OK, Woolrich, a few days late, as per usual. I read I Married
a Dead Man in Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1930s and
40s (great present). Interesting structure--first and last
sections the exact same, with the middle a long flashback.
Interesting dilemma, too: who's the killer? The narrator or
her husband? The narrator says she didn't do it, but
acknowledges that the husband claims that he didn't, either.
The possibility of a third party isn't really entertained. A
pretty good story.
The prose is anything but pared down. Woolrich favours a kind
of repetition, a kind of repetion that can build a mood, but
a kind of repetition that can also be boring. Sometimes it
works, sometimes it doesn't.
Karin
At 08:31 PM 29/02/2008 +0000, you wrote:
>My apologies for being absent from Woolrich month for
the past few
>days but I've been tied up with family matters. It's
hard to do
>much writing when there is the imperative of a
two-year-old grandson
>tugging at my sleeve to read to him and his two-day
old brother is
>upstairs crying his first protests to the
world.
>
>I mentioned at the beginning of this Woolrich month
that my favorite
>Woolrich novel is RENDEZVOUS IN BLACK (1948). It
features
>the "avenging angel" themes that Woolrich often used
in his novels
>and most resembles the much better known THE BRIDE
WORE BLACK
>(1940). In many ways, BRIDE is more striking from the
stark image of
>the title to the female protagonist. In the first
novel, the bride
>is left a widow on the church steps when gunfire from
a passing car
>kills her husband. She then tracks down everyone in
the car in
>order to avenge her murdered love.
>
>In RENDEZVOUS, the novel opens with a young man on
his way to meet
>his fianc饠on a street corner. I love the opening
setup to the
>novel with the outline of a relationship that is both
wonderful and
>ordinary in hometown American way. If you were
casting this scene in
>the year the novel came out, it would have starred
Van Johnson and
>June Allyson.
>
>One of the joys of reading Woolrich for me is the
riffs he tosses off
>all along the way. In describing the young man Johnny
Marr, he said
>he looked "Like any Johnny, anywhere, any time. Even
people who had
>seen him hundreds of times couldn't have described
him very clearly,
>he looked so much like the average, he ran so true to
form. She
>could have, but that was because she had special eyes
for him. He
>was a thousand other young fellows his own age, all
over,
>everywhere. You see them everywhere. You look at them
and you don't
>see them. That is, not to describe afterwards. `Sort
of sandy
>hair,' they might have said. `Brown eyes.' And then
they would have
>given up, slipped unnoticeably over the line from
strict physical
>description. `Nice, clean-cut young fellow; never has
much to say;
>can't tell much about him.' …He would perhaps take
his coloring from
>her, starting in slowly from this June on. He was
waiting to be
>completed, he wasn't meant to stop the way he
was."
>
>So Woolrich has set up the loss that is about to
occur to Johnny as
>more than the loss of a fianc饬 an unconsummated love.
Johnny is
>about to lose a huge piece of himself and his chance
to be complete.
>
>The girl is also idealized. "Her name was Dorothy,
and she was
>lovely. You couldn't describe her either, but not for
the same
>reason. You can't describe light very easily. You can
tell where it
>is, but not what it is. Light was where she was.
There may have
>been prettier girls, but there have never been
lovelier ones…She was
>everyone's first love…She was the promise made to
everyone at the
>start, that can never quite be carried out afterward,
and never is."
>
>And our Johnny is about to enter a world of darkness.
Before he
>reaches their regular point of rendezvous, a bottle
falls out of the
>sky and kills Dorothy. In a few pages, Woolrich
outlines how Johnny
>goes through a period of nearly immobilized mourning
before he learns
>that the bottle was thrown from a charter plane
carrying a group of
>hunters.
>
>The novel then moves to a series of segments dubbed
"The First
>Rendezvous", "The Second Rendezvous" and etc. as
Johnny seeks revenge
>against everyone on that plane. It becomes apparent
to the reader
>that he is not usually seeking to kill the men from
the plane.
>Typically, he seeks to destroy the person or
relationship each of the
>men hold most precious.
>
>There are some brilliant elements to developing the
story this way.
>Woolrich makes use of Johnny's indistinct appearance
in several
>ways. As the episodes mount, a detective named
Cameron begins to
>connect the cases as Johnny is leaving cryptic
unsigned notes at the
>conclusion of each rendezvous. Cameron is hampered by
the fact that
>few people can describe the person that the detective
realizes must
>be the perpetrator.
>
>More importantly, the reader does not always know
which character in
>each episode is the avenging angel Johnny. Sometimes
it is not so
>obvious and this adds to the suspense. Also it is not
obvious at the
>beginning of each episode is the intended victim-the
person most dear
>to the object of Johnny's revenge. Add these two
suspenseful
>features to the overt "race against the clock"
suspense of the later
>episodes as Cameron identifies the next victim and
races to prevent
>the next crime.
>
>One of the most interesting aspects of the novel is
how Woolrich
>forces the reader to completely reverse emotional
ties. Johnny
>starts off the novel as a totally sympathetic
character and this
>continues for a time into the revenge chapters. But
Woolrich forces
>the reader to turn against Johnny as the victims are
quite innocent
>of any direct involvement with his fianc鳠death and
are themselves
>quite sympathetic. Instead of pulling for Johnny to
gain his
>revenge, the reader begins to pull against him and
for the
>detective. In the episodes, Johnny has disappeared
and is replaced
>by a merciless avenger.
>
>As Francis Nevins points out in his biography of
Woolrich, there are
>many flaws in the plot, although fewer problems than
he found in
>BRIDE, …"but on the visceral level where Wool Rich's
work either
>stands or falls, it is a masterful performance." I
agree with his
>opinion that it is "one of the most powerful suspense
novels ever
>written."
>
>I know this is a long post but in winding up Woolrich
month, I want
>to quote a few paragraphs or from my favorite
Woolrich riff. It is
>in the "Third Rendezvous" on a troop train (the novel
takes place
>just before and during World War II): "The ceiling
lights peered
>down through the blurring layers of tobacco smoke
upon the packed
>humanity clogging the aisle, swaying and undulating
in unison, but in
>no danger of falling, for there was not room enough
to fall in.
>Passing paper cups of gin or corn from hand to hand,
like relays in a
>chain…Singing shouting, laughing, scowling in
momentary but quickly-
>dispelled quarrel…"
>
>Later the train is shunted to the side to make way
for another
>train. "Somewhere immediately outside there was a
continuous
>clacking vibration going on. It didn't come from the
car itself now;
>that stood still; it was an external vibration that
shook its
>windowpanes, and shook its wheel-trucks, and even
seemed to shake the
>very tracks it stood on. On one side only, on the
left, outside on
>the next track, an endless succession of dark
inscrutable cars went
>flitting by, ghostlike. Not a light showing. A train
of death. A
>cavalcade of doom. Dozens of black cars, scores of
them; shaking the
>rails, shaking the night, shaking the stalled day
coach.
>
>"All the railroad cars there were in the whole
country, all the
>railroad cars there were in the whole world, going
down to death.
>Like black dominoes on wheels, like litmus paper
cut-outs against the
>stars. Not a light, not a glimpse of the thousands of
already dead
>they were packed with; and all the more awful for
that.
>
>"The war, the war. The madness of the whole
universe."
>
>It is a classic Woolrich over-the-top digression that
few writers
>would attempt because it is difficult to bring off
and so easy to
>look silly. The scene should be read in full to judge
it accurately
>and I recognize that some might consider it purple
nonsense. But it
>blew me away when I first read it many years ago and
retains its
>power for me now.
>
>Richard Moore
>
>
>
>
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