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WARâS TRAUMATIC IMPACT
I should guess that all in all he has had a lonely life ⌠Heâs a lonely old eagle.
âCHANDLER, QTD. IN MACSHANE, LIFE
The impact of war upon American hard-boiled fiction is a topic that is rarely discussed. While many works in the crime genre touch upon the more disagreeable aspects of peacetime societyâcorporate greed, political dishonesty, a corrupt police forceâthe psychological and emotional impact of war upon the genre has remained relatively unappreciated. Utilizing the crime genre to express their disillusionment arising from war and the subsequent treatment of American veterans, many contemporary writers expose a society ignorant of their charactersâ traumas. They focus their discontent upon a government that routinely abandons its soldiers after their return from combat. While in combat they are hailed as heroes, but on their return they are quietly forgotten and left to survive on their own. As a form of protest, many embittered writers who belonged to the generations âlostâ to conflict consciously incorporated a new, more extreme vision into their work. By embedding a war-traumatized protagonist, an unforgiving portrayal of violence, a seething undercurrent of frustration and resentment, and the insensitivity of an uncaring society into the story-line, the hard-boiled novel and the war genre became inextricably fused to produce a unique hybrid. This distinctive âwar noirâ absorbed the anger, discontent, and brutality of both genres and came to symbolize the bitter criticism directed against an unsympathetic American culture and a cynical and corrupted state.
Yet while the impact of war upon crime fiction, particularly since the Vietnam War, has received some consideration, the influence of war upon the writers themselves has received less attention. American hard-boiled crime writers were directly involved in the numerous wars that have occurred throughout the twentieth century, including Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Charles Willeford, Robert B. Parker, Elmore Leonard, and James Crumley. As well as those directly involved in war, many other writers have been exposed to warâs destabilizing influence upon society, especially during and immediately after Vietnam. As a result of this destabilization, biographical studies of many of these writers reveal a new and greater forcefulness in their work that, in many cases, necessitates a reevaluation of the complexity of the literature produced in the crime genre.
As one of the principal proponents of the advancement of American hard-boiled fiction, an examination of Raymond Chandlerâs life is especially relevant to the task of establishing the impact of warâin this case, the First World Warânot only on the authorâs life and work, but more importantly on the origins of the distinctive subtleties in Chandlerâs style. It is these subtleties, this book argues, that would inspire later generations of crime writers to establish more nuanced and multifaceted characters that resonate with the eraâs wartime generations. Understanding the nuances and idiosyncrasies of Chandlerâs life is important because they reveal not only the impact of war upon the intimate construction of his work, but also how he achieved his place within the American literary landscape as a writer of traumatic literature.
While many of the peculiarities and character traits described in this chapter may be interpreted as simply the qualities of an eccentric personality, when considered collectively and placed within the psychological framework of Chandlerâs biography, something more significant starts to emerge, demonstrative of the symptoms of severe emotional stress. In light of the damaging aftermath of the First World War, Chandlerâs own behavior and symptoms become a fundamental factor in creating the potential for the veteran status of his detective protagonist. By recognizing the symptoms of trauma in Chandler himself it becomes plausible to see how these same symptoms became a central facet of the idiosyncrasies bestowed upon Philip Marlowe.
Two years before he died Chandler gave an illuminating summation of his troubled life in a letter to his London solicitor, Michael Gilbert. Writing, âI have lived on the edge of nothingâ (qtd. in Hiney and MacShane 242), Chandler described a life marred by torment and lacking lasting contentment. He lived, as Frank MacShane says, âa tortured and lonely life only temporarily relieved by moments of happiness,â when he would, like his fictional detective Philip Marlowe, become an âeffective Galahadâ (Life 268, 246). Like many war veterans Chandler was never able to fully erase the memory of his wartime experience, which troubled him throughout his life. To fully understand the theory that Philip Marlowe is a character born from the traumatizing impact of war it is essential to recognize the intensity of Chandlerâs own experiences in France. Only by doing so can we appreciate how his trauma seeped into cultural representations, thereby creating war noir.
