Re: RARA-AVIS: Science Fiction and Noir

From: Patrick King ( abrasax93@yahoo.com)
Date: 12 Oct 2007


The ultimate scifi noir is William Gibson's Neuromancer and the novels that succeeded it. The world those books populate is dark and lurid. Eveyone has to commit some kind of crime just to stay alive. The protagonists take psychotropic drugs so they can think as fast as their computers, and surgically alter themselves to include disk drives. Of course, Gibson sites Hammett, Chandler and Dick as his muses.

Patrick King
--- Eric Chambers < nqexile@yahoo.com.au> wrote:

> --- In rara-avis-l@ yahoogroups. com,
> jacquesdebierue"
> jacquesdebierue@yahoo.com wrote: Also, the search
> for noir shouldn't limit itself to the mystery and
> crime pulps. For example, there were lots of
> noirish stories in the
> fantasy and weird tales pulps, with notable authors
> like Donald
> Wandrei, Theodore Sturgeon, Fritz Leiber, etc.
> Woolrich brings some of
> that to the crime and mystery story, but the stuff
> was in the air. I
> am sure the experts on western pulps can find noir
> examples in that
> genre as well.
>
> Funny you should say that - I 've just reread
> Sturgeons 'More than Human' which started me
> thinking about possible connections between Science
> Fiction, Noir and Hardboiled.
> 'More than Human' is definitely hard-boiled, but
> Noir it is not, because it ends on a positive note.
> One set piece in the book es something to Dickens
> 'Great Expectations' which I believe is definitely
> noir. (The David Lean film definitely is).Sturgeons
> short story 'Bianca's hands' is in Cornell Woolrich
> territory. Are Lieber's 'Fafred and the Grey
> Mouser' tales Sword and Sorcery Noir?
> Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury and Robert Bloch also
> spring to mind. For a more contempory blend of SF
> and Noir, try Jonathan Lethem's "Gun with occasional
> music".
>
>
>
>
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