Farewell, my lovely
Raymond Chandler - 1940
Eva de Bruijn
10-11-2011
Theme
The main theme of Farewell, my lovely is crime. In this story, there take place different forms of
crime: raid, several murders including suicide, kidnap, blackmail and a gang of jewel thieves.
Therefore, violence plays a big part in the book.
Beneath this action, there is another, a deeper theme: the power of the will. First, Moose Mallow
wants absolutely to find his girlfriend Velma when he is out of prison. That is why he commits crimes
again: he kills two people on his quest. Furthermore, Velma, who wants to become rich, is heady too.
She gives up her job, her boyfriend and her reputation and murders people too to reach that. At
least, the private detective Philip Marlowe wants to discover the truth at the risk of his life. He is
kidnapped, threatened, injured, et cetera but he does not give up. The negative effects of the taken
risks are the costs of success.
At least, police corruption is an important theme. In the next paragraph, this will be explained.
Setting
The location of the story is Bay City, modelled on Santa Monica[1], which had a very corrupt
government in the 1930s. There is a lot of corruption in Farewell, my Lovely too. Par example, the
policeman who gets the case is a racist and the police chief threatens Marlowe. Raymond Chandler
despises with this book the corruption of the early 20th century.
Naturally, the story takes place during this period. This affects the story line in technical respect
because in the 1930s tools like hidden cameras, satellites and DNA databanks did not exist. The
detectives used methods like rational thinking and interviewing people to solve a crime.
Furthermore, there were no mobile phones. When Marriott is killed, Marlowe has to go to a house to
call the police. At least, it took longer to catch the offender because the communication system was
not as well developed as today.
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Character
The novel’s main character is Philip Marlowe, a single private detective with a soft heart, who is not
averse of alcohol and cigarettes. He always gets into trouble because he wants absolutely to find out
the truth. He is a brave person who does not shrink from danger. However, his clients do not like
him: he just helps them when they tell him exactly how the matters stand. Furthermore, inasmuch
as he pokes his nose into everything, his popularity to the police is not big.
That is why he changes a little bit in the story. He tries to walk away from the troubles and takes
another case: a blackmailer victim, who has to pay an $8,000 ransom for a jade necklace, asks for his
help. However, when the man has been killed, Philip finds out there is a connection between the two
cases. On this way, the detective gets into trouble: he is abducted, threatened, injured et cetera.
Nevertheless, he stays just as brave (or imprudent) as he usually is.
Key scene
The key scene is the scene in which Marriott asks Marlowe for his help to buy back the rare necklace
of his woman friend. Marlowe has just refused the case with Moose and Velma but he is out of work
and accepts this case. They drive in the middle of the night to the meeting point. However, at that
place Marlowe is knocked out and when he comes to, he meets Anne Riordan, who has found
Marriott killed.
In this scene, the two cases – the case with Moose and Velma and the case with Marriott – begin to
overlap each other. In this scene, Marlowe becomes concerned again in the case from which he has
tried to walk away. In this scene, he starts to get into troubles again. This book is about the link
between the two cases and that is why this scene is so important.
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Ending
Marlowe realizes Mrs. Grayle is actually Moose's missing girlfriend Velma. She is the killer of Marriott
because he knew her real identity. He was not the leader of a gang of jewel thieves, who blackmailed
Velma, but he thought he was helping her to kill Marlowe. That was a trap of Velma.
Since the detective knows that Mrs. Grayle Velma is, she wants to kill him too. At the moment she is
going to shoot Marlowe death, Moose, who has found her and knows that it was she who had
betrayed him eight years ago, comes out of hiding. The woman kills him and then she flees. Later,
Marlowe hears that she has murdered the policeman who recognized her singing in a nightclub and
then she has committed suicide.
I think the ending is satisfying. The main theme of the story is crime. While I was reading the book, I
asked myself things like: ‘Why is Marriott so secretive?’ and ‘Why has he been killed?’ At the end of
the book I knew the answers at these questions.
Personal opinion
I think Raymond Chandler was a very good writer. I like his style, which contains a lot of metaphorical
language and a little bit humour, for example: ‘His smile was as cunning as a broken mousetrap.’ The
descriptions of the situations are meticulous because it is a detective novel. However, that did not
hinder. I liked the book too because I were invited to think along and the reader has to pay attention
to understand the story line. Sometimes I lost the thread, yet I understood the story.
I have learned how the detectives in the early 20th century solve crimes. Furthermore, I know more
about the police corruption in the United States in the 1930s so I have understood the message of
the writer.
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