Talk:Raymond Chandler/Archive 1

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Chandler's Dual Citizenship

Unless Chandler explicitly renounced his American citizenship before *American* authorities in 1907, he did not (and could not) lose his American citizenship by acquisition of British citizenship - because his mother was herself a British citizen (having been born when the whole of Ireland was part of the United Kingdom). US Const. Amend. XIV explicitly states "A person born or naturalized in the United States is a citizen of the United States". There being no contrary provision in that or any subsequent amendment, once American citizenship is acquired it cannot be constitutionally taken away.

It is arguable that even a formal renunciation of one's own citizenship is not constitutionally possible, because the US Constitution - which outlines the limited sovereignty of the United States as a federal state - makes no provision for renunciation of citizenship; thus, it is probably unconstitutional for the US Government to recognize such a renunciation.

That said, if Chandler re-entered the United States in 1912 using a British passport instead of an American one, he may have had to prove his American citizenship - which could well have taken some time since, 1) he was born before the State of Illinois began to record and issue copies of birth certificates, and, 2) he may have wrongly presumed that he lost American citizenship when he acquired British citizenship, and, 3) he may not have cared. I suspect the third point is most likely, since his wife, from 1924 to her death in 1954, was American - so it's not something he would have needed to worry about unless and until he wanted an American passport to go abroad after she had died.

One source I have consulted claims that Chandler renounced his British citizenship in 1948, in order to avoid income tax obligations in the United Kingdom. That, too, may or may not be true (and unless he did it before British authorities, it would not have been effective). But it would have done him no good on the tax front, since he would still have owed any income tax that had been levied before any renunciation of British citizenship. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.4.56.198 (talk) 18:53, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

Philip Marlowe

There is no direct reference to or discussion of Chandler's major character, Phillip Marlowe -- nor is there any link to the Philip Marlowe wiki article. Guernseykid 05:10, 30 March 2006 (UTC)

The link is under the "Novels" section. However it could be made more prominent.

Chandler v. Hammett

One interesting item that could be added to this article would be a comparison of Chandler and Dashiell Hammett, who were almost polar opposites in some ways:

Hammett was a working detective. He only began to write when disabled by TB. He used the material of his own experience. His primary interest in the writing was to make a living, as witnessed by the many weak and novelty-type stories he published, especially those which could be considered "action" rather than detective. The cops in his stories are always good guys. Rich folks are always plain honest citizens except when they are actual, manifest, criminals or "deviates". His biggest themes - deriving from his actual experience as a detective - were the viciousness and stupidity of actual criminals and conversely, he was fascinated with the notion of the "master criminal", which he dealt with in many stories and novels - "the Gutting of Coufignal", "The Big Knockover", "Red Harvest", "the Dain Curse", "the Girl with the Silver Hair", and so on. He had no particular literary ambitions prior to his disability and forced retirement from the Pinkertons.

Now Chandler was a great admirer of Hammett - admired him for his strengths rather than his weaknesses. But he knew nothing, by experience, of the work of actual detectives. He was obsessive about the purity of his Art, and was enraged when some of his earlier stories that had been "cannibalized" - his own word - to provide material for his later novels were reprinted against his wishes. He was not at all interested in criminal "masterminds" and even, in the person of Marlowe, had no principled hostility to mob bosses, except when he came head to head with them. He used up far more ink on the subject of corrupt and brutal cops; and dissipated, bored, and miserable rich people who lived by unearned or undeserved wealth. Finally, Chandler had always possessed literary ambitions and had tried his hand, in England, as a poet and literary critic.

That's pretty interesting, and it rings true to me for the most part. It would take some legwork to make it truly "factual" and it could just be worked in to the existing text. Chandler's take on the cops and rich people has become engrained in American culture but Hammet belonged to a slightly earlier era. According to the bio, there was a several year gap between his detective work and his literary endeavors. He was a communist of sorts, so it's hard to see any great sympathy for the wealthy, but movies from the 1920's employed similar characterizations. I seem to recall Chandler used the term "cannibalized" to describe his own process of utilizing his short stories as material for his novels. Guernseykid 12:00, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

