Hard-Boiled Heaven

February 14, Valentine’s Day, marks the 75th anniversary of the publication of what is possibly the greatest, and certainly the most famous, American detective novel, Dashiell Hammett’s “The Maltese Falcon.”It would be difficult to think of a less appropriate story to celebrate Valentine’s Day, a sentimental holiday for lovers, than this utterly unsentimental novel. You probably have read the book (if you haven’t, you should be as embarrassed as Bill Clinton should have been when his favorite cigar flavor was made public), and you certainly have seen the movie – the Humphrey Bogart version, that is, which happened to be the third time in a decade that it was filmed.When Sam Spade discovers that the luscious Brigid O’Shaughnessy has not been entirely a Girl Scout (well, perhaps that is an understatement, since she proves to be a liar, a thief, a slut, and a murderess), Spade gives her up to the police. She is incredulous, knowing that Spade has fallen for her, and reminds him that he loves her. “Maybe I do,” he says in his Valentine’s Day speech. “I’ll have some rotten nights after I’ve sent you over, but that’ll pass.”Among aficionados of the American private-eye novel, there are two camps: those who think Hammett was the greatest of them all, and those who think Raymond Chandler was. While I believe Chandler was the far superior stylist (and one of the great writers of the 20th century, for that matter), his plots were frequently so convoluted that even he couldn’t figure out who did what to whom.Much of Hammett’s work, on the other hand, is badly dated, using heavy doses of underworld argot that no longer resonates. In “The House on Turk Street,” an early short story, a character speaks of some stolen money. “You don’t think I’m going to take a Mickey Finn on that, do you?” From the context, I assume “Mickey Finn” means something like “give up my share,” but I wouldn’t swear to it. Oddly, when two criminals agree to a deal, one says, “it’s a bet.” In another story, a detective is told, “I knocked it over for you, kid,” which meant he learned everything there was to know from some interviews.But Hammett could plot, and the characters he created are so fully realized that some have become iconic, most notably those in his third novel, “The Maltese Falcon.”You could argue that Hammett was the most influential American writer of the 20th century. This is an honor generally accorded to Ernest Hemingway, but who influenced him? There has been some question about whether Hammett influenced Hemingway or whether it was the other way around.There is no question they knew each other’s work. In Hemingway’s “Death in the Afternoon,” he remarks that his wife is reading Hammett’s “The Dain Curse,” adding that it’s his “bloodiest yet” (“The Dain Curse” was Hammett’s second novel). In Hammett’s “The Main Death,” his detective, the Continental Op, notices that a wit ness is reading “The Sun Also Rises.”Joe Gores, one of today’s most distinguished hard-boiled writers, a three time Edgar winner and a Hammett scholar, knew Lee Wright, one of the greatest editors of mystery fiction who ever lived. Wright knew both men, Mr. Gores has written, and she said she always believed Hemingway learned his terse writing style from Hammett.Chronology supports this assessment. Hammett’s first story for “Black Mask” magazine came out on October 1, 1923, and the Op appeared regularly after that for some years. Hemingway’s first book, “In Our Time,” was published in a limited edition in Paris and did not appear in America until 1925, and then in a very small edition (1,335 copies), by which time Hammett was well established and his writing style firmly entrenched.Mr. Gores writes about this in his excellent introduction to what will be a hugely important book to those of us who think Dashiell Hammett is a major American literary figure – which should be everyone who has graduated from “see Spot run.”“Lost Stories” (Vince Emery Productions, $27.95, 342 pages), which will be released in April, includes 21 stories, most of which have never been seen except by the most dedicated scholars. In addition to the fiction, Emery provides vital biographical and bibliographical commentary throughout, and the volume belongs on the shelf of every detective fiction reader and collector.Meanwhile, Vintage Books, Hammett’s paperback publisher, is celebrating the anniversary by reissuing three of the novels in new packaging and producing “Vintage Hammett” (Vintage, $9.95, 197 pages), a collection of well-known short stories and excerpts from the novels. None of the books has any new material at all, not even new introductions.Overall, it is a pretty lame homage to an author who has been in print at various Random House imprints (Alfred A. Knopf, Modern Library, Random House, and Vintage) almost perpetually for three-quarters of a century, skipping only a few years in the 1950s, when his communist activities got him in trouble.Hammett’s significance cannot be overstated. Without him, Chandler, Ross Macdonald, Robert B. Parker, James Ellroy, Mickey Spillane, and the other practitioners of the hard-boiled private-eye novel could not have existed, or their work would have been dramatically different.He did not invent the hard-boiled private-eye story, as is so often claimed. That was achieved by Carroll John Daly, a hack of minimal talent who was nonetheless the most popular tough guy writer of the 1920s and 1930s. But Hammett moved the pulp PI story firmly into the realm of literature, for which he will always command a warm spot in the heart.And a warm spot in the heart is what’s wanted on Valentine’s Day. When Sam Spade was ready to have Brigid arrested, here’s what the sentimental old fool had to say: “Yes, angel, I’m going to send you over. The chances are you’ll get off with life. That means if you’re a good girl, you’ll be out in twenty years. I’ll be waiting for you. If they hang you, I’ll always remember you.”Makes you all mushy inside, doesn’t it?The Congressional OpThis anniversary is of such importance that Senator Feinstein of California has placed a resolution before the U.S. Senate “recognizing the importance of the writings of Dashiell Hammett to American literature and culture, especially ‘The Maltese Falcon,’ on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of its first publication” – this is followed by a lot of “whereases,” finally resolving that the Senate “salutes Dashiell Hammett as one of the most notable authors of hard-boiled crime fiction; notes the 75th anniversary of the publication of ‘The Maltese Falcon’; and recognizes ‘The Maltese Falcon’ as a great American crime novel.”It may be a little long-winded and repetitive (gee, from a politician?) but it’s a swell thought, and maybe the only thing on which the Republicans and Democrats will agree this year.Further events in recognition of this important date in the history of crime fiction include a talk by noted Hammett biographer and scholar Richard Layman to the Library of Congress on February 15, and a March 19 event in which 891 Post Street in San Francisco, where Hammett lived, will be officially made a national literary landmark.Mr.Penzler is the proprietor of the Mysterious Bookshop in Manhattan and the series editor of the annual “Best American Mystery Stories.” He can be reached at openzler@nysun.com.

Hard-Boiled Heaven

Hard-Boiled Heaven

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