Dashiell Hammet

[Jack Scorpion]

I really don't like his Continental Ops detective. What's a detective story without an interesting detective? After reading The Dain Curse, I stopped reading Hammet for awhile.

I loved The Thin Man, which was the first I read of his, and I am a huge fan of Dashiell Hammett overall. The Glass Key was Hammett's favorite of his novels and from what I've gathered, generally considered one of the most overlooked novels in American literature. I, unfortunately, have yet to read it.

 

[Sunny]

My least favorite is actually Red Harvest. If you're used to the "puzzler" type mystery novels, The Dain Curse would be the best introduction. He's got enough murders and plots in that one to stock half a dozen Agatha Christies. I'm a big Christie fan, too, so I should know. Both Red Harvest and The Dain Curse are the only Continental Op novels.

I, personally, found the Op quite an interesting detective. And definitely The Thin Man is one of the best.

 

[Lawman]

I am a large fan of Hammett. I have to say that I prefer Chandler, however. More levity, and more campy in a Hollywood sort of way.

Another less known noir master is Cornell Woolrich, whom I am just beginning to discovery. Anyone read any of his work?

Mark

 

[Sunny]

No - but my current libraries are pretty poor. I've only seen the name in the credits for "Rear Window." What did he write? I really enjoy Chandler as well, and I'd like to try something new. How does he come and what particularly do you enjoy?

 

[J. M. Stovall]

The current issue of Oxford American has a really great cover story on Noir, and how it's an underrated and often overlooked genre. The feature article was written by a lit prof, and it has a lot of great info!

 

[Harp]

Thanks for the tip, I'll check it out!

 

[Lawman]

Here is a link to some pretty good dope on Woolrich. A pretty tortured soul, but a fascinating writer.

http://www.case.edu/artsci/engl/marling/hardboiled/Woolrich.HTM

Mark

 

[Mark Finn]

Surprised that more of you haven't read them...

To me, Hammett and Chandler are like the bookends of the American Detective Story as we currently understand it. Both of these guys just have to be read together. Hammett gave us moral ambiguity, and Chandler gave us a bootstrap smart-ass. Their influence on the detective story, popular culture, and literature cannot be overstated.

That said, there's a bunch of guys who carried on (as opposed to imitated slavishly) the ideas of noir writing, and many of them get very little recognition. I'll throw out a few names of guys to look for when you're trolling the used bookstores. Buy 'em when you see 'em and behold in their majesty:

Frederic Brown--a clever, terrific writer. Titles include The Screaming Mimi and His Name was Death. One of my all-time favorite noir authors.

James M. Cain--The Postman Always Rings Twice? He wrote a number of good, crunchy crime thrillers.

David Goodis--Man, could that guy write. And he was later, too. You've all heard of Shoot the Piano Player. He is so infrequently reprinted, you should grab him when you see him.

Horace McCoy--actually a contemporary of Hammett and Chandler, he came up through Black Mask with them. He only wrote a handful of books before being whisked away to Hollywood to drink himself to death (sound familiar?) but you absolutely must read They Shoot Horses, Don't They? if you read nothing else by him. The bleakest 1935 novel you'll ever read, I promise you that. He's a new favorite of mine, and I'm sorry I had to stumble across him to find him. More people should know who he is.

Cornell Woolrich--the Nuttiest of the bunch, really. Half of Woolrich's (or William Irish's, if you find his pseudonym) stories spiral into entropy and madness. It can be disconcerting, to say the least. His short stories are excellent, if you can scare them up.

I didn't mention folks like Thompson, Willeford, et.al, because I just assume that people know 'em already.

But it all started with Hammett and Chandler.

 

[The Wingnut]

I've read most of his works, including the 'Lost Stories', which are in a compilation currently available under the same name. Red Harvest was one of the more memorable ones, which served as the inspiration for the Bruce Willis movie Last Man Standing. The Dain Curse was a puzzler right up to the end.

I kind of ruined the books by seeing the movies first with Thin Man and Maltese Falcon. Still excellent, though, and interesting to see the choices made between paper and film.

 

[Flying Scotsman]

Read all of those Hammett books many years ago, loved them. Also read some of the Chandler stuff, too...great fun.

Now I'm going to have to re-read them all, because it's been ages since I read them the first time

 

[Jack Scorpion]

To me, Hammett and Chandler are like the bookends of the American Detective Story as we currently understand it. Both of these guys just have to be read together. Hammett gave us moral ambiguity, and Chandler gave us a bootstrap smart-ass. Their influence on the detective story, popular culture, and literature cannot be overstated.

That said, there's a bunch of guys who carried on (as opposed to imitated slavishly) the ideas of noir writing, and many of them get very little recognition. I'll throw out a few names of guys to look for when you're trolling the used bookstores. Buy 'em when you see 'em and behold in their majesty:

Frederic Brown--a clever, terrific writer. Titles include The Screaming Mimi and His Name was Death. One of my all-time favorite noir authors.

James M. Cain--The Postman Always Rings Twice? He wrote a number of good, crunchy crime thrillers.

David Goodis--Man, could that guy write. And he was later, too. You've all heard of Shoot the Piano Player. He is so infrequently reprinted, you should grab him when you see him.

Horace McCoy--actually a contemporary of Hammett and Chandler, he came up through Black Mask with them. He only wrote a handful of books before being whisked away to Hollywood to drink himself to death (sound familiar?) but you absolutely must read They Shoot Horses, Don't They? if you read nothing else by him. The bleakest 1935 novel you'll ever read, I promise you that. He's a new favorite of mine, and I'm sorry I had to stumble across him to find him. More people should know who he is.

