The Critical Response to Raymond Chandler - (Critical Responses in Arts and Letters) by J Kennet Van Dover (Hardcover)

About the Book

In the past decade, Raymond Chandler has come to be recognized as a major mid-century American novelist. Though an immensely popular writer of mysteries, Chandler is now receiving the serious attention of scholars. He is seen as a writer with a deliberate approach toward the creation of fictions that present a significant criticism of American life. The essays and reviews in this volume trace the response to Chandler's work from 1944 to the present.

This volume traces the changing reception of Chandler's works. It includes essays and reviews from 1944 to the present. These pieces treat various aspects of Chandler's art, such as his writing style, the nature of the hard-boiled detective hero, the relation of Chandler to his contemporaries, Los Angeles as the setting for his fiction, studies of individual novels, and analyses of films of Chandler's works. An introductory chapter provides a context for understanding Chandler as a writer, and the bibliography at the end of the volume demonstrates the growing amount of attention his novels are receiving.

Book Synopsis

In the past decade, Raymond Chandler has come to be recognized as a major mid-century American novelist. Though an immensely popular writer of mysteries, Chandler is now receiving the serious attention of scholars. He is seen as a writer with a deliberate approach toward the creation of fictions that present a significant criticism of American life. The essays and reviews in this volume trace the response to Chandler's work from 1944 to the present.

This volume traces the changing reception of Chandler's works. It includes essays and reviews from 1944 to the present. These pieces treat various aspects of Chandler's art, such as his writing style, the nature of the hard-boiled detective hero, the relation of Chandler to his contemporaries, Los Angeles as the setting for his fiction, studies of individual novels, and analyses of films of Chandler's works. An introductory chapter provides a context for understanding Chandler as a writer, and the bibliography at the end of the volume demonstrates the growing amount of attention his novels are receiving.

Review Quotes

"J. k. Van Dover has done an admirable job in providing the reader with a group of essays and selections that not only convey insight into the works of Chandler but also illustrate several critical approaches....The book [itself] is substantial, attractively bound, and easy to handle."-Paradoxa

?J. k. Van Dover has done an admirable job in providing the reader with a group of essays and selections that not only convey insight into the works of Chandler but also illustrate several critical approaches....The book [itself] is substantial, attractively bound, and easy to handle.?-Paradoxa

About the Author

J. K. VAN DOVER is Professor of English at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. He has published books on William Kennedy, Daniel Defoe, Erle Stanley Gardner, Ian Fleming, and others.