Bill wrote:
> My attention was caught this morning by the opening
lines of Paul
> Seabright's review of the recent book FREAKONOMICS:
A ROGUE ECONOMIST
> EXPLORES THE HIDDEN SIDE OF EVERYTHING (by Steven D.
Levitt and Stephen
> J. Dubner), in the TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT (5
Augusut 2005):
>
> "This book should be read at a single sitting: it is
written with great
> fluency and brio, and the real substance of the
earlier chapters will
> generate enough momentum to compensate for the light
weight of the book's
> second half. At its best, it has the pace and the
mock hard-boiled charm
> of a collection of Hammett or Chandler detective
stories. Steven D.
> Levitt is an economist, not a gumshoe, but he looks
out from his office in
> Chicago with the same curious eye for a puzzle, the
same disinclination to
> believe the pious self-descriptions of the ambitious
and the greedy, that
> move Philip Marlowe in Los Angeles."
Yeah, well, I don't think Chandler's ever gone out of style
in our culture, and it's a cynch that Hammett is coming back
into style again, in no small part because of the release of
the complete "Thin Man" movie series on DVD.
Who would have thought that my cozy-reading grandmother would
be crowing about something associated with Hammett being
released? What with the disdain he had for the work of such
writers as Christie and Sayers and their wealthy, respected,
social-climbing (or slumming) detectives, it's probably
enough to have poor Old Dash spinning in his grave.
Brian Thornton
------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor
--------------------~-->
<font face=arial size=-1><a href="
http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=12h74otst/M=362335.6886444.7839734.2575449/D=groups/S=1705020068:TM/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1124379269/A=2894362/R=0/SIG=138c78jl6/*http://www.networkforgood.org/topics/arts_culture/?source=YAHOO&cmpgn=GRP&RTP=http://groups.yahoo.com/">What
would our lives be like without music, dance, and
theater?Donate or volunteer in the arts today at Network for
Good</a>.</font>
--------------------------------------------------------------------~->
RARA-AVIS home page: http://www.miskatonic.org/rara-avis/
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rara-avis-l/
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email
to:
rara-avis-l-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 18 Aug 2005 EDT