Raymond Chandler Essay

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Besides writing novels, short stories, and poetry, Raymond Chandler also wrote some screenplays. Chandler worked on a movie called “Strangers on A Train” that was later directed by Alfred Hitchcock, and “Double Indemnity” (for which he got one of two best original screenplay Oscar nominations), and “The Blue Dahlia” (for which he was nominated for his other best original screenplay Oscar). He also wrote some other screenplays with other people. These screenplays were very influential in the American film noir genre.

He decided to take up writing, in 1932, during the Great Depression after losing his job in the oil business, where he was an executive. He was forty-four at the time. He sold his first story in 1933 to Black Mask, which is a popular
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Philip Marlowe, a private investigator, goes out to a home that is owned by the elderly and wealthy General Sternwood during the month of October. Sternwood wants Marlowe to take care of a bookseller named Arthur Geiger, who is trying to blackmail Sternwood's daughter Carmen, a wild young woman. After putting things right, something else that Sternwood said still nags at him that is very vital to the rest of the case.

“Farewell, My Lovely” is the second novel in the “Philip Marlowe” series. Marlowe is looking into a missing persons case that seems to be going nowhere when he sees a felon (Moose Malloy) going right on into a nightclub called Florian's looking for his ex-girlfriend (Velma Valento).

“Farewell, My Lovely” has been adapted into a movie three times, the biggest being “Murder My Sweet”. The biggest adaptation of one of his works is probably “The Big Sleep” in 1946 which starred Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe and Lauren Bacall. The rest of his novels, except for “Playback”, have been adapted into a movie.

“The Big Sleep” has made its way on to classic novels lists and best books of the century lists such as Le Monde's One Hundred Books of the Century and Time's List of the 100 Best

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