Farewell, My Lovely (Phillip Marlowe)

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If there were enough like him, the world would be a very safe place to live in, without becoming too dull to be worth living in.

which brings me to ‘farewell my lovely’ — a book which doesn’t have that unifying thematic quality, but what it makes up with in spades is chandler’s new found confidence in his writing ability after his debut. Whereas the stories were neatly contained as standalones, the edits in piecing them together were more slapdash, sacrificing both congruency and clarity in the process. If you like to take an enlightened look back at the fragility of fame, in the early days of Hollywood, at the procession line of starlets chewed up and spat out, the casting couches and the extremely questionable tactics of producers and directors, in the jaded lights of 1930s LA, then you can do no ill by reading this. He’s also, seen more clearly by today’s standards, not admirable; he’s homophobic, at times seemingly racist, certainly arrogant with some women if not misogynist, with addictions to booze and cigarettes.

If possible the plot/story-line of Farewell, My Lovely is even more convoluted than its predecessor, The Big Sleep. It's like a muddied up pond, but a pond nonetheless, so you can swim fairly easily through the murky waters to the other side.

Lewin ( Helen) Grayle but money doesn't smell, ( not always) things go dark and when Philip awakes at night in the lonely canyon, his client is no more.The novel is very well written and has an old-fashioned touch (busty blondes, crooked police officers, Italian mobsters), giving it a natural charm. The bouncer went over with a table and smacked into the baseboard with a crash that must have been heard in Denver. Phillip Marlowe is a great faceted character which contrasts nicely against the one-dimensional villains, cops and women who populate the stories. Chandler > chandelier > πολυέλαιος > κρεμάστηκα απ’ τον πολυέλαιο (έκφραση που λέμε στην παρέα και σημαίνει συγκεκριμένα πράγματα, όποιος κατάλαβε κατάλαβε).