Re: RARA-AVIS: Hardboiled and Marxism

From: DJ-Anonyme@webtv.net
Date: 05 Sep 2006


I took Kerry's football metaphor as meaning that while they might be rooting for different teams, or political parties, they at least agree on the rules of the game. And that applies to PIs, for instance. They are still working within the rules of a capitalist society.
  This is my problem with the idea of hardboiled, or even Hammett, being Marxist lit. While a PI's ironic detachment may lead to his or her seeing a lot of what goes on within capitalist society with skepticism, it does not make him or her a Marxist. Even if the critique of society jibes well with a Marxist analysis, it does not mean a Marsit solution to that corruption is being proposed. Individual capitalists are exposed, and a certain degree of corruption is presupposed, but rarely is the entire system attacked. I can't think of a single PI who is out to foment revolution. Not even Michael Collins's PIs, who often do go on to expose the system itself as corrupt, and not just the individuals within it.

PIs work as individuals, not collectives. And they'd probably set themselves just as far apart from the power structure in a Marxist society as they so often do in a capitalist one.

Mark

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