Raymond Chandler
Paperback | Pages: 292 pages Rating: 4.15 | 28903 Users | 1560 Reviews
Be Specific About Appertaining To Books Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe #2)
| Title | : | Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe #2) |
| Author | : | Raymond Chandler |
| Book Format | : | Paperback |
| Book Edition | : | First Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 292 pages |
| Published | : | August 1992 by Vintage Crime/Black Lizard (first published 1940) |
| Categories | : | Mystery. Fiction. Crime. Noir. Classics. Detective. Literature. American |
Interpretation Concering Books Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe #2)
Definitely my favorite Chandler, beating out The Big Sleep by a star and more than a dozen memorable lines. This book is absolutely soaking in quotables and may have the best prose of any noir I’ve ever read. Add in a classic main character and a solid plot and you have a nice shiny bundle of win.PHILIP MARLOWE:
Chandler’s iconic PI is an arrogant alcoholic who fails every PC test you can formulate. He’s racist (from what I recall he insults African-Americans, Japanese and Native Americans and maybe others), homophobic and sexist enough that I would blackjack him on the braincase before he ever got within 10 yards of either of my daughters.
He’s also mesmerizing and fills up the page with his presence. His entertainment value is off the charts and he cracks wiser than anyone this side of Sam Spade. But whereas Hammett’s Spade is all slick, smoky quips and cat-like grace, Marlowe is the “other side of the tracks” version. He’s unkempt, rugged and surly and his words are crusty with barbs.
Whereas Spade’s every move seems coordinated and cross-referenced like a well-rehearsed play, Marlowe is all reaction, counterpunch and intuitive hunches.
However, like Spade, he’s also smart (much more than he usually lets on) and has a knack for clear thinking and being able to read people. Best of all though, the man is incapable of cutting slack or giving inches and is saltier than the Pacific Ocean.
THE PLOT:
A convoluted series of mini-mysteries all stemming from Marlowe’s search for the ex-girlfriend of a just released from prison man-mountain named Moose Malloy. Fairly typical noir stuff but very well executed and paced to perfection by Chandler.
THE WRITING:
Finally…the prose. The real star of the show. I would say Chandler’s writing is a masterful example of noir. There may be others as good but it is hard for me to imagine any better. I would put Chandler’s prose into 3 separate and equally impressive categories that you don’t usually see from a single pen. First, you have a whole host of “I have to remember that” lines that are just fun to read. Quotes like:
“The eighty-five cent dinner tasted like a discarded mail bag and was served to me by a waiter who looked as if he would slug me for a quarter, cut my throat for six bits and bury me at sea in a barrel of concrete for a dollar and a half, plus sales tax.”
“‘Who is the Hemingway person at all?’
A guy that keeps saying the same thing over and over until you begin to believe it must be good.”
“I didn’t say anything. I lit my pipe again. It makes you look thoughtful when you’re not thinking.”
“It was a nice walk if you liked grunting.”
“She gave me a smile I could feel in my hip pocket.”
“I like smooth shiny girl, hardboiled and loaded with sin.”
“A Harvard boy. Nice use of the subjunctive mood. The end of my foot itched, but my bank account was still trying to crawl under a duck.”
Second, Chandler has a wonderful facility for painting descriptions so that you feel like you’re walking right beside Marlowe and he does it in such sparse, efficient style.
1644 West 54th Place was a dried-out brown house with a dried-out brown lawn in front of it. There was a large bare patch around a tough-looking palm tree. On the porch stood one lonely wooden rocker, and the afternoon breeze made the unprunned shoots of last year’s poinsettias tap-tap against the cracked stucco wall. A line of stiff yellowish half-washed clothes jittered on a rusty wire in the side yard.Those descriptions materialized in front of me more than pages of less polished prose could accomplish. It felt like I was there.
…
I was looking into dimness at a blowsy woman who was blowing her nose as she opened the door. Her face was gray and puffy. She had weedy hair of that vague color which is neither brown nor blond, that hasn’t enough life in it to be ginger and isn’t clean enough to be gray. Her body was thick in a shapeless outing flannel bathrobe many moons past color and design.
Finally, there are the passages that aren’t just clever quips or snappy dialogue, but that convey a real sense of emotion.