Misquote on Marlowe

I removed a misquote about Philip Marlowe from the article. The article suggested that Marlowe described himself as "a nice clean private detective who wouldn't drop cigar ashes on the floor and never carried more than one gun." The actual quotation is about his client Elizabeth Murdock, who you might say had rather Victorian attitudes and sensibilities. He says Ms. Murdock "wanted to hire a nice clean private detective who wouldn't drop cigar ashes on the floor and never carried more than one gun." I'm not so sure by this he was saying someting about himself so much as he was about Ms. Murdock who wanted dirty work done, without anyone getting dirty, so to speak. I take the statement by Marlowe to be a subtle criticism of Mrs. Murdock, not a self-description. --Jakob Huneycutt 04:56, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Judgement call

"Chandler's finely wrought prose was widely admired by critics and writers from the highbrow (W.H. Auden, Evelyn Waugh) to the lowbrow (Ian Fleming)."

I don't think passing subjective judgements on the merits of an author's writing should be a part of a 'pedia entry, unless the author described his own writing as low or highbrow (and I imagine Fleming did not describe his own writing as lowbrow). I wouldn't put the Bond novels in the same category as Auden, but that's my personal choice to make; it shouldn't be in a definitive article about literature.

I would suggest "...was widely admired by critics and writers as diverse as W.H. Auden and Ian Fleming."

Thoughts?

I agree -- but don't leave out Waugh. Hayford Peirce 16:15, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

--- And indeed the description "Pulp" - while it can be a non-judgemental term describing the places it was published - can be read as very judgemental - I have placed it in :""

"Repressed homosexual"?

"...Sonia Orwell (George Orwell's widow), who assumed Chandler was a repressed homosexual..." Where in the world does this come from? I'm quite the Chandlerphile and I've never heard of it, and googling it leads to nothing but this page. Surely this warrants deletion? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.32.93.230 (talk) 02:22, August 27, 2007 (UTC)

I put that in. Note that Orwell wasn't necessarily correct in her conclusion (although I suspect that she was). I read about this in a book I found in the stacks of Cal State Los Angeles, about twenty years ago. I can't remember the title or the author, and so couldn't put in a citation. I will say that listening to an audio tape of Chandler talking to Ian Fleming that he sounded almost like a caricature of a homosexual (although he was said to be drunk at the time) and based on that alone I can understand why Sonia Orwell would have "assumed". Eye.earth 21:53, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Did he speak with an English accent? Article mentions that he moved and went to school there. mdclxvi 07:03, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

Eureka! I have found a recent reference to the mysterious 'repressed homosexual' assumption I discussed above. Turns out it was Natasha Spender, not Sonio Orwell, who reported it. Now an entire book has apparently been written about it. See the article for the reference. Eye.earth (talk) 21:44, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Re. Chandler's Accent

Here is this gem, a conversation between him and Ian Fleming, recorded July 1958, seven months before Chandler's his death: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Zj6cc0T1z7I&gl=GB

twitter.com/jontycampbell 00:36, 19 January 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Radiojonty (talk • contribs)

Raymond Chandler

Wikipedia's biography of Raymond Chandler states that Farewell, My Lovely was published in 1940. So did several other sites I checked. This is impossible. Chandler uses Joe DiMaggio's 1941 hitting streak to move along the story. Unless he had a crystal ball, Chandler could not possibly have known in 1940 what DiMaggio was going to do in 1941. I don't have the correct date, but somebody should; I'm guessing it was 1941. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.127.212.5 (talk) 15:53, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

My copy says "Origninally published 1st October 1940". --Dmol (talk) 19:22, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Cultural references

I am moving the "cultural references" section (really, a trivia section) here for discussion.