Cornell Woolrich--the Nuttiest of the bunch, really. Half of Woolrich's (or William Irish's, if you find his pseudonym) stories spiral into entropy and madness. It can be disconcerting, to say the least. His short stories are excellent, if you can scare them up.

I didn't mention folks like Thompson, Willeford, et.al, because I just assume that people know 'em already.

But it all started with Hammett and Chandler.

Mark Finn, I enjoy this post of yours. Having read maybe 90% of Chandler + some Hammett and Cain, I've always been hopeful but hesitant trying out their contemporaries. My goal is to pick up at least one book by each of the others you mentioned pretty soon.

I, of course, have run across the names, but I know that the genre even back then was oversaturated with as much filth as beauty, so I've labeled all guilty until proven innocent. Walter Mosley and James Ellroy, in the meantime, have been satiating my need for new blood, but their wells are running dry. Good looking out.

 

[carebear]

Try Loren Estleman with his Detroit shamus Amos Walker.

 

[TM]

Mark Finn,

Ah yes, Frederick Brown! "The Screaming Mimi" is a wonderfully noir book. It was done as a film entitled "The Bird with the Crystal Plumage" by Dario Argento. Transplanted from Chicago to Rome. The movie's not as good as the book, but still has an edge.

Tony

 

[Travis]

Read all of those Hammett books many years ago, loved them. Also read some of the Chandler stuff, too...great fun.

Now I'm going to have to re-read them all, because it's been ages since I read them the first time

I'm with you on that.

 

[Wise1too]

My favorite writer!

Read his lesser know Continental Op stories.
His style is down to earth. Not too gritty and not flamboyant. Like a great conversationalist.

 

[scotrace]

Last weekend at a HUGE used book store...

Got this compilation from 1965. Reading The Maltese Falcon now - it is EXCELLENT.

...he did over and over again what only the best writers can ever do at all. He wrote scenes that seemed never to have been written before.
-Raymond Chandler

 

[manton]

I remain mesmerized by The Maltese Falcon, and can read it over and over. The others never did it for me.

Red Harvest is too bloody and implausible. Supposedly it is inspired by real events that Hammett witnessed as a Pinkerton op in a Montana mining town, but it seems to me he just way overdoes it.

The Dain Curse was insipid and even more implausible. The Glass Key is supposed to be the other great one, but it's more political than crime, and I didn't get the sense from it that Hammett understands politics. The Thin Man is good, but it's candy.

Overall, Chandler is much better, IMO. Falcon is better than anything Chandler did, but the rest of Chandler is better than the rest of Hammett. However, Spade is a better character than Marlowe, more fully realized. Chandler tried to pour all this depth into Marlowe, and didn't always succeed. Long Goodbye, case in point.

 

[Sunny]

Overall, Chandler is much better, IMO. Falcon is better than anything Chandler did, but the rest of Chandler is better than the rest of Hammett. However, Spade is a better character than Marlowe, more fully realized. Chandler tried to pour all this depth into Marlowe, and didn't always succeed. Long Goodbye, case in point.

Interesting analysis and comparison. I don't agree with most of your points , but that's personal preference entirely. I have no in-depth analysis of the genre as a whole and these two in particular to offer; merely what I like and why. Could you compare Spade with Marlowe from another book, however? The Long Goodbye is arguably his weakest novel. Compare strength to strength.

 

[manton]

Hammett once said something to the effect that Spade was not any actual detective that he had ever met, but all of them, as they wished themselves to be. Tougher, smarter, shrewder, stronger, quicker, wittier, etc. Sort of like when Homer Simpson looks in the mirror and he sees a full head of hair and rippling chest muscles.

Marlowe, on the other hand, is not so much a character as he is Chandler. He is too maudlinly intellectual to be a detective. He plays chess with himself when he gets home at night. Mostly he meanders through the novels getting his @$$ kicked and reflecting on that. To me, these little touches seemed calculated not to make Marlowe more real but to make Chandler more respectable to intellectuals. My guy is not some street tough, he has depth! This is literature, not genre candy!

Overall, I say Chandler is better because his style is superior. It's clear he worked hard on it. He once said the only thing enduring about writing is style. All of Hammett's plots, as a technical matter, work like clocks. With the exception of Farewell, My Lovely, Chandler's are a mess. Yet the books to me hold up much better because of the style. Also, even though the plots rarely add up in the end, there is generally a greater air of plausibility to Chandler than to Hammett. Red Harvest, Glass Key, and especially Dain Curse just seem like outlandish silly ghost stories. And overwritten. Neither the Falcon nor the Thin Man are overwritten, but, as I said, the Falcon is a masterpiece, and the Thin Man is candy. There is an element of social realism in Chandler that is missing in Hammett. Hammett's San Franscisco is just a backdrop. Chandler uses Southern California in a more fundamental way. From what I can tell, he may exaggerate its underside, but he is writing about real things.

 

[Private Eye]

Hammett is great, but I favor Chandler

I can't get enough of Chandler, but what I've read of Hammett is pretty terrific too. Very interesting to see how closely they used to follow books when drafting a screenplay. "The Maltese Falcon" is so true to the book with just a few exceptions that I am sure were made for expediency. "Red Harvest" was hard to get into after "Falcon," primarily because it's easier to identify with Sam Spade than with a no-name Continental Operative.