Well, there's morality and then there's morality, of course.
But we're talking Christian morality. Certainly Spade did not
throw over O'Shaughnessy because he believed in God. His
reasoning was entirely practical: bad for business and he
didn't have sufficient faith in her to support a romantic
relationship. Entirely anti-Christian in my mind.
I think, if you go back into the RA archives you'll find one
of the reasons suggested for the popularity of hardboiled and
noir fiction at its origins was that it identified a loss of
faith in institutions (governmental and religious) to deliver
populations from horrific wars and economic want during the
first half of the 20th Century.
I've already mentioned Postman. Nobody citing the vengeance
of God there, that I can recall, unless God's ways are now
revealed as not so mysterious auto accidents. Which I guess
is my point. Noir characters may be punished for running
afoul of the law, or various and sundry other powerful
characters or institutions, or because the human condition is
one of losing more than winning, but offhand only Pulp
Fiction (if you'll forgive the digression) comes to mind as
having a character who quotes spiritual scripture before
delivering vengeance, and he quit the noir biz when he
figured out what he'd been reciting. There are others I'm
sure, but usually delivering Christianity through the barrel
of a gun is meant to reveal hypocrisy, isn't it?
I think you're reading your own morality into noir.
Best, Kerry
At 03:15 PM 13/04/2006 -0700, you wrote:
>Kerry J. Schooley wrote:
>
>And I cannot think of any noir stories
where
>characters are punished for their
immorality.
>
>****************
>And I can think of very few where they
aren't.
>
>miker
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