• British post-punk band The Three Johns released the single "Pink Headed Bug" in January 1983, using phrases from Farewell My Lovely. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.144.32.165 (talk) 10:34, 10 February 2008 (UTC)
• The British rock musicians Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians released the song “Raymond Chandler Evening” in the Element of Light (1986) album.
• In the Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode “Field of Fire”, Odo and Miles O'Brien admit to being Chandler aficionados.
• In the Friends situation comedy episode “The One With Rachel’s Dress”, Chandler mentions Raymond Chandler in reply to Joey’s asking if any famous Chandlers exist; Joey retorts, “Name someone you didn't make up”.
• The lyrics to Jim Carroll's song “Three Sisters” include “But she just wants to lay in bed all night reading Raymond Chandler”.
• On a rare split 12" record (with Castanets), free jazz duo I Heart Lung titled each track in homage to Raymond Chandler: "Speedboats for Breakfast" referring to Chandler's guess as to what the early residents of Santa Monica ate in the morning, "Song of the Boatman of the River Roon" from an early poem by Chandler, and "If I Were A Young Man Now" from a letter written late in his life.
• The detective novelist Robert B. Parker based his detective, Spenser, on the Chandler tradition; Spenser was born in Laramie, Wyoming, where Raymond Chandler was conceived. Parker has a Ph.D. in English literature, his thesis was partly about Chandler's writing.
• The days of the plot in the film Kiss Kiss Bang Bang of Raymond Chandler works: the short story “Trouble is My Business”; the novels The Lady in the Lake, The Little Sister, and Farewell, My Lovely; and the essay “The Simple Art of Murder”.
• In James O'Barr's The Crow graphic novel, the lyrics to the song, “Raymond Chandler Evening” by Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians, are in the panels leading to the Eric Draven character bursting into the Fun Boy character’s room.
• Country/Goth band Miss Derringer uses the Chandler line "Dead Men Weigh More Than Broken Hearts" (The Big Sleep) as a song title in the album 'Lullabies'.
• The Argentine novelist and journalist Osvaldo Soriano used Phillip Marlowe as a character in his first novel, Triste, solitario y final (Sad, Lonely, and Final) a phrase spoken by Marlowe in The Long Goodbye. In that novel, Soriano wrote as himself, an Argentine lost in Los Angeles, who meets an older Marlowe. Together they must solve the last mystery about Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. Soriano died in 1996, but his novels were translated, despite that, Triste, solitario y final is difficult to find in English translation.

Most of these references are so short they are mostly pointless. For example, "The British rock musicians Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians released the song “Raymond Chandler Evening” in the Element of Light (1986) album." Really, so what? Of what possible importance is it that Chandler was mentioned in a pop song? How does that elucidate the subject? Most of this, it seems to me, can go and the article is not hurt one jot. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 23:16, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

I am a new Wikipedia participant and need advice

I am immersed in Raymond Chandler. I am also an experienced writer and blogger who is used to sourcing and prides myself on my research skills. I am not sure of the fine distinctions made as to what is appropriate for a Wikipedia entry.

I spent some time writing this am about a comparison between the book "The Big Sleep" and Howard Hawks' movie, "The Big Sleep". When I came back to the Chandler listing, my stuff had been removed. That's fine and fair. I'm just feeling my way around. But maybe whoever removed it should tell me why the stuff I spent time writing was inappropriate.

There are a few passages in the main page which could be construed as opinion without sourcing. For instance, the paragraph that begins, "Critics and writers, ranging from W.H.Auden to Evelyn Waugh..." The next sentence reads, "Although his swift-moving, hardboiled style was inrpired mostly by Dashiell Hammett, his sharp and lyrical similes are original: The muzzle of the Luger looked like the mouth of the Second Street tunnel; The minutes went by on tiptoe, with their fingers to their lips" defining private eye fiction genre...Yet Philip Marlowe is not a sterotypical "tough guy" but a complex, sometimes sentimental man of few friends..."

Is it okay to call a writer's similes original if you quote some of his similes to prove it? Is that what is meant by sourcing in those cases? The fact that Raymond Chandler defined private eye fiction genre, well, that seems like opinion to me. Many would disagree and say that Hammett did. Probably (especially) Chandler would agree that Hammett defined it (see: The Simple Art of Murder.) Then the page writer wrote about the character of Philip Marlowe as not some stereotypical tough guy, but a complex person, etc. That seems to me to also be subjective interpretation.

I wrote about Marlowe's character in the book The Big Sleep and how it differed from the Bogart Marlowe especially by contrasting one scene with Carmen Sternwood, when he came into his apartment and found her naked in his bed. I think my example offered an acute illustration of Marlowe's character as delineated by Chandler in The Big Sleep. And the scene I used was taken directly from the book. Should I have quoted the passage referred to? I mean, in that scene Marlowe certainly wasn't the ordinary gumshoe or Mike Hammer.

