An Anglo-American crime writer whose work transcended the traditional boundaries of the genre, Raymond Chandler turned to penning short stories for pulp magazines such as Black Mask and Dime Detective after he lost his job at an oil company in 1932. By the time of his debut novel, The Big Sleep, in 1939, his style had developed a tough street poetry that would be referred to as ‘hard-boiled.’ The Big Sleep also introduced the iconic private eye Philip Marlowe, the cynical yet noble anti-hero who would feature in all seven of Chandler’s published novels. In addition to his literary output, Chandler also co-wrote several movie scripts for Hollywood, including Double Indemnity and Strangers on a Train, adapted from James M. Cain and Patricia Highsmith’s novels respectively. In the decades since his death in 1959 Chandler’s reputation has blossomed enormously and he is now regarded as one of the great American prose stylists of the 20th century.
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