Biography of Raymond Chandler

Yellow with strong shades

23 July 1888
March 26, 1959
American author of detective novels and crime fiction, Raymond Thornton Chandler was born in Chicago, Illinois the day 23 July 1888. He moved to Britain in 1895, when the parents divorce. Back in the USA in 1912. Not yet twenty, in 1917 he enlisted in the Canadian Army, then in the R.A.F. (Royal Air Force), fighting the first world war in France. He works occasionally as a journalist and correspondent. He began writing for a living and, after a brief period where he works as a laborer in oil field, he published his first story at the age of forty-five, in 1933, on "Black Mask Magazine" magazine that publishes detective stories. His first novel is titled "the big sleep", and is given to the press in 1939. His talent comes out and the Paramount Film Studio, in 1943 he propose a contract as a screenwriter.
In 1924 he married Cissy Pascal, 18 years his senior, already divorced twice. His literary output will count nine novels, one of which is unfinished, and various scripts for Hollywood: the most important are "double indemnity" (1944, Billy Wilder), "The Unseen" (1945, Lewis Allen) and "the other man" (1951, directed by Alfred Hitchcock). In 1955 with the book "the long goodbye" (The Long Goodbye) won the Edgar Award, "American dedicated annually to the best works. Raymond Chandler is very critical of the traditional mystery novel for its lack of realism; follows the way of the narrative "hard boiled", initiated by Dashiell Hammett.
His character by far most famous is hard but honest detective Philip Marlowe-Knight of modern times, cynical yet profoundly honest-brought to the screen with unforgettable performances by actors such as Dick Powell, Robert Mitchum, James Garner, Elliot Gould but especially Humphrey Bogart. But the producers have a difficult relationship with his lyrics, often full of sex, corruption, pornography and homosexuality. In 1954 his wife dies and Chandler moved to Europe, but no longer recover from pain. Long a victim of alcoholism, a year after his wife's death, in 1955, attempts suicide. He died in La Jolla on March 26, 1959 due to pneumonia, leaving unfinished the eighth novel in the saga of Marlowe.
Article contributed by the team of collaborators.