Then this sentence: "Raymond Chandler also was a perceptive critic of pulp fiction; his essay "The Simple Art of Murder" is the standard reference work in the field. It is the standard reference work? By whose standards? Is that conventional wisdom?--Katiebgood (talk) 21:20, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Let me address some of your points. First, sourcing means using citations to reliable, published sources, not first hand evidence. If there are other places that need sourcing and are possibly contentious, it does not excuse adding more. They too should be modified or removed, which you are of course welcome to do. Content analyzing Marlowe doesn't really belong here, this is a biography of Chandler, and there is a separate Philip Marlowe article. VanTucky ^talk 22:46, 15 December 2007 (UTC)

Newtown School

According to yesterday's Sunday Independent, Raymond Chandler, who had an Irish mother, "claimed to have been at" the Quaker Newtown School, Waterford. Is that verifiable? Millbanks (talk) 10:00, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

According to Tom Hiney's biography, RC and his mother stayed in Waterford before moving to Norwood in London. No mention of how long, or where he went to school.--Dmol (talk) 19:18, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

According to the chronology in Later Novels and other Writings, Chandler moved with mother to London in 1895, stayed in Norwood, and spent summers in Waterford Ireland. It then says Attends Church of England and goes to local school, but the school is not named.--Dmol (talk) 17:49, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Interesting but probably not true. According to US Immigration records, Flo took baby Ray to Ireland/Waterford shortly after he was born, and returned within 6 months. There are no records I've yet found of their traveling back to Ireland again until 1900, when they traveled via Canada to London in time for Ray to start school.

Plattsmouth, Nebraska school records indicate Ray attended school in 1895-6, but left for Chicago shortly after the Fall term began. The school records also show Ray enrolled in the 1896-7 Fall term, and again moving to Chicago shortly after it began. The records also indicate his father was living with them at those times.

Further, the 1900 US Census counted Ray and Flo living in Plattsmouth, Nebraska at the beginning of 1900.

Therefore, Ray and his mother did not move to Ireland in 1895. He may have gone to Waterford during the summers, but how did they travel without informing US, Canadian and UK Immigration?

Neither Frank McShane nor Tom Hiney had ancestry.com available when writing their books, and Tom used McShane as his source for Chandler's early years.

By the way, someone, somewhere mentioned Chicago didn't issue birth certificates when Ray was born. Ray was born at home, and I have a copy of his Chicago birth certificate, which looks like it dates to 1888. Llatker (talk) 17:38, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Raymond Chandler's death

Raymond Chandler was not buried in the Potter's Field in Mount Hope. The Public Administrator is charged with investigating and administering the estates of persons who die with no will, or without an appropriate person willing or able to act as an administrator. The County of San Diego had a contract with the City of San Diego, Mount Hope Cemetery to bury not only indigent cases, but also those person who had assets at the time of their death, but died without a will, or in the case of Mr. Chandler, whose estate was contested. Florpopoca (talk) 07:38, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Short story list

I just made a few edits to the intro to the short story list, filled my edit summary, then saw something else. The title "I'll Be Waiting" was in both detective and non-detective lists, with the former having only the first word capitalized and dated 1938 to the other's '39. A quick check of the Chandler website linked in at the bottom of the article showed it listed as only "non," in '39, and with normal capitalization. I made alterations per that information. Also, shouldn't short story titles be in quotation marks rather than italics? --Tbrittreid (talk) 00:33, 21 December 2009 (UTC)

Bibliography

I propose that the bibliography section, which has recently been expanded dramatically, be moved into a separate article. I have started a user subpage version here if anyone wants to look at it and make suggestions. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 20:54, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

That sounds like a good suggestion; it might be worth checking out George Orwell bibliography for ideas on formatting. Nev1 (talk) 21:01, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

I just did a good deal of work on the section myself. I answered my own question above and changed the short story titles' italics to quote marks, among many other things. A few questions remain, however. Original publication venues for several works were given as Park East, Go, Screen and Manhunt. I can identify none of these. The second and third have Wiki-articles as magazines, but are chronologically, geographically and/or thematically invalidated for this. Also, 1961 seems to me to be a little late for a fiction magazine titled Manhunt to be publishing, as plausible as it would have sounded several years earlier. The first two were both attributed to the story, "Professor's Bingo's Snuff" with the same (!) dates — June, July and August 1951. If this refers to three consecutive issues of a magazine and Chandler's story was serialized, then italics might be more appropriate than quotes for that one. Can anybody clarify any of these? --Tbrittreid (talk) 21:35, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

