Hammett's Moral Vision: The Most Influential In-Depth Analysis of Dashiell Hammett's Novels Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass ... Man (The Ace Performer Collection series) [Hardcover]

George J. "Rhino" Thompson (Author), Vince Emery (Preface), William F. Nolan (Introduction)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 2006 | Series: The Ace Performer Collection series

Previously only available serialized over seven issues of The Armchair Detective magazine, this examination is the single most influential book-length analysis of Dashiell Hammett’s novels. Spanning all sections of his career, the book discusses five novels: The Dain Curse, The Glass Key, The Maltese Falcon, Red Harvest, and The Thin Man. Detailed analysis shows how the author and his work changed over time. Each novel is discussed in its own chapter with comparative criticism, and there is a list of resources for further reading and research. Additionally, this compiled text includes a new chapter in which the author discusses the impact Hammett has had on his own life.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Hammett continues to thrill and fascinate mystery readers and writers, and Thompson's work offers deep insight into his novels."  —Library Journal

"Dashiell Hammett aficionados will be grateful for Thompson's erudite Hammett's Moral Vision, a work that offers fresh insights."  —Wall Street Journal

"Incredibly well done, beautifully researched, and displaying tremendous insight into what made Hammett tick as a writer. . . . [Thompson's] vision is timeless."  —William F. Nolan, author, Logan's Run and Hammett: A Life at the Edge

"Given its high quality and influence on later Hammett critics, it's surprising this pioneering study has not appeared previously."  —Mystery Scene

"One of the most intelligent critics of Hammett's work."  —Julian Symons, author, Dashiell Hammett

"One of the best books of 2007."  —January Magazine

"If you haven't read Thompson, you don't know Hammett."  —Vince Emery

About the Author

George J. “Rhino” Thompson is the author of Verbal Judo: The Gentle Art of Persuasion and Verbal Judo: Redirecting Behavior with Words. He has also been featured on the network news programs of ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC,as well as in the Los Angeles Times and New York Post. He lives in New York City. William F. Nolan is the author of Logan's Run and Hammett: A Life at the Edge.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 342 pages
• Publisher: Vince Emery Productions (December 1, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 097258983X
• ISBN-13: 978-0972589833
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,718,435 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Hammett, revisited, February 29, 2008

By 

Charles A. Clemens (West Branch, MI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hammett's Moral Vision: The Most Influential In-Depth Analysis of Dashiell Hammett's Novels Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass ... Man (The Ace Performer Collection series) (Hardcover)

I have just finished reading HAMMETT'S MORAL VISION for the second time and I continue to be amazed at the conclusions drawn by Mr. Thompson. His suggestion, expressed late in the book, that these classic mysteries are a form of comedy, mystifies me. That being said, I like the way that "Rhino" shows the methodical changes in Hammett's writing through his career. I enjoyed thoroughly reading comments dredged up by Mr. Thompson by previous reviewers, comparing those critics' observations with his own, and then being allowed to draw my own conclusions. In his chapter about THE THIN MAN, Thompson suggests that the focus of the book is on the disintegration of the famiy unit. Two pages later he quotes Robert Edenbaum, who suggested that the major theme of THE THIN MAN was cannibalism! I found it intriguing to compare Sam Spade with Nick Charles.

Thompson quotes everyone from Shakespeare to Sartre, Raymond Chandler, and Lillian Hellman. I think he gives a nice well-rounded look at the novels of Dashiell Hammett and even goes so far as to suggest the reason that he stopped writing: He had said all that he had to say!

How many writers, famous, successful writers, keep writing the same story over and over again? I see Dashiell Hammett as an important author and a great author. Mr. Thompson's book has only reinforced those beliefs.

I do not feel that "Rhino" Thompson gives sufficient honor to Dashiell Hammett by wasting the first chapter discussing his own (Thompson's) life and "verbal judo" training course. I found that self-serving and distracting.

That being said, I loved the last 179 pages of the book. I found it well-written and organized. The type-setting, page numbering, and headings made it easy to follow the numerous footnotes and to access the Notes section in the rear of the book.

I disagree with Mr. Berger's complaint about Thompson's emphasis on "Hammett's Development As A Writer." I think the emphasis is more on Hammett's development as a humanist, as a commentator on capitalist society, and as a human being. He had a message regarding the dehumanizing effects of a money-oriented, soulless world, and he told his stories well.

I think Thompson did an excellent job in selecting short quotations from the five books he discusses and I think a reader of HAMMETT'S MORAL VISION cannot help but gain a better understanding of the man, Dashiell Hammett.

My biggest disappointment was that Thompson chose not to discuss Hammett's final work, TULIP. Hammett's writing style changed markedly after THE THIN MAN and I would have liked to read a discussion of how Hammett's relationship with Ms. Hellman, his declining health, and thoughts of mortality led to that strange little book.

