Chapter 3 guide

Time flies, and unexpectedly, six years have passed in a blink of an eye. When the "Murder Specialty Store", which is about to publish 101 classic mystery novels, just came out from afar, the first mystery novel it launched happened to be the black detective Virgil Tibbs. ) in In the Heat of the Night (1965). There are of course some considerations in choosing "Night Pursuit" as the first book to appear in the mystery reading club. On the one hand, the editor wants to use it to adapt the film (starred by the first black film star Sydney Bowdy), and The worldly prestige of winning the Oscar for Best Picture (1967) as a milestone makes it easy for readers to accept; on the other hand, it wants to highlight the diverse and multifaceted characteristics of the detective image in mystery novels, so that readers can understand the detective in Western reasoning classics Eligibility is not limited to middle-aged Caucasian European men.

I said in the introduction at the time that the greatest historical contribution of "Night Pursuit" is to break the unfairness of the absence of people of color in mystery novels (in fact, the absence of "reader's attention", the work has long been there) But I also said that the work that really penetrates into the soul of black characters and writes about the character of black detectives and the environment and atmosphere of black communities is not this "Night Pursuit", but comes from black writers themselves.The black compatriot writers I am referring to are far ahead of the pioneer Chester Himes (CHESTER HIMES, 1909-1984), the author of this book; those who are close to the current reading scene are active in Walter Mosley (Walter Mosley, 1952-), the black treasure of today's literary world.

Hymes created a unique detective novel in which two black police detectives "Coffin Bucket" Ed and "Grave Digger" Jones (Coffin Ed and Grave Digger Jones) handled cases on the streets of Harlem. It has been rediscovered, reappreciated, and given high recognition and evaluation (although it is long overdue); while Mosley's black private detective "Easy Rawline" series (Easy Rawline) is currently attracting much attention. A representative work of black culture, a series of Yi Laolin's works in the 1990s with color in their titles made the international literary scene even more refreshing. Among them, "Devil In a Blue Dress" (1990) was made into a Hollywood blockbuster (by black star Dan Ze As he himself said when he won the Oscar gold award, he followed the old path of Sydney Bowdy step by step).It seems that black detectives (and the black community and black culture that follow them) are still in their infancy, and there is still a bright future ahead!

When you read the mystery works of the pioneer Chester Hymes, you will get mixed evaluations of good and bad (precursors are often like this, because they are groundbreaking characters, the development is eclectic, while Their work may not meet your expectations).Some people feel that Hyams' reasoning, although the novel's characters and story atmosphere are good, the plot of the story seems to be too loose and too random, and it cannot be regarded as the best or most rigorously structured reasoning work; I praised Hymes to the sky, thinking that this is the best work to capture the sensibility of black people. The moral of the story and the poetic text are both good. It can be regarded as a representative work of reasoning in black novels and an artistic realm of literary works. Its street realism is even more unmatched by white people's hard-line detective novels.These positive and negative comments, who is better and more reasonable?

I'm one of the latter, a big fan of the kind of talent that astounds Hyams.In my personal opinion, Hyams not only has a keen description and insight into black culture, but the language in his book is filled with a kind of rich poetry and hidden sadness, which makes it difficult to read without emotion.His mystery novels are not just ordinary news and entertainment?He simply wrote euphemistically about the history of black people being insulted and harmed in popular novels, and he also saw the funnyness and absurdity in the racially discriminatory human cannibalism, as well as the deep sorrow revealed in the sudden ladder.

In my mind, Chester Hymes is a born poet. His works are full of sensual and unique urban dark corner violence poems. However, his growth conditions and writing career seem to have no achievements. The slightest trace of a poet. Chester Hymes was imprisoned for a crime at the age of nineteen and spent seven years in prison. In prison, he accidentally came into contact with Dashiell Hammett (1894- 1961), was greatly moved (probably the cruel dark corners of the streets described in Hammett's novels, which are basically the familiar growth place and daily life of Hymes), so he determined to become a writer.But this was the late 1920s, early 1930s, and how did black ex-offenders, who were discriminated against, become socially acceptable writers?

Looking back now, Chester Hymes has indeed walked a tortuous and difficult road.His first work describing the conditions in prison was repeatedly rejected, and several drafts were changed. It took sixteen years before he got the chance to be published; but the white editor of the publishing house changed his manuscript, not Hyams's. According to the original intention of creation, the original appearance of this book has to wait until fourteen years after the author's death before it can be published in its complete original appearance, and the author's original original title is restored.The unbearable Hymes seldom writes, and the title of the book is like a sad self-prophecy: "Yesterday Will Make You Cry" (Yesterday Will Make You Cry).

Yes, it was a weepy yesterday, a time when people of color were discriminated against and without dignity.Chester Hymes's writing career has been stuck in the United States for more than ten years, and he could not find a way out. Therefore, he decided to sail to France, switch to writing in French, and follow the advice of his friends to rewrite more marketable mystery novels.His first mystery novel, For Love of Imabelle (1957)—sometimes called A Rage Up In Harlem in the United States—was It was the title of the book that the publishing house changed for him—it was published in France. In the book, two black police officers who were alienated from the police system appeared in the book. They took charge of the case independently in Harlem, which is full of violence. The strange living atmosphere and unique cultural color, This made his novel an immediate box office and critical success, and also won the French "La Grand Prix du Roman Policier" (La Grand Prix du Roman Policier) that year.

Chester Hymes's successful works in France have been translated and introduced back to the United States one after another. Judging from his later autobiography, Hymes obviously cared about his hometown's evaluation of him. Unfortunately, his works can only be regarded as cheap books at the beginning. Directly out of paperback, and the title is often very confusing (the "Harlem Rampage" mentioned above was not changed back to the title of the author's mind until the author's later years". In fact, if we look at Hymes's self-defined book The title is usually much higher than the title of the book that the editor of the publishing house tampered with. For example, his first published book "If He Hollers Let Him Go" (If He Hollers Let Him Go, 1948), or the previous introduction His first work "Yesterday Will Make You Cry", or his non-series mystery novel "Run Man, Run, Run" (Run Man, Run, 1966) written in English in his later years, or even a collection of short stories published after his death "Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned, 1998" (Always Outnumbered, Always Outgunned, 1998), the words he uses always have an incomparable power, simple and direct, at first glance, it seems like the rough and straight of the lower class The language is exquisite but very delicate, with endless aftertaste. Perhaps only poets with sensitive writing can extract such flavorful sentences from the dross of language. This is what some readers (including me) marvel at his talent reason.

Chester Hymes was not recognized by American readers until the publication of "Cotton Comes to Harlem" (Cotton Comes to Harlem, 1965), and he had to wait again (The Heat's On, 1966) It was only when they were published that they were truly accepted by the American public with open arms. Both novels were adapted into movies, which were very popular.A year later, he resumed writing in his native English, and he was able to return home (though he remained in self-imposed exile in France and Spain for the rest of his life). Now, he is one of the most studied black writers in the United States; the racial discrimination revealed in his novels, as well as the distorted culture that has to self-harm under discrimination, are now a pair of cold eyes to see American society.Some commentators once said that Chester Hymes's works use "mystery novels as a form of social accusation".However, what Hymes really cares about is how absurd the soul situation of the injured will be, and how they will become a deformed life state. From this level, it may be too much to describe his work as a "social indictment". Small is too narrow.