Judith Lewis Herman makes the assertion that while the normal response to atrocities is to âbanish them from [the] consciousness,â quite often these horrors ârefuse to be buried,â and in time âthe story of the traumatic events surface not as verbal narrative but as a symptomâ (1). Chandlerâs postwar life is a catalogue of unpredictable behavior, mood swings, alcoholism, oscillating swings between intimacy and loneliness, attempted suicide and recklessness, all of which are symptomatic of psychological neurosis. Although not recognized institutionally as a medical condition at the time, it now seems plausible that Chandler suffered combat-related PTSD, the debilitating psychological condition prevalent in veterans of war. For Chandler, this neurosis would reemerge during times of stress throughout the rest of his life.
Born in Chicago on 23 July 1888, Raymond Thornton Chandler was the only son of Maurice and Florence Chandler. Living in England for his most informative years after his parentsâ divorce, he quickly became accustomed to the dominance of his female relatives, social isolation, and an extreme sense of loneliness. Tom Hiney notes, âIn both suburban South London and Quaker Waterford, Chandler was an anomalyâan American-sounding boy with a pretty Irish mother about whom people, including her own family, gossiped [ ⌠] In late Victorian England, he was without a clear social class, nationality or male role modelâ (11). The solitude and seclusion of his early life caused Chandler to develop âan extraordinary sense of loyalty [ ⌠] and a sense of justice that became a central part of his character and gave him the attitudes he was to express later through his character Philip Marloweâ (MacShane, Life 5).
Chandler attended Dulwich College from the age of twelve, where he was educated until 1905 under the tutelage of Arthur Herman Gilkes, a published novelist. Under his guidance Chandler developed a passion for literature and language, and acquired the belief that a man of honor was one who was âcapable of understanding that which was goodâ (qtd. in MacShane, Life 9). It was a quality that Chandler eagerly embraced and which would later become the thread that links all of his fictional detectives. Intent on a literary career, Chandler began writing poetry and articles for London newspapers and magazines, such as Academy and the Westminster Gazette. His poetry was highly romanticized and conventional, and invariably explored the theme of knights and ladies, nobility and honorable sacrifice. Although MacShane believes âThe less said of Chandlerâs poetry the betterâ (Life 16), these verses were the first expression of the individualistic code of chivalry that would later develop into an important facet of Philip Marloweâs character.
In the five years that followed, Chandler wrote twenty-seven poems, seven essays, and numerous reviews. But despite this achievement he felt restless and unfulfilled; yearning to return to the land of his birth, declaring that, âAmerica seemed to call to me in some mysterious wayâ (qtd. in Gardiner and Walker, 25). Initially, however, his experience of America was a disappointment that precipitated a rude awakening when he quickly realized that contrary to his expectation he âhad no feeling of identity with the United Statesâ and no feeling of identity for England either. Chandler felt as though he had become âa man without a countryâ (qtd. in Gardiner and Walker, 24, 25) and would later proclaim that âto be homesick for a home you havenât got is rather poignantâ (qtd. in Hiney and MacShane 206). Unsurprisingly, this acute sensation of a lack of identity later emerged as a prominent feature of the personality that Chandler gave to Marlowe, and although Chandler always denied any direct autobiographical connection, years later he would admit, âthereâs a lot of him in me,â especially âhis lonelinessâ (qtd. in MacShane, Life 253).
By 1916 Chandlerâs mother joined him in California, but the tranquility of their new life together was cut short when a year later Chandler decided to return to Europe following Americaâs entrance into the First World War. Choosing to enlist with the Canadian Army, he traveled to Victoria, British Columbia, where he joined the Fiftieth Regiment of the Canadian Army, declaring that âit was still natural for me to prefer a British uniformâ (qtd. in MacShane, Life 27). He received a brief induction before sailing to Liverpool on 7 November 1917. After training in Seaford, Sussex, Chandler was assigned to the Seventh Battalion of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, which was ordered to the French front line in March 1918. It was a shocking experience. For the young Chandler, âas for most soldiers brought so quickly to the front, his experiences were too overwhelming to digestâ (MacShane, Life 28â9) and the carnage around him would have soon shattered âthe illusion of manly honour and glory in battleâ (Herman 20). This reaction was, however, not unusual among new recruits. According to psychiatrists J. W. Appel and G. W. Bebbe, âThere is no such thing as âgetting used to combat.â[ ⌠] Each moment of combat imposes a strain so great that men will break downâ (1470). It is incredible to think, that âin every war in which American soldiers have fought in [the twentieth century], the chances of becoming a psychiatric casualtyâof being debilitated for some period of time as a consequence of the stresses of military lifeâwere greater than the chances of being killed by enemy fireâ (qtd. in Grossman 43). Similarly, in a study conducted by R. L. Swank and W. E. Marchand on the psychological effects of World War Two, it was found that at least 98 percent of soldiers suffered some form of psychological breakdown. They noted that when it came to combat, âOne thing alone seems certain: Practically all infantry soldiers suffer from a neurotic reaction eventually if they are subjected to the stress of modern combat continuously enoughâ (21).
