War’s Traumatic Impact

Chapter one examines Chandler’s biography to question the established view of the author’s life and war experience. By employing a psychological sketch of Chandler’s experience during World War One, fresh new insights into his writing, war trauma, and characterization can be gleaned.

Chandler and the American War Writers

Chapter three considers the relationship between detective fiction and war fiction and the impact of one style upon the other to create a ‘war noir’. Taking examples from renowned World War One novels, it will demonstrate that the same disillusionment and despair prevalent in the work of the renowned Lost Generation is equally prevalent in Chandler’s novels. Reading his novels as a convergence of the war novel and crime fiction, one can reconsider Chandler’s work as a legitimate representation of society and the trauma of war.

The Philip Marlowe Novels

Chapter five reconsiders Chandler’s own war experience to show that Marlowe, like his creator, displayed symptoms of combat-related post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Examining the novels for these manifestations, Marlowe’s symptoms appear to fall into the three separate symptom-related categorizations of PTSD. This chapter will also demonstrate how the game of chess becomes a metaphor for the city of Los Angeles that enables the troubled detective to locate himself within a structured and orderly environment. Marlowe reassess and reviews his own case-related actions and dealings by evaluating his movements on the chessboard.

Characterization: The Detective as Veteran

Chapter four explores how the symptoms of war trauma have been transferred onto Chandler’s protagonist Philip Marlowe. Marlowe’s character traits will be closely examined by considering certain notable features such as the detective’s origins, characterization, disillusionment and his chivalric code of honour. Like Chandler, it becomes possible to identify the small but distinctive aspects of Marlowe’s character that suggest that he was a psychologically damaged war veteran fighting new battles on a different front.

Aftermath: Chandler’s Legacy

The final chapter will consider how Chandler’s novels have created a lasting legacy in contemporary fiction. The Vietnam War and the revival of the “traditional” hard-boiled detective during the 1970s signalled a considerable change in the image of the detective and the crime genre in general. In the aftermath of Vietnam, renewed interest in Chandler’s novels, from writers like James Crumely, brought with it a revival of the character of the veteran detective, with contemporary writers taking Chandler and Marlowe as their models.

The Long Goodbye

In addition to Marlowe, Chandler’s other veteran characters also unwittingly suffer post-traumatic symptoms, and chapter six is an exploration of the most significant of Chandler’s novels and the work that best represents his protagonist as a veteran, The Long Goodbye (1953). Examining Marlowe’s behaviour around, and attitude towards, the two veterans identified in the novel, Roger Wade and Terry Lennox, it is argued that Marlowe becomes part of a “band of brothers,” an intimate group of veterans in whose company the detective displays the undeniable evidence of his past experiences and trauma.

A New View: Chandler and War

Chapter two discusses the version of Chandler’s experiences presented by his biographers, before conducting a new and original investigation into the accuracy of their survey. Chandler’s correspondence was used to formulate a narrative version of his World War One experience in France.