Spotlight On Philip Marlowe

 I used to love, and still love, the noir style of Raymond Chandler. Today I'm going to tell you why I love it. This post spotlights one of my favorite detectives - Philip Marlowe - who is the topic of not only books, but radio dramas and movies. 

Courtesy of avclub.com

Who is Philip Marlowe? He's the main detective character that truly paid off for Raymond Chandler. He's gritty, rough around the edges, has a heart, and can't make a marriage work. He's blunt. He's smart enough to put together pieces during cases that become a tangled ball of yarn. Usually, the case is simple, complicates itself with a bunch of murders and other connected cases, and then has a twist ending. I love it. It's dramatic and fun. Radio dramas of the books are the best things to spend an evening with. They only last about an hour and a half, which makes them a good choice for a quick book. 

Some of you may comment with some distaste on the femme fatale, however. I didn't say it was realistic. This is Raymond Chandler writing in the 1940s. At times it sounds like Chandler is fantasizing in his stories (and I could say the same of Ian Fleming's James Bond). I know not all men write women who aren't realistic; lots can write realistic female dialogue and do. In the case of Raymond Chandler, you should be prepared to find dialogue that isn't going to sound like a rational, everyday female. The noir style is full of femme fatales. If you pick up the genre you'll find highly sexualized women behaving like Jessica Rabbit. It was written in the 1940s and was beloved during that time. This is distinctive to the noir style of writing and film. You'll get a gritty detective, cigarettes, alcohol, murder, sketchy morals, and sexualized women. Know what genre you are picking up, ladies and gents. These detectives walk into back alleys in the dark to speak to sources. They also get beat up and drugged in almost every case. 

What Makes Marlowe Great

The best thing about Marlowe is his witty dialogue and descriptions. The cases themselves are, as I said above, tangled balls of yarn. He only has to take a sketchy case from a cagey woman and suddenly he finds that a few people turn up dead in the process. Then said cagey woman will sometimes turn out to be the culprit because they are related to someone or lied to Marlowe through their teeth. You only see what he sees, thus you will get fun descriptions of him being drugged through a cigarette or drink on occasion. 

Let me show you what I mean by witty dialogue. The dialogue below comes from The Big Sleep. All of these are Marlowe speaking to Carmen Sternwood, who is definitely not a sane woman. 

(Carmen Sternwood showing up in Marlowe's bed unasked for)

"I bet you can't even guess how I got in." I dug a cigarette out and looked at her with bleak eyes. 

"I bet I can. You came through the keyhole just like Peter Pan." 

"Who's he?" 
"Oh, a fellow I used to know around the poolroom." 

(Marlowe finding Carmen at a house where she had been found drugged, standing outside it alone)

"Remember me?" I said. "Doghouse Reilly, the man that grew too tall. Remember?" She nodded and a quick jerky smile played across her face. "Let's go in," I said. "I've got a key. Swell, huh?"

(Marlowe speaking to Carmen at the Sternwood home)

"You're cute."

"What you see is nothing," I said. "I've got a Bali dancing girl tattooed on my right thigh."

What I listed is only the tip of the iceberg. He's a sarcasm machine. If you speak sarcasm you'll love Marlowe's dialogue. 

I don't feel the need to give away all the plot twists, mostly because you can read them in one afternoon or listen to them in less than two hours. Seriously, go check these out yourself. The series has been picked up by other authors since Chandler passed on. Poodle Springs is written partially by Chandler and finished by Robert B Parker. Chandler wrote four chapters of the book and died before he could finish writing it. 

The Main Books

While he has short stories out and those are just as good, these are the main Marlowe features in order of first to last, according to bookseriesinorder.com. 

