Viewing page 4 of 11

00:06:00
00:08:00
00:06:00
Playback Speed: 100%

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

Transcription: [00:06:00]
{SPEAKER name="David C. Ward"}
—leader in Butte, Montana. Hammett supposedly, well like we know he refused.

[00:06:04]
Um, although Little was later lynched, uh, was killed - although not necessarily by a Pinkerton.

[00:06:09]
And this was the beginning of Hammett's radicalism, according to Hellman.

[00:06:13]
What that doesn't explain is that he stayed with the Pinkertons for several more years.

[00:06:17]
So he's storing up his sense of injustice - but he clearly is dissatisfied, he's dissatisfied where he is in life, as well.

[00:06:25]
And while he's kicking around, looking for one-armed men, he begins to write for the flourishing pulp fiction novels-- I'm sorry um, magazines of the day.

[00:06:37]
I mean, remember we only have radio as entertainment. The magazine industry was, was tremendously important. And it, it covered all kinds of genres.

[00:06:44]
And he begins to send in stories to The Smart Set, which is a sophisticated magazine and more importantly Black Mask, which is the leading detective mystery magazine.

[00:06:57]
And he's successful right off the bat. And in a period between 1923 roughly and 1934 he writes hundreds of stories.

[00:07:05]
And in an amazing period of creativity between 1929 and 1934 he writes and publishes five novels.

[00:07:12]
Among which is the Maltese Falcon, probably the most successful early and, and still at the top of the heap when it comes to quality.

[00:07:21]
Uh, four other novels one of whi-, all of which or most of which have been made into films -

[00:07:26]
the most famous of the film versions is the Thin Man, which you have may have seen,

[00:07:29]
which is the very sophisticated, alcoholic couple of Nick and Nora Charles and their dog, Asta pursuing um, criminals in a rather playboy-ish fashion.

[00:07:40]
Um, Hammett writes these in a storm of creative fury. Um, and he stops in 1934. Writes nothing more. Uh, it's, it's, it's largely inexplicable.

[00:07:53]
In 1918 he had broken his career with the Pinkertons to enlist in the army. And in- while in the the army he was str-