Hard-boiled ecologies: Ross Macdonald’s environmental crime fiction

Ashman, Nathan (2018) Hard-boiled ecologies: Ross Macdonald’s environmental crime fiction. Green Letters: Studies in Ecocriticism, 22 (1). pp. 43-54. ISSN 1468-8417

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Abstract

Although Ross Macdonald’s position in the annals of great American hardboiled crime writers is unquestioned, what often been overlooked in the study of his works are the underlying environmental preoccupations that frequently serve as the background to, or context for, crime. This context of ecological violence is forcefully manifested in two of Macdonald’s later Archer novels The Underground Man (1971) and Sleeping Beauty (1973). This essay scrutinizes the environmental imperatives of Macdonald’s work, arguing that the damage and destruction inflicted upon the environment in these two texts becomes symbiotically connected to the broader, morally fraught social milieu of the city.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	ross macdonald,hardboiled,pastoral,crime fiction,ecology,sdg 16 - peace, justice and strong institutions ,/dk/atira/pure/sustainabledevelopmentgoals/peace_justice_and_strong_institutions
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of Literature, Drama and Creative Writing
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Creative Writing Research Group Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Modern and Contemporary Writing Research Group
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	16 Oct 2018 14:30
Last Modified:	28 Mar 2025 08:56
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/68550
DOI:	10.1080/14688417.2018.1431139

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