None of those were the least bit familiar to me, so I am afraid I cannot answer your questions. As for the stylistic concerns, when I copied the information to my subpage, I made those necessary changes. But, there is a great deal more which should be done before a proper bibliography article is created. ---RepublicanJacobite_{The'FortyFive'} 23:18, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Filmography

The "Critical Reception" section says "All but one of his novels have been cinematically adapted." without identifying which one was not adapted. The Bibliography article doesn't clarify this either. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.77.250.54 (talk) 07:19, 18 July 2010 (UTC)

added some new sections and paragraphs

I added some paragraphs including Chandler quotes which are all cited. I also broke one of the very large paragraphs into smaller paragraphs for the sake of readability. I added two new sections: "Chronology of Chandlers Life" and "Chandler's Thoughts on Pulp Fiction" both with citations from good sources.

I am about to add to the chronology using a web source which has information that is not cited. I am going to use it because it contains dates and events that agree with other sources, therefore appears reliable, and because it contains information that is new and helps complete the picture of Chandler. I will attempt to verify the information that I use as I have time, and others are welcome to do so. This new information can be easily identified because the events are identified by month as well as year, and by the citation. cheers, H.E. Hall (talk) 19:05, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

The mysterious web site I mention above may be the work of Robert Moss Moss who published "Raymond Chandler A Literary Reference"(2002) New York Carrol & Graf. I feel like a detective. Cheers, H.E. Hall (talk) 19:27, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Your "chronology" largely duplicates a lot of information already present in the article, but with less detail. I'm adding a template that states the article is repetitive and requires cleanup. 12.233.146.130 (talk) 23:07, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, the purpose of a chronology is to provide a quick review of events, an outline without the detail. One often finds a chronology within a book on history and no one objects to its redundancy. It is true that the later sections of this article provide detail of some of the events in the chronology. But, I think that if you read the article more carefully, you would discover that a great many more events are contained in the chronology than are in the later sections, and that is the main reason I created the chronology. I thought that the article did not contain many of the events in Chandler's life. Also, I think that the chronology provides a good introduction to those later sections containing the detail. For these reasons I object to your template.H.E. Hall (talk) 21:20, 31 May 2011 (UTC)

Disambiguation Needed

The new US "Sergeant Major of the Army" is Raymond F. Chandler. There needs to be a disambiguation link added, in case somebody gets to this page by accident, but I don't know how to add it. 24.131.99.225 (talk) 19:08, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Edited and cleaned up Raymond Chandler.

Taking note of the repetition box from May of this year, I spent a couple of days cleaning up and editing this article about Ray.

I tried to leave as much untouched as possible, without making a mess, and yet make the article less repetitive, factual and readable.

I also deleted some tidbits that were not really necessary (3rd highest score in the civil service exam) and changed opinion feedback loops requiring citation to mere generalizations that should not need citation. I loved the loop of Marlowe being synonymous with PI - did a search and it led right back to this wiki article by way of dozens of articles that simply lifted/quoted the entire thing, often without any citation. Isn't the internet grand!

I've added information about Ray's Plattsmouth early years. I also fleshed out the information about the court case and reuniting Cissy and Ray this past February.

I hope I haven't stepped on anyone's writing fingers.

As to having a biography article: Perhaps it should wait until Tom WIlliams' new Chandler Biography hits the shelves. Tom has been doing a lot of research, and was presented with a batch of unpublished/unknown letters while at UCLA, which has delayed publication. It will be interesting to see what additional facts he has unearthed.

Llatker (talk) 18:35, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Good editing job Llatker. I had not looked at the site since May and was pleasantly surprised.

H.E. Hall (talk) 23:58, 6 December 2011 (UTC)

Should be dispersed

Category:20th-century American novelists is a dispersing category. Its contents should not be also in the parent category Category:American novelists. There is no reason to not disperse into by century category.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:26, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

concur. WP:Categorization is clear on this point. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 02:55, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

It's a guideline, not a policy. Why revert when discussion is ongoing? Do you have an actual reason other than that you think guidelines are policies?

