> My definition is pretty narrow. If there's no
downward spiral too hell,
> if there's no psychic damage and sense of doom, it's
not noir. Quoting
> Eddie Muller's definition of noir (as taken from Ken
Bruen's foreward
> for a new edition of Miami Purity), "starts bad and
gets worse." That's
> noir. At least that's my narrow definiton. And very
little of what's
> called noir today has a resemblance to noir (at
least to me). Russell
> Hill's "Robbie's Wife" is noir, Seymour Shubin's
"Anyone's My Name" is
> noir (yeah, okay, it was written 50 years ago, but
we've been
> discussing it recently)
I agree with this definition. WIth noir there is a sense of
doom hanging over the main character. From the first page of
Anyone's My Name, you know the character is doomed to the
electric chair, so much so that I can understand readers not
finishing it.
In noir fiction, the lives of the main characters seem to
spiral out of control, usually because of bad decisions
compounded by even more bad decisions. This is a hallmark of
Charles Williams' and Gil Brewer's novels for example and
contemporary writers such as Jason. You see the decisions the
characters make and you cringe and you watch as they loose
complete control of their own lives.
Even with someone like Spillane, whose stories don't quite
fit this mold, their is a sense with each Mike Hammer book,
e.g., that this time Hammer is doomed. It's either Hammer or
the bad guy. Of course, Hammer always prevails.
Jeff
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