James M. Cain

[NOIRTRASH]

https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3474/james-m-cain-the-art-of-fiction-no-69-james-m-cain

Interview.

 

[ChloeTzang]

https://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3474/james-m-cain-the-art-of-fiction-no-69-james-m-cain

Interview.

And I have never read one of his books. Which would you recommend to start with?

 

[NOIRTRASH]

And I have never read one of his books. Which would you recommend to start with?

He published 16 or 18. All are short. THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE was his first and a best seller (still is) of 34K words. DOUBLE ENDEMNITY was a 27K best seller. MILDRED PIERCE was a 44K best seller. All his books involve femme fetales. He invented the Loving Wives category.

I don't have a favorite but the 3 above are his most popular and best selling.

 

[ChloeTzang]

He published 16 or 18. All are short. THE POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE was his first and a best seller (still is) of 34K words. DOUBLE ENDEMNITY was a 27K best seller. MILDRED PIERCE was a 44K best seller. All his books involve femme fetales. He invented the Loving Wives category.

I don't have a favorite but the 3 above are his most popular and best selling.

I'll try those three and see. I was getting him mixed up with James Jones and "From Here to Eternity" for some weird reason. That one's on my reading list too.

Speaking of reading lists, I find this list quite fascinating - the clash between the literary "establishment" I guess you'd call it, versus readers. Robert Heinlein for example doesn't make the editors list at all, but he has half a dozen novels in the readers list - and there's a lot of SF there, bit none on the editors list except maybe 1984.
http://www.modernlibrary.com/top-100/100-best-novels/

 

[NOIRTRASH]

I'll try those three and see.

THE POSTMAN
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBShQRX0bIU

DOUBLE ENDEMNITY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKdcYnlkhx8

MILDRED PIERCE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozf32hrXGiY

 

[NOIRTRASH]

Started reading Cain's novel, THE BUTTERFLY, its long preface is an essay about fiction writing practices, and in it he answered a question I had about why other writers made movie scripts of his books when he wrote plenty of movie scripts in Hollywood.

Cain explained that script writers serve 2 functions, 1) they fix literary scenes that cannot be depicted in film, and 2) they make literary dialog legible to movie audiences. Cain explained that word meanings change, and the script writer replaces old words with current words for the same action or object. One example are the words amusement and diversion. In one sense they have the same meaning, but their core words are amuse and divert, and readers get confused when they see something like GENERAL WASHINGTON CREATED AN AMUSEMENT TO FOOL THE BRITISH.

 

[colddiesel]

Speaking of reading lists, I find this list quite fascinating - the clash between the literary "establishment" I guess you'd call it, versus readers. Robert Heinlein for example doesn't make the editors list at all, but he has half a dozen novels in the readers list - and there's a lot of SF there, bit none on the editors list except maybe 1984.
http://www.modernlibrary.com/top-100/100-best-novels/

Any 'readers' list which has 4 books by Ayn Rand and 3 by L Ron Hubbard in the top 10 defines itself as nonsense. That set of readers needs closer definition to make any sense of it at all.

 

[SusanJillParker]

Any 'readers' list which has 4 books by Ayn Rand and 3 by L Ron Hubbard in the top 10 defines itself as nonsense. That set of readers needs closer definition to make any sense of it at all.

Totally agree. I feel bad for all those who have been duped to join Scientology (Tom Cruise) and fork over their money (Tom Cruise).

 

[ChloeTzang]

Any 'readers' list which has 4 books by Ayn Rand and 3 by L Ron Hubbard in the top 10 defines itself as nonsense. That set of readers needs closer definition to make any sense of it at all.

Yes, I'd love to know how they came up with that. If was some kind of readers poll or something. It's an interesting list alright. Both sides of the list in fact.

Totally agree. I feel bad for all those who have been duped to join Scientology (Tom Cruise) and fork over their money (Tom Cruise).

How true. L Ron Hubbard has a lot to answer for with that one. He wasn't even a particularly good writer. Shudder!