Kevin Burton Smith wrote:
> >In Tarantino's vocabulary I understand the word
as anything that is
> >trashy and violent. But that's not the original
pulp fiction.
> It isn't?
Well, you caught me in the act. Of course the original pulp
fiction is trashy and - of-courser! - violent, especially the
shudder pulps. But in Tarantino pulp seems also to include
stuff like porn novels and bad Hongkong B-movies.
> I don't know, I always thought of pulp fiction as
just a certain kind
> of writing, not limited by however it was actually
bound.
You're probably right, but the usage of the word seems to
have gotten out of hand. "The Caine Mutiny"? Why not "Gone
With the Wind"? The editors of "Pure Pulp" (Pronzini,
Greenberg, Gorman) claim that anything that is popular is
pulp fiction. Do they mean that if Dostoyevsky is popular, he
is pulp fiction?
(Well, he has this guy kill that guy with an axe...)
> Or that a John D. MacDonald story published in Black
Mask is
> pulp fiction, but one printed in Manhunt
isn't?
I've never been able to say the real difference between the
pulps and the digests. MacDonald - yeesh, I just couldn't get
through "Where Is Janice Gantry?" Booooring! (This was
off-subject.)
> I mean, you say pulp fiction, you just think of a
certain type of
> writing, that bears similarities to the early pulp
mags. That's all.
The paperbacks of the fifties and sixties bear similarities
to the early pulp mags, so do Hammett's, MacDonald's and
Chandler's novels. But I just can't imagine how "The Caine
Mutiny" bears any similarity to any pulp mag. It seems like
Pronzini and co. are trying to elevate pulp fiction from its
lowly status, but I think that's unnecessary. (Well, I don't
know how high in the literary circles "The Caine Mutiny" or
"Peyton Place" are, but I believe they have been upper than
John MacDonald and others.)
But, well, maybe there must a good word for all this stuff we
are talking. Why couldn't it be pulp fiction? What happened
to hardboiled? There is so much pulp stuff that isn't
hardboiled in any sense.
Juri
jurnum@utu.fi
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