Pulp Fiction discussion

Could anyone recommend a good non-fiction book about the history of pulp/noir fiction? I'm hoping to find something with a scholarly bent to it - discussion of the authors, writing style, use of language, etc.

Thanks!

Hey Nicholas, perhaps try something from Lee Horsley of www.crimeculture.com, maybe Twentieth-Century Crime Fiction. Can't guarantee it's what you need but I've found those guys to be pretty interesting and informative in the past.

The Julian Symons book Bloody Murder: From the Detective Story to the Crime Novel is pretty seminal when it comes to general crime fiction but is probably a bit removed from the pulp/noir category.

Bloody Murder looks great! Thanks!

No problem Nicholas.

That O'Brien book looks pretty cool Alberto. Michael saw The Noir Thriller and pretty much broke his book buying ban on the spot I think!

Not yet, but it is tormenting me

There is the Crown Companion to Crime which would cover noir
and the Routledge guide to Crime Fiction which is a small encylopedia of crime authors and crime fiction-it has really fun lists in it.

There are some excellent studies of crime fiction out there. Not mentioned here that relates to pulp from African-American writers are Pimping Fictions: African American Crime Literature and the Untold Story of Black Pulp Publishing, by Justin Gifford and The African American Experience in Crime Fiction: A Critical Study. Both are well worth the money and the time spent on them.

I know there are a few books by Woody Haut that put pulp writers in a historical context (namely the Cold War).

Pulp Culture: Hardboiled Fiction and the Cold War

Although, I would second Julian Symons.. and P. D. James in his footsteps: Talking About Detective Fiction

Christopher wrote: "I know there are a few books by Woody Haut that put pulp writers in a historical context (namely the Cold War).

Pulp Culture: Hardboiled Fiction and the Cold War

A..."

I didn't care much for Haut's book -- I know the description says it's "essential" but in my opinion, you can skip it.

Nancy wrote:
I didn't care much for Haut's book -- I know the description says it's "essential" but in my opinion, you can skip it.

Fair enough. I bought it, but did not read much of it. It seemed pretty tendentiously left-wing.

Haut, in Neon Noir and the earlier Heartbreak and Vine, is very good at discussing cultural currents in popular crime fiction. If you think his contrast btw Goodis and Willeford, for ex., early in Neon Noir, is left wing, I disagree. He is talking about the effects of early neo-liberalism on a dissolving sense of respect for government . . He sees evidence in the contrast btw Goodis' and other 1950s writers' assumptions about behavior in a democracy and those of Willeford, citing Woman Chaser and the Hoke Mosely novels.

Did Vietnam, Watergate, and the murders of King and RFK inject cynicism into our society? Did the assassination of JFK (see DeLillo's Libra)? Did other essential critics such as Horsley, Polito, O'Brien or Cochran come to different conclusions?

Jay wrote: "Haut, in Neon Noir and the earlier Heartbreak and Vine, is very good at discussing cultural currents in popular crime fiction. If you think his contrast btw Goodis and Willeford, for ex., early in ..."

That is a good point, Jay. Maybe it was the guy who wrote the foreword to PULP CULTURE whose tendency was so much to one side.. I really didn't get much farther into it.

Which reminds me of one more book I bought and have not cracked yet:

The Legendary Detective: The Private Eye in Fact and Fiction

Someone sent me this article:

https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/crim...

From the Drawing Room to the Gutter
Crime fiction affords its readers a way to acknowledge the world’s violence without either succumbing to despair or believing it can be made to go away.

By Charles Taylor

from Lapham's Quarterly

Christopher wrote: "Someone sent me this article:

https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/crim...

From the Drawing Room to the Gutter
Crime fiction affords its readers a way to acknowledge th..."

Thank you for sharing...