Nasty, Brutish, and Short Fiction by Cain, Chandler, Hammett, and Thompson *Online* *NEW*

If you haven’t read Double Indemnity, The Long Goodbye, The Maltese Falcon, or The Getaway, you are doubtless familiar with the movies they inspired. If you have read them, are you ready for a deeper cut? How did Cain, Chandler, Hammett, and Thompson portray the tawdry and the tragic in their short stories, first printed in pulp magazines like Black Mask and Dime Detective? Read ‘em and weep. Or wince. Benders and bloodstains and blondes, oh my! Students are encouraged to beg, borrow, but not steal: Chandler’s The Simple Art of Murder; Hammett’s Nightmare Town; Cain’s The Baby in the Icebox and Other Short Fiction (out of print); and Fireworks, The Lost Writings of Jim Thompson (out of print). Out-of-print books can be found in libraries or at resellers like thriftbooks.com or abebooks.com; also online at archive.org, and by courtesy of the instructor.

Instructor: Josh Passell