Chandler's books include: 

The Big Sleep - 1939

Farewell My Lovely -1940

The High Window - 1942

The Lady in the Lake -1943

The Little Sister - 1949

The Long Goodbye - 1953

Playback - 1958

Poodle Springs - 1989

Continuations include:

Perchance to Dream (Robert B Parker) - 1991

The Black Eyed Blonde (Benjamin Black) - 2014

Only To Sleep (Lawrence Osborne) - 2018

The Goodbye Coast (Joe Ide) - 2022

I suggest picking it up from the library or hitting up your local bookstore, but do start at the beginning. There are repeat characters that make more sense this way. He gets married at Poodle Springs to a woman shown in  The Long Goodbye and Playback. You have to read The Long Goodbye before you read The Black Eyed Blonde to make sense of the ending. Just go in order. It'll be easier. They are quick reads. 

Raymond Chandler And Ian Fleming

Most of these were published in magazines, which explains the length. Chandler himself was a drinker, which got him fired from his job at Dabney Oil Syndicate. It explains the perspective of Marlowe pretty well. The depression shot him into writing full-time, as he'd had several jobs across the years. These included civil service, the Canadian army, bookkeeping, screenwriting, and vice president of Dabney Oil Syndicate. Some of his Marlowe successes were reworkings of previous short stories (which are obvious once you read the one and then the other). 

Chandler is much like Ian Fleming. He drank. He had his share of troubles. They both have a similar style in one aspect  - the unrealistic dialogue of women and objectifying of women. I also adore the James Bond novels. I have found a different perspective on these two authors. I still like what I read; that won't change. Time passes, as we are all aware of, and cultures change. Fleming's Bond is sometimes outright sexist. Marlowe isn't quite so sexist, but the storyline sounds like a fantasizing man (and Fleming does this, too). Few female characters actually act normal. Some of them fall into Marlowe's lap or bed unasked for. 

Courtesy of The Guardian

The difference between Bond and Marlowe is their reaction to the women in their lives. Marlowe has next to no real relationships in the books. No girlfriends in most of the books, though many kisses. One failed marriage. He cares about people and helps those he can, especially the innocent who have been wronged or abused (like in The High Window). Relationships don't work for him. He's bitter about life and being alone. To his credit, he assumes women have intelligence (when they exhibit sense and intelligence). He doesn't get many sexual favors (but does get kisses) and turns some offers away (like Carmen Sternwood). When he does get sex, he ruins it by saying something he shouldn't or interrogating the woman he just made love to. Smooth, Marlowe, real smooth. His thoughts about women are cynical, like he's been hurt by someone. Perhaps, the author of the books has. 

Now we talk about Bond. Bond's thoughts toward women make me want to throw my book across the room, and yet I'm still reading it. I would go pick it up to continue my chapter after a long rant about why Bond should stop fantasizing and end the short story realistically. Bond will refer to a woman as a "silly bitch", which erks me to no end. I collect these books, just like I collect the Marlowe books. James Bond is not Marlowe, though both objectify women. Bond has countless, fruitless relationships and lots of sex. These two men are not the same. The tone is also far less cynical. The genre makes a difference. It isn't Noir. It is a spy novel thriller. Same umbrella, but a different subcategory. 

To be fair, these are written in the 1940s and the 1950s, after a war that displaced a lot of men. The depression didn't help, either. Every author pours themselves into their main character in some capacity. Marlowe is no different. We know Chandler crawled into a bottle from time to time, and so does Marlowe. Did Chandler feel hurt by women? Did he feel like he was looking through a glass wall at others' happiness? It's distinctly possible. We just know that he wasn't a completely happy man. I can say the same for Fleming, who had trouble transitioning from wartime espionage to post-war life when he was writing James Bond, and he, too, crawled into a bottle. Perhaps that's why I get hints of similar themes in their work. 

Oh, and did you think I'd forget I wrote a suspense novel? Here is the QR code to get to my website and the link to my amazon page. Wrenville, a novel about a private detective hiding from a previous case, is available in ebook and physical form. 

Amazon Listing of Wrenville here

Sources:

Raymond Chandler - Biography - IMDb

Famous drinkers: Raymond Chandler | Raymond Chandler | The Guardian

Raymond Chandler in the age of #MeToo. (slate.com)