Hammett and Chandler birds of two vastly different feathers

[Adam J. Thornton]

One should not simply lump Hammett and Chandler together as detective-story
authors.  Hammett is, as far as I can tell, pretty much what he's
advertised as.  Sam Spade is a private dick filled with low cunning and
knuckles.  On the other hand, Marlowe is an intellectual.  Chandler's books
are amazingly overwritten, and it's quite intentional that Marlowe went to
college before becoming a private investigator.  Just recall the
conversations on Eliot with the chauffeur in _The Big Sleep_.  Chandler has
a self-conscious irony about him that Hammett, as I recall (I've read
Chandler much more recently), lacks.

Adam
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