Raymond Chandler
Raymond Chandler
Raymond Thornton Chandlerwas a British-American novelist and screenwriter. In 1932, at the age of forty-four, Chandler became a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Great Depression. His first short story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in 1933 in Black Mask, a popular pulp magazine. His first novel, The Big Sleep, was published in 1939. In addition to his short stories, Chandler published seven novels during his lifetime. All but Playback have been...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth23 July 1888
CityChicago, IL
CountryUnited States of America
book average stories
The average detective story is probably no worse than the average novel, but you never see the average novel. It doesn't get published. The average -- or only slightly above average -- detective story does.... Whereas the good novel is not at all the same kind of book as the bad novel. It is about entirely different things. But the good detective story and the bad detective story are about exactly the same things, and they are about them in very much the same way.
sleep average white
We have the whitest kitchens and the most shining bathrooms in the world. But in the lovely white kitchen the average [person] can’t produce a meal fit to eat, and the lovely shining bathroom is mostly a receptacle for deodorants, laxatives, sleeping pills, and the products of that confidence racket called the cosmetic industry. We make the finest packages in the world, Mr Marlowe. The stuff inside is mostly junk." —
book writing average
That's one thing I like about Hollywood. The writer is there revealed in his ultimate corruption. He asks no praise, because his praise comes to him in the form of a salary check. In Hollywood the average writer is not young, not honest, not brave, and a bit overdressed. But he is darn good company, which book writers as a rule are not. He is better than what he writes. Most book writers are not as good.
air bothered dirty high lay marble matter oil sleeping top tower water wind
What did it matter where you lay once you were dead? In a dirty sump or in a marble tower on top of a high hill? You were dead, you were sleeping the big sleep, you were not bothered by things like that. Oil and water were the same as wind and air to you.
challenges movement half
The challenge of screenwriting is to say much in little and then take half of that little out and still preserve an effect of leisure and natural movement
community world tough
If you're not tough it's hard to survive in this world; and if you're not kind then you don't deserve to survive.
american-writer angel looked slice
He looked as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food.
god split
When I split an infinitive, God damn it, I split it so it will stay split.
The streets were dark with something more than night.
advertising american-writer chess elaborate human intelligence outside waste
Chess is the most elaborate waste of human intelligence outside of an advertising agency.
against along animosity asked beating cares cell clubs disposal few fight gets gives good guards hates jail life looks loves mad man men minor nobody places problem quietly remain running rushing spoons stuff unless yelling
In jail a man has no personality. He is a minor disposal problem and a few entries on reports. Nobody cares who loves or hates him, what he looks like, what he did with his life. Nobody reacts to him unless he gives trouble. Nobody abuses him. All that is asked of him is that he go quietly to the right cell and remain quiet when he gets there. There is nothing to fight against, nothing to be mad at. The jailers are quiet men without animosity or sadism. All this stuff you read about men yelling and screaming, beating against the bars, running spoons along them, guards rushing in with clubs -- all that is for the big house. A good jail is one of the quietest places in the world. Life in jail is in suspension.
city paper
A city with no more personality than a paper cup.
adding ball brakes common common-sense front game gray guy high last man mistake monday money morning ought smashed somebody speaks stands suit tells week won
Common sense always speaks too late. Common sense is the guy who tells you ought to have had your brakes relined last week before you smashed a front end this week. Common sense is the Monday morning quarterback who could have won the ball game if he had been on the team. But he never is. He's high up in the stands with a flask on his hip. Common sense is the little man in a gray suit who never makes a mistake in addition. But it's always somebody else's money he's adding up.
himself man mean streets
Down these mean streets a man must go who is not himself mean.