Doug,
Re your comments below:
> I don't think people are really looking for
"realism",
> anyway. While it's true that the busy little
forensic
> details of "CSI" and similar shows seem to be part
of
> their appeal, and while there's always been a
small
> diehard group of fans obsessed with authenticity
in
> their police procedurals and the like, in general
I
> think people look to fiction to escape their
reality.
As one of those who is "obsessed" with authenticity in the
police procedural, I take some exception to that
comment.
The reason procedural readers like procedurals to be accurate
is because the sub-genre is defined by the accurate depiction
of the profession of law enforcement. If it doesn't do that
it's not delivering what it's supposed to deliver.
That's not obsession. That's simply a reasonable
expectation.
> So if the PI's run is really up, I don't think it
has
> anything to do with him/her not being
"realistic"
> anymore. Never mind what "real" PIs do: at heart
the
> fictional PI is an incarnation of the
traditional
> American hero -- individualistic to the point
of
> isolation, deeply moralistic, violent, stoic,
a
> Romantic, etc. That figure will probably stick
around
> as long as there's an America.
Here you have a better point. The hard-boiled PI of cition,
Gores, Ellin, and (arguably) Hammett notwithstanding, unlike
the procedural cop, was a figure of fantasy, a fictional
construct designed to fulfill a purpose in the story, not to
be a authentic, albeit fictional, representative of a
particular profession.
Still, there is a fascination, and always has been, with
fiction that accurately depict people at work, at least if
the work is interesting in itself. That's one of the appeals
of MOBY DICK, an accurate look at 19th century whalers.
That's one of the appeals of FROM HERE TO ETERNITY, an
accurate look at the peacetime military. And I think PI
novels that DO try to accurately depict PI work in the same
way police procedurals try to depict law enforcement, like
Gores's DKA novels, appeal to readers who might be put off by
the comic book heroics of a Mike Hammer or even the tarnished
romanticism of a Phil Marlowe.
> Now, whether it'll be incarnated ever again as
the
> traditional "I get a hundred bucks plus expenses"
and
> a bottle in the bottom desk drawer is hard to say.
My
> guess is that he/she will probably be back again in
a
> big way, but not for awhile. My guess is that
we're
> living through an unsettled age and a PI needs to
be
> in a settled time, since his/her whole raison d
etre
> is to confront the corruption that undergirds
the
> seeming stability. (This is the same reason why
spy
> fiction, my other major interest, has somewhat
receded
> as of late. It too is predicated on
stability.)
I'm not sure that what you're saying about "unsettled times"
bears scrutiny. The hard-boiled PI was conceived, born, and
thrived, between the wars, during the gangsterism of
Prohibition, the economic woes of the Depression, and the
anxiety over the rise of fascisim in Europe and Asia. What
was particularly "settled" about that era?
Hoever, you do imply a good point about the PI, like the
western gunfighter, being a creature of his era. That, I
think, is why so many PI writers are writing historical PI
stories. Even Sue Grafton has retroactively decided that all
future Kinsey Milhone entries will be set no later than the
'80's.
As for spy fiction, I've noted a rise, not a decline, in
recent years. Nothing like the the levels of popularity seen
in the mid- 60's, but certainly a spike. The sub-genre DID
decline quite a bit with the end of the Cold War (a time of
apparent "settled stability") but took an upsurge with 9/11
and the consequent "War on Terror"
(inarguably unsettled times).
Regarding the general theme of this thread, I can only point
out that the St. Martin's PI Contest gets all kinds of
entries every year, and that there are more than enough first
PI novels every year to glean five nominees for the PWA's
First Novel Shamus. That's hardly the sign of a declining
sub-genre.
> Actually, as I type this, it strikes me that this
is
> an age for horror (and we do see a lot of
horror
> efforts in pop culture nowadays) and, strangely,
the
> Western. If somebody could reconceive the Western
to
> speak to these times, they'd probably make a
killing.
How about combining the two? Maybe if someone wrote a
screenplay about a legendary Old West outlaw who encounters a
vampire from Transulvania. Yeah, that's it! We could call it
BILLY THE KID VS. DRACULA.
JIM DOHERTY
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