't jonesing in the least for another set-to on this
issue, and the only thing that drew me back in after all this
time was an assertion that the recent intrusion of commercial
interests was somehow distorting the original meaning of the
term, an assertion that was so historically inaccurate that I
couldn't let it pass.
Yes I care about the issue, but only to the degree that I
care about proper usage. Words mean things, and language is
the only method of communication we have. When you use a word
incorrectly you communicate badly.
If you say "hard-boiled" when you really mean "private eye,"
you're misusing the term and, moreover, implying that
characters like Joe Friday (who's a cop), Matt Helm (who's a
secret agent), Parker (who's a professional armed robber), or
Flash Casey (who's a newspaperman) are somehow outside of the
parameters. You may prefer that "hard-boiled" referred
exclusively to private eye stories, you'd probably find it
more useful if that's all it referred to, but it's incorrect
usage, it communicates badly, and it confuses the
issue.
If you use "mystery" when you mean "whodunit" or
"puzzle," you imply that any story in which the villain is
known to the audience from the first is NOT a mystery, an
assertion that excludes, for example, the short stories
collected in THE SINGING BONE by R. Austin Freeman, most of
the episodes of COLUMBO, virtually all 75 years of DICK
TRACY, the Holmes/Moriarty duel described in Sir Arthur Conan
Doyle's "The Final Problem," and the duel between Dupin and
Minister D-- (one that prefigures the Holmes/Moriarty
conflict) in "The Purloined Letter." If you say "mystery"
when you mean "whodunit," no matter how much you may WANT
"mystery" to mean something more restictive, you might find
it more useful if it was used more restrictively, but if you
do so you are misusing the term as it's been understood since
Poe first created the form, and you are confusing the
issue.
Simlarly, if you use "noir" when you really mean
"screwed," you exclude PI novels like Spillane's ONE LONELY
NIGHT, procedurals like Goodis's OF MISSING PERSONS, gangster
novels like Stark's THE OUTFIT, romantic suspensers like Vera
Caspary's LAURA , and a whole lot of other crime fiction that
fits the parameters of the term as most people understand it.
You may WANT "noir" to mean something more restictive, you
may find it more useful if it meant something more
restrictive, but it's incorrect usage, bad communication, and
it confuses the issue.
Use "private eye" if you mean private eye, not
"hard-boiled." Use "whodunit" or "puzzle" if you mean
whodunit/puzzle, not "mystery." And use "screwed" or
"modern tragedy" or "nihilistic" or else come up with some
similar term to describe what you mean. "Noir" already means
something more generic.
> Yes, I think your definition is too broad to
be
> useful. Isn't crime and
> murder itself considered dark in western culture?
So
> what then separates
> noir from other crime fiction? Tragedy is dark
too,
> atmospherically. So
> what separates noir from tragedy as well? Even
in
> the classic love-story
> plot, between meeting and getting the girl,
boy
> briefly loses her. That too
> could be said to be atmospherically dark. In
fact,
> in western literature
> plot hinges on conflict. You say it's enough
that
> there are dark
> atmospherics in the story, but the presence
of
> conflict suggests dark
> atmospherics in almost every story.
Sure it does, but, as you very well know, it's a question of
treatment and degree. A comic romp by Donald Westlake treats
the dark subject matter much more lightly than a brooding PI
novel by Tucker Coe or a gangster novel by Richard Stark,
and, waht's more, that's obvious to anyone who's the least
bit perceptive. To suggest that "dark" is simply too broad
because it necessarily encompasses all of western literature
is mere sophistry.
Of course there will be disagreements at the frontiers over
whether a given piece of work meets the defintions. That's
why, for example, some people regard James Bond or Batman as
hard-boiled and I don't. Or why some might insist that the
gothic suspense PBO's that were so popular in the '60's
and
'70's are noir (because they usually have dark, sinister
atmospherics) while others would not (because they lack the
grittiness most expect from noir fiction due to its close
association with hard-boiled).
These are issues that can be dealt with on a case by case
basis, but they have nothing to do with the broader
definition.
> I respect your
> research into the works
> and sources you site, (and you inspire me to want
to
> do more of that
> myself, time permitting) but the conclusion you
come
> to regarding the
> definition is, quite simply, useless.
Well, it may be useless. I won't argue about that. You know
best whether a term is useful to you or not. But saying the
definition's useless is not the same thing as saying that
it's incorrect. If a broad definition of noir is useless to
you, that's not my fault, and not my problem. The term means
what it means. If you want a term that encompasses a more
strictly defined kind of story, come up with something new,
'cause noir's already taken.
JIM DOHERTY
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