"Why revert when discussion is ongoing?" - I think you reverted twice! Do you have any reason to not follow a guideline here? What is so magical to you about American novelist, and why is 20th century American novelist not just as good - and perhaps better? I really would love to see the diffs that demonstrate there was some consensus against diffusing in general. Until then, perhaps starting a discussion with the novels project is the way to go? My actual reason is, American novelists is bloated and unorganized and as of now, 50% of novelists aren't even in it. No-one is volunteering to bubble people up, either. Thus, diffusion is the way to go, and that is standard practice with all cats I'm familiar with. That's my reason... --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 03:27, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

You imply in your edit summary that Filipacchi should remain in both American Novelists and 20th-century american novelists. Why should not Raymond Chandler? Why is Filipacchi an exception? Do you have any reason not to follow a guideline with her? What is so magical about 20th-century American novelists? The CfD on American women novelists concluded that women should remain in both that category and in American novelists. Why should men be different? — alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:51, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

white-knight editors guarding the "special" bio reverted my attempts, so I'm not touching it any more. And no I don't think any novelist should be treated differently in this matter regardless of fame. Btw, you're the one who brought the special bio into this discussion, not me! What is so "magical" about 20th century novelists is it can fully and unambiguously diffuse American novelists, which as stated was bloated and causing confusion (because people saw it as a list of all novelists, which it never was.) Diffusing by century/time period is standard practice in many other parts of the tree, including the writers, poets, and novelists tree for example. Finally the CFD was mum on men, and I still think diffusing women (and men) to a non-gendered subcat is fully in line with the spirit of the CFD. No arguments were mooted anywhere within to challenge the idea of diffusion in general, just the idea of diffusion-by-gender specifically. Now that that is fixed, I don't see any reason to never diffuse any more categories anywhere ever again. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 12:45, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

You don't see any down-side to the fact that you're going to end up first with just women in American novelists and then with just Filipacchi? — alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:58, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

If I could change that, I would, but I've been smacked for trying to diffuse women bios, so I'll just leave it to other editors to deal with that - my assumption is, they will come around. And yes, that downside you speak of, is exactly the problem with reading the CFD too literally, as the conclusion ends up being absurd - either only women remain, or, all novelists, including those that were already diffused by genre and have been sitting there peacefully for years, must now be bubbled up to the parent. Doing either of those based on the CFD would be absurd. So I feel a more "in the spirit" interpretation still gives the community what they want (e.g. no ghettoization by gender) while still allowing the long-standing consensus around diffusing categories to play out. I note that Tim, one of the admins who enacted the results, agrees with this interpretation - that we should not extend the CFD results beyond the particular question. Best regards,--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 15:04, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

The Blue Dahlia

The paragraph about Chandler writing the Blue Dahlia is misleading. He had written a denouement for the screenplay. He had the character of Buzz, played by William Bendix, be the killer. Paramount sent the script to the Navy. The three main characters in the film are Navy veterans in 1946. The conduct of military men on screen had to be okayed or nixed by the brass. The Navy Department did not want Buzz, the wounded war hero to be the villain of the piece. They said this was bad for morale and was disrespecting the war service of Navy vets in general. So the Navy pretty much made Chandler change the identity of the murderer. Dad newell, played by actor Will Wright, became the killer, as Chandler rewrote the ending in alcohol fueled night sessions. Someone should rewrite this pgivaragraph in the article so it is more precise. See pp. 197-203 of Biesen, Sheri Chinen. Blackout: World War 2 and the Origins of Film Noir (Baltimore, MD: John Hopkins University Press, 2005), 243 pp. L. Thomas W. (talk) 13:47, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Sounds like you should give the rewrite a go, L. Thomas W.! DIY! Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 23:20, 11 January 2014 (UTC)

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Chandler's ambitions

Chandler explains what he was about as a writer in the following excerpt:

How could I possibly care a button about the detective story as a form? All I'm looking for is an excuse for certain experiments in dramatic dialogue. To justify them I have to have plot and situation; but fundamentally I care almost nothing about either. All I really care about is what Errol Flynn calls "the music", the lines he has to speak (...) A long time ago when I was writing for the pulps, I put into a story a line like "he got out of the car and walked across the sun-drenched sidewalk until the shadow of the awning over the entrance fell across his face like the touch of cool water". They took it out when they published the story. Their readers didn't appreciate this sort of thing: just held up the action. And I set out to prove them wrong.