13 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointed. Here's why:, October 1, 2007

By 

Flitcraft (Unreal City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Hammett's Moral Vision: The Most Influential In-Depth Analysis of Dashiell Hammett's Novels Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass ... Man (The Ace Performer Collection series) (Hardcover)

I love Hammett, and I think Thompson has some valid insights, but I'm kind of disappointed with this book. But it depends. If I were a regular reader of "detective fiction" (i.e., if Hammett didn't happen to interest me intellectually, and if I read any other detective fiction with arbitrary delight), I might have actually loved this book. So don't base your judgment entirely on what I have to say about this book.

But what I will say is this: as a student of philosophy and English literature, and as someone who has read some literary criticism in his day, I will say this book is disappointing. Part of the problem is, Mr. Thompson tries to cover way too much. What I mean is this: he takes you through the novels entire. What he might have done is taken a more specific theme and found the places in the novels that fit with that theme. What you need, in that case, is not the entire novels: you need only "pieces" of each novel, and more speculation, more imagination. Not explication. The assumption should be that your reader is reading you because they've already read the author's books already.

For a good example of what I mean, read the Introduction to THE CONTINENTAL OP collection by Steven Marcus. His theory of the truth/fiction dichotomy in Hammett is very fruitful, and very short.

This book is advertised as "in-depth" and "influential." I don't know how influential it has been, as I have not read ALL the criticism on Hammett over the past forty years. But I really don't think it is "in-depth": it's more of an introduction.

There really is, I think, too much focus out there on "Hammett's Development As A Writer." To HELL with his "development"! He was a writer; that is all. There is no "development": everything he wrote was good. He might have changed over the years, sure. But it's not as though he started out as a hack writer and ended up as a brilliant novelist in the end. The fact of the matter is that Hammett was able to say in very few words what it takes other writers pages and pages and pages to say. It is simply more difficult to write something short than it is to write something long. This may be especially true of detective fiction. For instance, why is it that we have so little of Hammett and Chandler, but they are still considered the best? Whereas we have volume after volume of Parker, Spillane, Burke, Grafton, etc., and don't seem to be an "Influence" on anyone.

But by all means, if you want a good introduction to Hammett's worldview, or if you're a book collector, or if you are really unfamiliar with literary analysis, you might love this book.

But I wouldn't read a mediocre book on Hammett for the same reason I wouldn't read a mediocre book on Shakespeare or Aristotle.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Still Insightful Criticism of Hammett, Though Much of It Taken for Granted Now., August 26, 2009

By 

mirasreviews (McLean, VA USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Hammett's Moral Vision: The Most Influential In-Depth Analysis of Dashiell Hammett's Novels Red Harvest, The Dain Curse, The Maltese Falcon, The Glass ... Man (The Ace Performer Collection series) (Hardcover)

In 1972, "The Armchair Detective" magazine serialized, in seven issues, George J. Thompson's analysis of Dashiell Hammett's moral vision as revealed in this five novels. It was a fitting medium for the first full-length criticism of Hammett's work, which had been Thompson's doctoral dissertation at the University of Connecticut. "Hammett's Moral Vision", the third volume of Vince Emery Productions' "Ace Performer Series", brings us the dissertation in book form, with one chapter added in which Thompson explains the place of Hammett's work in his own life, and with an introduction by William F. Nolan, Hammett's first biographer and fellow full-length critic of Hammett's work.

Thompson focuses on the protagonists' relationship with the corrupt world around them and posits that, over the course of five novels, "we find a clear and definitive progress of man's potential to deal morally and ethically with decadent worlds". Hammett's protagonists are not above it all; they constantly struggle to avoid being tarnished by the depravity in which they are immersed. The mysteries are generally not about plot, nor are the detectives archetypal tough guys. They grapple with the detective's moral dilemma in the real world. Thompson dedicates a chapter to each of Hammett's novels, which he analyzes in this vein: Red Harvest (1929), The Dain Curse (1929), The Maltese Falcon (1930), The Glass Key (1931), The Thin Man (1934).

When Thompson wrote his thesis, it was still new to consider that hard-boiled genre literature might hold considerable skill and intelligence. I've read other criticism of Hammett and a great deal of criticism of film noir, and Thompson's view of the noir protagonist is generally accepted now. That doesn't mean that "Hammett's Moral Vision" has nothing to offer anymore. It puts forth interesting ideas, and Hammett's march toward a progressively darker world view and more compromised protagonists is well-illustrated. Thompson finds value in "The Dain Curse", Hammett's weakest novel, as part of that progression. And I particularly enjoyed his insight into "The Glass Key", Hammett's most complex novel. This is a good place to start for Hammett criticism or a good place to return to understand its development.