A few thoughts on Chandler's burgher

[John Carvill]

Um....... what happened to the end of my post re. Paul N's theory?
Hmm... will try to re-type it now....

First of all, if I ever do get a chance to re-read Chandler (plus his
book of letters plus the Hiney biog), I will bear in mind what you say
about the payment/no payment transition, as well as how compact the
timeline is/isn't. ANd you are probably right about Marlowe becoming
more prone to female charms as teh cycle of books progresses. Whether
all this can be tied up into a theory, I dunno. But none of it really
speaks to the (now rather tired) question of Davis's conception of
Marlowe and Chandler as reactionary.

But if considering 'early' versus 'late' Marlowe, rather than trying
to squeeze him into 'does this' or 'doesn't do that' categories, a
more useful (and, arguably, more relevant) way of looking at a book
such as 'The Long Goodbye', from a structural perspective, is that
rather than the traditional ('early' Marlowe) setup where he is hired
by someone, who he usually doesn't fully trust, The Long Goodbye
begins with Marlowe intervening, getting invloved without having been
asked, and in the process actually making friends, with Terry Lennox.
This he also does, to an extent, with Roger Wade. We might, at a push,
compare either or both of these relationships with Doc and Coy. But
the interesting aspect of Marlowe's relations with Wade and Lennox is
that all three of these TLG characters resemble each other to some
extent, or in some respects.

Lennox is a drinker. More of a drinker than Marlowe, but perhaps
offering the latter a sense of 'there but for teh grace...' etc. In
other words, Marlowe *can* handle his liquor; what he cannot do is be
sure this will always be the case. He maybe sees in Lennox a version
of himself, further down the line. He also identifies with Lennox's
manners and ability to remain polite even while being picked up out of
the gutter. And the same goes for Roger Wade. The fact that Wade is a
writer also provides Chandler with a nicely porous boundary between
author and subject. It could be argued that Wade, Lennox, and Marlowe
are really three different, but interrelated, versions of Chandler
himself. Such autobiographical themes surely mesh well with our
conception of Pynchon and Inherent Vice?

Cheers
J