Hi, Jason Starr here (AKA crimeflix). Bill told me about the
switch to Yahoo and thought it would be a good time to join
the discussion. I've met a bunch of you already and I'll be
at Bouchercon in Toronto as well and I'm hoping I can make it
to Bill's Rara-Avis party...
Looking back through the archives a few weeks ago, I read the
long thread about noir fiction. I can understand why there's
been so much debate about the subject, because noir is such
an ambiguous term. While I know this topic has been heavily
discussed, I had one thought to share...
In my mind, I think there are 2 kinds of noir--French noir
and American noir/the rest of the world's noir. French noir
is very broad and includes any work of dark fiction, not just
crime or detective fiction. So in France Cold Mountain is
considered noir, and Fight Club is noir, and Stephen King is
noir, and, hell, Harry Potter is probably even noir. I think
"dark and sinister" is an excellent description for French
noir, although I don't think French noir necessarily needs to
be sinister--dark is good enough...But the rest of the
world's noir is different--it's more specific. American
noir
(IMHO) is crime fiction that has no detectives or cops (at
least not good ones). Usually it's from the point of view of
the little guy, or the loser, or the guy who's screwed. It's
the opposite of detective fiction where order is restored in
book. The endings are usually bleak or ironic...So with the
non-French noir definition--Thompson, Cain, Goodis etc would
be noir, but Chandler and Hammett are not noir-
-they are hardboiled detective. They are only noir according
to the French...
I'm sure this won't settle anything, but glad to be
here...
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