----- Original Message ----- From: "Brian Thornton" <
tieresias@worldnet.att.net>
> As long as we're talking about writers who elevated
Crime fiction to the
> level of literature, I have to agree on Chandler's
better stuff as an
obvious
> choice, and would also advance the notion that
Hammett's better stuff is
too.
Brian, I agree. I'd include _Red Harvest_ in that list of
Hammett's novels that merit attention. It is, as some
scholars have observed, a very cinematically structured
novel. It also may well be the first novel with a car chase
scene! The novel also presents some intriguing class
commentary that is especially interesting in light of
Hammett's later political shift.
(In fact, my lone contribution-- so far, anyway-- to noir
scholarship is a recent article in _Storytelling: A Critical
Journal of Popular Narrative_ called "Thin Man, Fat Man,
Union Man, Thief: Constructions of Depression-Era
Masculinities in _Red Harvest_ and _The Maltese
Falcon_.")
~Marc Seals
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