Throughout the First World War and for most of the twentieth century the political and military establishment denied the connection between psychological disorder and combat, and the complaint remained undiagnosed and unaccepted as a legitimate injury. Viewed by the military as the male counterpart of female hysteria, it became regarded as a sign of weakness and cowardice, treated with a brief rest period, or in more severe instances a so-called treatment âbased on shaming, threats, and punishmentâ (Herman 21). In 1941, Abram Kardiner and Herbert Spiegel published a comprehensive clinical and theoretical study of âwar neuroses,â in which they protested: âThe subject of neurotic disturbances consequent upon war has, in the past twenty-five years, been submitted to a good deal of capriciousness in public interest and psychiatric whims. But the public does not sustain its interest ⌠and neither does psychiatry. Hence these conditions are not subject to continuous study ⌠but only to periodic efforts which cannot be described as very diligentâ (1). They further maintained that to incorrectly diagnose patients suffering from war neuroses as âhystericalâ could be extremely injurious in its own right, essentially feminizing sufferers and impeding recovery. Furthermore, they also asserted that when the word is used, âits social meaning is that the subject is a predatory individual, trying to get something for nothing. The victim of such a neurosis is, therefore, without sympathy in court, and ⌠without sympathy from his physicians, who often take ⌠âhystericalâ to mean that the individual is suffering from some persistent form of wickedness, perversity, or weakness of willâ (406).
It was not until the years following the Vietnam War that it finally became institutionally acceptable to recognize posttraumatic injury and psychological trauma as a permanent and unavoidable legacy of war (Herman 27). In 1980, psychological trauma became a ârealâ diagnosis when the American Psychiatric Association incorporated a new category, called âpost-traumatic stress disorderâ in its official manual of medical disorders (Herman 28).
This of course was too late for many veterans of the First World War who were aware of their psychological illness but unable to obtain help, and subsequently articulated their predicament in their work. Writers such as Chandler and also Ernest Hemingway, who committed suicide in 1961, would die before the causal relationship between combat and psychological trauma could be established, and before PTSD would gain social recognition as an injury equally as damaging as the severest of physical injuries.
According to the biographies by MacShane and Hiney, Chandlerâs military service came to an end in June 1918. MacShane states that âChandlerâs service in France ended abruptly when an artillery barrage of eleven-inch German shells blew up everyone in his outfit, leaving him the sole survivorâ (MacShane, Life 29). And Hiney notes that âChandler was knocked unconscious [ ⌠] He was concussed and taken behind lines. The bombardment so depleted his outfit that it was disbanded and survivors, including Chandler, were transferred back to Englandâ (43). They both note that Chandler was evacuated to Britain concussed and âshell-shockedâ (Hiney 43) where he began drinking heavily. In all likelihood Chandlerâs experience of war caused the author psychological injury, yet because the existing biographical material is vague it does not allow us to comprehend the gravity of Chandlerâs war experiences. As such, the biographersâ account will be reexamined in the next chapter.
The First World War was a pivotal moment for the twenty-eight-year-old Chandler. While MacShane believes that the psychological impact of warâs brutality would make Chandler block out the memory of it (Life 29), many have overlooked the experience as a key influence upon Chandlerâs formulation of Philip Marlowe. MacShane, Hiney, Jerry Speir and more recently Tom Williams, have all confined their attention to dissecting his complex personality, believing Chandlerâs eccentricity to stem either from his upbringing, his education, his relationship with women, or his belief that he lacked a definite sense of identity. Chandlerâs only overt depiction of warfare, a short piece of prose titled âTrench Raid,â has generally been cited as the writerâs only attempt to exorcise his demons. Written between June and December 1918 while supposedly recuperating in England, âTrench Raidâ is the only work in which Chandler explicitly attempted to recount his war experiences. The piece, which is only 352 words long, is direct and displays the first signs of the detachment he employed to manage unpleasant realities. This short section combines the opening and ending of the piece:
As he pushed aside the dirty blanket that served for a gas curtain the force of the bombardment hit him like the blow of a club to the base of the brain. He grovelled against the wall of the trench, nauseated by the din. He seemed to be alone in a universe of incredibly brutal noise ⌠Time to move on. Mustnât stay too long in one place. He groped round the corner of the bay to the Lewis gun post. On the firing step the Number One of the gun crew was standing to with half of his body silhouetted above the parapet, motionless against the glare of the lights except that his hand was playing scales on the butt of his gun. (Qtd. in Moss 33)
This detached but precise writing style would later be used to great effect in the Philip Marlowe stories.
