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Re: RARA-AVIS: Noir/Hardboiled and popular fiction (long...
but interesting) Re : RARA-AVIS: Noir/Hardboiled
Michael wrote :
>>we tried to define terms like hardboiled and noir simply by pinpointing
> >to their original use, and left their current meaning out of the picture.
> This seems inaccurate. All anyone has been doing is speculating about
> meanings of terminology, not to try to come to a single consensus which we
> would all then have to adhere to, but to explore our own various
> understandings of what "hard-boiled" and "noir" mean. If you or anyone
> else wants to talk about "current meaning," 90's crime fiction, whatever,
> that would be Great. I am still very unclear as to what your criticisms
> of the ongoing discussion are. Is it necessary to criticize others' modes
> of inquiry in order to steer the conversation in a new direction? Michael
Hey, I'm not criticizing your methods ! :) Check my message, I said : 'we',
including myself among the speculators. I merely tried to bounce off
Etienne's long post, to open new areas of investigation.
That said, I think that maybe, just maybe, we've done enough 'speculating
about meanings of terminology'. We came to the conclusion that 'hardboiled'
refers more to the style of writing, and 'noir' to the contents of the story
(to make a long story short). And the last few posts didn't advance the
discussion much.
I'm not specially interested in "current meanings", but an historic
perspective on the evolution of the genre seems likely to shed some new
lights on our understanding of the terms used here. For instance, Etienne's
statement that the last 30 years' westerns were hardboiled fiction too...
Comments, anyone ?
Laurent
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