Mark wrote:
miker, you said in your Tapping the Source post that you had
been havng trouble empathizing with many of the noir
characters you've been reading about lately. Did you
empathize with Stanton Carlisle in this book? I found his
rise and fall (not really a spoiler, its inevitability is
apparent very early on) fascinating, but I can't say I
empathized with him.
************** Oh yeah. No problem with that. It's easy to
see Stanton at the beginning of the novel as almost a blank
slate with the ability to go either way. I say
"almost" because he's strapped with some seriously Freudian
childhood memories. His education into the carny view of
people as marks, and how he can profit by deception aimed at
people's weaknesses, seals his fate.
I would note that by "empathize" I mean that I was drawn into
and involved with the character's emotions and motivations.
That does not necessarily mean that I sympathize, or feel
sorry, for the character.
This brings up an interesting topic (at least for me).
I think that one of the mainstream critic's objections
to noir is that it oftentimes draws the reader into some
fairly evil characters. In Frohock's second edition of THE
NOVEL OF VIOLENCE IN AMERICA, he accuses James Cain of
immoral intent by involving readers in the wicked passions
and proceedings of Frank and Cora. All I can do is smile at
this sort of commentary. Frohock's understanding of the
purpose of literature is a world apart from mine. Frohock is
evidently looking for moral lessons, where I'm looking for
Hemingway's "one true sentence."
Which characters I can empathize with tells more about my
personal preferences than anything else. I like them smart
and cunning, even if they are overrun by fate at the end. And
yes, as probably anybody that's read my post knows by now,
I'm a sucker for a shot of sensationalism. I find no delight
in dumb characters in bland situations.
miker
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