{"id":3739,"date":"2014-11-05T07:39:12","date_gmt":"2014-11-05T12:39:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=3739"},"modified":"2015-01-30T08:11:37","modified_gmt":"2015-01-30T13:11:37","slug":"finding-philip-marlowe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=3739","title":{"rendered":"Finding Philip Marlowe"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Raymond<\/a>

(art: wikimedia.org)<\/p><\/div>\n

Some authors are unalterably linked to a particular place and time\u2014Faulkner, Dickens, Cheever. For Raymond Chandler<\/a>, the time and place are Los Angeles in the 1930s and 40s. His books about that era convey a very specific mindset, with such classic lines as \u201cThere is no trap so deadly as the trap you set for yourself\u201d (The Long Goodbye<\/em>), \u201cIt was a blonde. A blonde to make a bishop kick a hole in a stained-glass window\u201d (Farewell, My Lovely<\/em>); and \u201cYou know what Canino will do\u2014beat my teeth out and then kick me in the stomach for mumbling\u201d (The Big Sleep<\/em>). You can\u2019t read his rhythms without seeing Humphrey Bogart as the perfect personification of his detective, Philip Marlowe.<\/p>\n

According to Electric Lit<\/a>, from Malibu to Pasadena, Chandler\u2019s \u201ciconic spots dot the landscape.\u201d Now you can retrace the high (and low) points from this master of the hardboiled detective novel with a new map of the City of Angels<\/a>\"\"
\n, written and compiled by Kim Cooper and designed by Paul Rogers, which the publisher calls \u201can insider\u2019s guide to the city Chandler knew.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cooper\u2019s company Estouric<\/a> conducts literary, true crime, and California culture tours, including \u201cRaymond Chandler\u2019s Los Angeles: In a Lonely Place\u201d and \u201cThe Birth of Noir: James M. Cain\u2019s Southern California Nightmare,\u201d as well as the uplifting \u201cMausolea of Los Angeles.\u201d (Mystery writers attending the big Bouchercon conference will have a special edition of the Chandler tour.)<\/p>\n

Given the amount of research done for the tours, the map was a logical next step. Cooper had to do a fair bit of digging, too. \u201cI was thrilled to be able to confirm the actual location of Victor\u2019s, the bar where Marlowe and Terry Lennox grow close over gimlets in The Long Goodbye<\/em>,\u201d (my review<\/a>) she told Electric Lit.
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