Pulps and Detective Fiction

Hard-Boiled.

The hard-boiled style, an enduring influence on American writing, began in what was regarded as the subliterary environment of pulp fiction—so named because the magazines were cheaply printed on wood-pulp paper. This way of writing flourished in the pulps—also known as dime novels—that specialized in mystery-detective-crime fiction. The best and best known of these pulps was Black Mask. From the pulp racks grew what has been described as an authentic voice of American fiction. Raymond Chandler was a later Black Mask alumnus. The hard-boiled school outlived the demise of the pulps, achieved respectability, and flourishes in the 1990s.

Definition.

Hard-boiled writing results from the use of violent or brutal action and the writer's response to that material. It is therefore realistic fiction with some or all of these elements: objective viewpoint, impersonal tone, colloquial speech,...

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