There's a piece in the new Oxford American called "Dark
Harvest: On the pleasures of teaching noir, an underdog
genre" by Barry Hannah.
A couple of snippets:
"Hard-boiled" noir, detective, mystery-where do we separate
genres here or get close to a definition? The better the
book, the less definition and pedantry are required. An
actual masterpiece, so rare, escapes definition and genre
entirely.
and
"What isn't noir? Did I have a noir experience last night
when I mashed out my cigarette on old granny's forehead?"
Well, yes you did. Mean and nasty mark much of noir. Sadism
and masochism, usually disguised and even unconscious to the
writer, would make a rich field for Freudian theorists. Booze
itself can be masochism that erupts into sadism. But you need
greed, ungovernable passion, a storyline
(if not a plot), suspense, and some trail of detection.
You can find the entire essay here:
http://oxfordamericanmag.com/content.cfm?ArticleID=139&Entry-
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