At 10:32 PM 2/3/00 -0700, Greg S. wrote:
>That also helps me understand something else that was
nagging at me:
>Hammett's focus was largely external. X said this. Y
did that. Hammett
>doesn't take us inside the characters. If we're
interested in the internal
>life of the characters, it's up to us to infer that
from Hammett's
>observations. Fair enough. But, that's where noir and
hardboiled tales
>like Bloch's first few tough Scudders part company
with Hammett. There, the
>focus is on the internal.
>
>
This is at least half the
reason that Hammett and Hemingway are so often compared. The
emotions and attitudes of the character have to to be
inferred by the reader, as you say. Chandler did the internal
monologue thing and other writers....like Block...have tended
to get carried away with it ever since. But Hammett's
restraint is one reason why he hardly ever gets accused of
sentimentality or floridity as most of the other PI guys
sometimes do.
James
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