Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe: The Hard-Boiled Detective Transformed

Written by John Paul Athanasourelis

The author argues persuasively that Marlowe, far from being a standard super-confident loner private eye, is connected to a larger society and is given to introspection and self-doubt in contrast to the rugged-individualist vigilantes of Daly, Hammett, and Spillane. He believes film versions of Marlowe in the 1940s distorted the character as a result of Production Code constraints and the inability of film to depict interior life. Chandler is defended against the supposed misreadings by his follower Ross Macdonald.