IVIV Chandler

[Doug Millison]

> … it could be argued that
> depicting a character who continually smokes joints, and is therefore
> dazed and semi-coherent and semi-capable, might not make for the most
> engaging of narratives.
>

  Pynchon has in fact depicted a character who admits he can't  
remember how many joints a day he smokes, who smokes to the point of  
falling asleep in front of the Tube, and who stumbles from one step of  
this plot to the next, and I found myself grinning, chuckling, and  
even laughing out loud a couple of times, at this depiction.

>
>> Marlowe is fun to read about, but what a brute in real life he is.
>
> Poor old Marlowe is taking a kicking lately. Don't think he's anywhere
> near as much of a 'brute' as is being suggeted.

I don't see how anybody could argue that Marlowe is not mysoginist,  
homophobic, and racist, reflecting as he does the attitudes of a  
culture that is all that, but would be interested in a close reading  
that shows him not to be. Sorry but I don't like the police very much,  
or their milieu. I got beat up by them one time for no good reason.  
I've seen them beat up other nice people for no good reason.   
Understood that they occupy a tough spot in society, that many have  
the best intentions (as most of us have), that sometimes they protect  
us from evil, etc. I still don't care for them much.  Marlowe seems a  
bit more self-reflecting that the meathead pigs who beat me, that's  
true, but as a PI, like Doc, he's only one step removed from being a  
cop himself.

>
>  But the book *does* make clear that
> Doc spent some time as a 'skip tracer', having skipped and been traced
> himself, a sort of 'poacher turned gamekeeper'.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skiptrace
Skiptracing (also skip tracing) is a colloquial term used to describe  
the process of locating a person's whereabouts for any number of  
purposes. A skiptracer is someone who performs this task, which may be  
the person's primary occupation. The term comes from the word "skip"  
being used to describe the person being searched for, and comes from  
the idiomatic expression "to skip town," meaning to depart, perhaps in  
a rush, and leaving minimal clues behind for someone to "trace" the  
"skip" to a new location.  Skip tracing tactics may be employed by  
debt collectors, bail bond enforcers (bounty hunting), private  
investigators, attorneys, police detectives, journalists or as a part  
of any investigation that entails locating a subject whose contact  
information is not immediately known.

> He never hit anybody
> up with that syringe, but he carried it and used it as a threatening
> visual aid.

And that makes him a nice guy?  It makes him a bully at best.


> , his narration
> particularly, is a joy.

I expect that his publishers, editors, and everybody who enjoyed his  
voiceover appearance on The Simpsons realized that he had potential.

Pynchon as Doc, narrating Inherent Vice the movie.  I'd pay to see that.