Because the story is incomplete, MacShane believes that Chandler never felt the need to finish âTrench Raidâ or attempt further work in this style because suffering âbombardment was not as unbearable a memory as leading other men to their deaths in an infantry attackâ (Life 29). By drawing this conclusion, however, MacShane demonstrates the failure of 1970s society to comprehend the variety of experiences that affect soldiers in wartime, and did not have the benefit of more recent scientific and medical evidence concerning the causal relationship between combat and PTSD. It is therefore likely that MacShane did not understand just how devastating warfare could be, whatever a soldierâs location or experience of conflict. With this in mind, Chandlerâs failure to complete âTrench Raidâ was not simply a matter of choosing to leave it unfinished, but, as contemporary medical evidence suggests, more likely a conscious decision not to revisit painful memories so soon after the event. As will be shown later in this chapter, it matters little whether a soldier is involved in an infantry attack or an artillery bombardment since each can result in some form of traumatic neuroses. Herman explains, âNo two people have identical reactions [to a traumatic incident], even to the same event [ ⌠a] traumatic syndrome, despite its many constant features is not the same for everyoneâ (58). It is therefore likely that Chandler (together with countless thousands of soldiers from the Great War) emerged from combat suffering some form of emotional distress. Although MacShaneâs biography was published before PTSD became widely accepted as a legitimate injury, critics since have continued to overlook the crucial role that war experience played in the psychological development of his fictional characters, and the style and realism of his work. Such an oversight not only fails to appreciate the intensity of Chandlerâs own psychological suffering but fails to discern the motivation for in creating Philip Marlowe as a character who, like himself, was troubled by psychological wounds.
Further insight may be gained from Herbert Hendin and Ann Pollinger Haasâs study, Wounds of War: The Psychological Aftermath of Combat in Vietnam (1984). Discussing a study conducted after World War Two to determine the variables for a personâs susceptibility to PTSD, Hendin and Haas cite various analystsâ discoveries of increased levels of trauma among those who had endured a troublesome childhood. In a study of combat veterans with PTSD, it was argued that each manâs main pattern of symptoms was related to his individual childhood history, previous emotional conflicts, and his method of adaptation (Hendin and Haas 34). It is quite feasible, then, that Chandlerâs war experience may have been exacerbated by the tensions and insecurities of his early childhood. Exaggerated moral imperatives and an introverted demeanor had been etched on Chandlerâs character as a child, and it is plausible that after his war experiences that these personality traits may well have transformed themselves into periods of extreme depression, despair, and emotional instability.
This altered behavior, which was previously regarded as simple eccentricities, is a symptom consistent with PTSD. However, Hendin and Haas also note in their study that this theory has not been definitively proven, and some analysts have argued that childhood history plays less of a role in the development of trauma than does the severity of the traumatic event itself (34). Kardiner and Spiegel, for example, argued simply that with sufficient stress, âwar neurosesâ could affect anyone exposed to combat, no matter what war they fought in, the methods used, or the location of battle (2â7).
Nonetheless, the difficulty in diagnosing PTSD is that â[w]ith the passage of time ⌠negative symptoms become the most prominent feature of the post-traumatic disorder, [and] the diagnosis becomes increasingly easy to overlookâ (Herman 49). Herman continues, âBecause post-traumatic symptoms are so persistent and so wide-ranging, they may be mistaken for enduring characteristics of the victimâs personalityâ (49). However, simply dismissing these symptoms as merely the peculiarities or eccentricities of an individualâs character can be extremely destructive for the sufferer. Disregarding a suffererâs symptom...