Sidney,
Re your comments below:
". . . I rather think they [reviews by Hammett and other
pieces on the 'hard-boiled movement' by other writers] were
written by authors who had GRADUATED
[emphasis mine] from the ranks of free-lance writers, who
started by cranking out hard-boiled tales for BLACK MASK . .
."
In fact, Hammett's review of S.S. Van Dine's first book, THE
BENSON MURDER CASE, (a savage pan, by the way) appeared while
he was still making his living writing short stories for
BLACK MASK and other publications. His first book was several
years away. His first novel-length work, BLOOD MONEY, had not
even been serialized, and perhaps not even written, yet. In
fact, I think "Cap" Shaw's invitation to submit a book-length
work for BLACK MASK serialization came AFTER Hammett's
review.
The point isn't whether or not Hammett and the other
pulpsters saw themselves as craftsmen creating a commercially
saleable product. Clearly they did, as you've ably
demonstrated in several subsequent posts. Even those who
"took themselves more seriously," as Bill Crider put it,
approached the craft of fiction with workmanlike
professionalism rather than with the dilettantism of an
"artiste."
The point is that, in approaching story-telling with
professional craft, they were, as Graham pointed out, aware
that their approach to detective fiction was something very
different from what had traditionally been the form to that
point. Which is to say, though they might not have put it in
so many words, that they knew they were part of a
"movement."
To say otherwise would be similar to saying that '50s rock
and rollers had no idea that the songs they were playing were
in any way different from mainstream popular music.
JIM DOHERTY
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