Hard-Boiled Sentimentality: The Secret History of American Crime Stories by Leonard Cassuto

Victorian Noir: Cornell Woolrich's Waltz into Darkness

“… 2 2 I also endorse Cassuto's recognition that in such “essentially sociopathic” tales as Waltz into Darkness , given Louis Durand's mesmerization with femme fatale Bonny Castle (aka Julia Russell), Woolrich is revamping (pun intended) “conventional romantic narrative” (2009, 117). …”

“…These paratexts hint that we can expect a tragic Victorian love story, but as will be argued here Woolrich seeks to have it both ways. Waltz into Darkness , that is, subverts the ethos of triumphant love common in many Victorian triple‐deckers ending happily, as does Jane Eyre (1847) when the eponymous heroine begins its concluding chapter by declaring, “Reader, I married him.” At the same time Waltz affirms the nobility of Louis Durand's life‐ending passion for the woman who initially identifies herself as Julia Russell, bearing out Leonard Cassuto's thesis that “[i]nside every crime story is a sentimental narrative that's trying to come out” (2009, 7) 2 . Romance both destroys and exalts.…”

O policyjnej przemocy w polskiej powieści kryminalnej (i nie tylko)

“…Niektórzy nazywają amerykańską odmianę kryminału hardboiled, inni preferują etykietkę czarny kryminał, a jeszcze inni, posługując się terminologią kina francuskiego lat 50., mówią o literaturze w stylu noir (Barańczak, 1975: 273;Burkhardt, 1978;Giudice, 1979;Schmidt, 1989: 113-164;Marling, 1995;Cassuto, 2008;McCann, 2010). Niezależnie od tego, na jaką konstrukcję słowną, na jaką definicję się w końcu zdecydujemy, w dyskusji prędzej czy później zawsze przewinie się jedno nazwisko: Nazywam się Chandler.…”

Hardboiled Hysterics: Shell Shock and Tough Guys inThe Maltese Falcon, 1929/1941

“…This climax is deeply ambivalent, and critics have seen it that way. Leonard Cassuto concludes, “Spade's delivery of Brigid to justice counts as a betrayal as well as a solved murder case. Hammett emphasizes both angles, making Spade the hero and, to put it mildly, a cad” (59).…”