--Letter to Frederick Lewis Allen, May 7 1948. From "Raymond Chandler, Later Novels and Other Writings", page 1032

Chandler didn't need to 'naturalize' because his mother was already a British subject, as she was born in Ireland before 1922, and he was entitled to British citizenship through her. He only needed to apply for a British passport to be granted one as-of right. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.31.130.120 (talk) 18:45, 29 December 2015 (UTC)

BTW, FYI Chandler never wrote anything of note while an American citizen. All his most famous books; Farewell, My Lovely, The Big Sleep, The High Window, The Lady in the Lake, etc., were all written while he was a British subject. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.10.248 (talk) 16:30, 8 August 2017 (UTC)

How well did his books sell?

One item I was hoping to find in this article -- or the ones about his novels -- but just how many copies of his books did Chandler sell? Were they best-sellers? Or respectable mid-list sales? Despite writing for a mass market, where writers were expected to crank out the books & stories, Chandler wrote very slowly. His income from his books might explain why he wrote screenplays for Hollywood. -- llywrch (talk) 16:40, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

His first novel, The Big Sleep, sold 10,000 copies in the first US edition published by Alfred A. Knopf and earned him $2,000. https://blackmaskmagazine.com/blog/tag/raymond-chandler/ But his books went on selling steadily, in the US, in England and elsewhere. It was not for no reason that Hollywood came calling and made the classic 1944 version of Farewell My Lovely starring Dick Powell and the 1946 version of The Big Sleep starring Humphrey Bogart. As a result of those films, Chandler's books went into paperback editions which sold in the millions. As the previous cited source puts it: 'For Chandler, the paperback revolution and the reprinting of his novels resulted in more income and something new: fame. By the beginning of 1945, 750,000 copies of The Big Sleep and Farewell, My Lovely had been sold. Just four years later, a Newsweek report on the crime-fiction business noted that there were more than 3 million copies of Chandler’s mysteries in the hands of readers.'

Chandler's books also sold very well in Britain, where they were handled by the literary publisher Hamish Hamilton and Chandler was regarded as a novelist rather than a mere 'mystery writer', something that Chandler, schooled at Dulwich College, greatly appreciated. On Chandler's last visit to England in 1958, he was famously interviewed for BBC radio by Ian Fleming. http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/james_bond/12601.shtml Frank MacShane's 1976 biography records that, at the end of that visit, Chandler's British literary agent Helga Greene, with whom he was besotted, practically had to push him up the gangplank to put him on the ship home to the US, because he was in danger of passing the 90-day residency mark which would make him liable for British supertax on his enormous UK earnings. In those days, British supertax on very high incomes was punitive. (Mainly to pay for the Cold War defence budget.)

If you are that interested, Helga Greene became Chandler's legal heir and deposited her Chandler papers at the Bodleian Library in Oxford, where Chandler's royalty statements from 1939 on can be found at shelfmarks Dep Chandler 53-56. http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/online/modern/chandler/chandler.html Khamba Tendal (talk) 19:44, 30 January 2019 (UTC)

Incomplete Comparison

Toward the end of the Critical Reception section, we find, “Notable for its revised take on both the Marlowe character, transplanting the novel to the 1970s, is Robert Altman's 1973 neo-noir adaptation of The Long Goodbye.”

Something has gotten lost here. “…Both the Marlowe character…” and what?

Moshe (talk) 20:22, 13 November 2019 (UTC)

Early journalism c. 1910

Most online biographies say Daily Express, meaning the London paper. Seems fine. We and some others add "Bristol's Western Gazette", which is a problem, because this is a Yeovil weekly paper (see here) and our very short article on the paper confirms that. To a Bristolian Yeovil seems half a world away. The Bristol paper that sounds similar is the Western Morning News, but I don't see anyone saying that Chandler wrote for it. The French and German wiki articles say that he wrote for the Westminster Gazette, which would have been quite a coup for a fledgling writer if he really did. Can anyone check one of the printed biographies to see which if any of these could be true? Andrew Dalby 13:47, 13 July 2020 (UTC)

Yes, he wrote for the Westminster; see MacShane p 17. Qwirkle (talk) 06:36, 21 August 2020 (UTC)

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