“She hung up, leaving me with a curious feeling of having talked to somebody that didn’t exist.”
“…a sudden flashing movement that I sensed rather than saw. A pool of darkness opened at my feet and was far, far deeper than the blackest night. I dived into it. It had no bottom.”
“There was just enough for to make everything seem unreal. The wet air was as cold as the ashes of love.”
That is the trifecta of writing. Brilliant, sharp and fun….descriptive, informative and polished…and evocative, moving and powerful.
Yes, 5.0 stars and a definite must read for fans of noir, mysteries or just superb prose.
HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!
Specify Books Toward Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe #2)
| Original Title: | Farewell, My Lovely |
| ISBN: | 0394758277 (ISBN13: 9780394758275) |
| Edition Language: | English |
| Series: | Philip Marlowe #2 |
| Characters: | Moose Malloy, Philip Marlowe, Lindsay Marriott, Jessie Florian, Anne Riordan, Mrs. Lewin Lockridge Grayle, Jules Amthor, Laire Brunette, Dr. Sonderborg, Lewin Lockridge Grayle, Detective-Lieutenant Carl Randall, Nulty, Chief John Wax |
| Setting: | Los Angeles, California,1940(United States) California(United States) |
Rating Appertaining To Books Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe #2)
Ratings: 4.15 From 28903 Users | 1560 ReviewsCriticism Appertaining To Books Farewell, My Lovely (Philip Marlowe #2)
Philip Marlowe is looking for a woman's missing husband when he encounters Moose Malloy, a brute fresh out of prison, looking for his lost love Velma. Moose kills a man and Marlowe gets corralled into looking for the missing Velma. In the mean time, Marlowe gets another gig as a bodyguard and soon winds up with a corpse for a client. Will Marlowe find Velma and get to the bottom of things?As I've said before, noir fiction and I go together like chronic constipation and heroin addiction.Mr. Philip Marlowe is six feet tall and weighing 190 lbs. man, women find quite attractive, maybe a tough guy to many onlookers in a sleazy and a low -paying occupation too, but is not a superhero, no eyes in the back of the head when someone smashes his skull with a club from behind, bigger stronger men can and do beat him to a bloody pulp, still the private detective is relentless and will get up... A kind of honestly is his code, yet does bend a little for his needs... constantly smoking
"Even on Central Avenue, not the quietest dressed street in the world, he looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food."I'm gonna admit right up front that the fourth star of my rating comes entirely from Raymond Chandler and his way with words. Nobody knew how to turn a phrase like good old Ray-Ray. I mean, what a guy. What a kick he must have been at parties.I don't normally read books for language alone. I'm an emotional reader, and my emotions tend to be tickled by
3.5 starsA very uneven successor to The Big Sleep, but truly brilliant in part. If I were to make a movie from a book, this would be The One. 😃The first 1/4 is quite slow, clumsy even (see below). But then it quite suddenly gets wonderful. I wish I could know what happened to Chandler to wake him up. The prose suddenly soars.Update: It turns out this book is a (clumsy) conglomeration of three of Chandlers previous short stories: 1. Moose looking for Velma (poor)2. A stolen jade necklace
Excerpts from a dinner honoring the 2016 winner of the Otis Chandler Award for Literary Criticism Audience Question: Youre known for your essay on the Kantian aesthetic of disinterested judgment as seen in the works of James Joyce, William Gaddis, and Dan Brown. Are there other authors or titles that come to mind, perhaps even more focused on the primacy of style?Steve: Well, lets see Maybe the first book I read where a certain shadowy deportment really popped as a pure statement of style was
Phillip Marlowe is one of the most famous and influential characters in detective fiction. Hes also a racist alcoholic, and after all the blows to the head he routinely takes, hes almost certainly suffering from post-concussion syndrome so you gotta question his judgment.But hes also the guy that says things like this:"It was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window."And this:"He looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food cake."And
I love Goodreads it has really enhanced my reading experience. And at the same time added to my anxiety. There are too many great books to read. I have at least 3k physical books on my TBR pile in my office that has really turned into a book storage space. When another reader posts something about one of my favorite books, I stop and think about how much I loved that book. Thats what happened recently with Farewell My Lovely. I dropped what I was reading and read it again. I dont have time to
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