WOMAN IN THE DARK
by Hammett, Dashiell
- Used
- Fine
- first
- Condition
- Fine/Fine
- ISBN 10
- 0747200866
- ISBN 13
- 9780747200864
- Seller
-
Los Angeles, California, United States
Payment Methods Accepted
About This Item
Synopsis
Dashiell Samuel Hammett was born in St. Mary’s County. He grew up in Philadelphia and Baltimore. Hammett left school at the age of fourteen and held several kinds of jobs thereafter—messenger boy, newsboy, clerk, operator, and stevedore, finally becoming an operative for Pinkerton’s Detective Agency. Sleuthing suited young Hammett, but World War I intervened, interrupting his work and injuring his health. When Sergeant Hammett was discharged from the last of several hospitals, he resumed detective work. He soon turned to writing, and in the late 1920s Hammett became the unquestioned master of detective-story fiction in America. In The Maltese Falcon (1930) he first introduced his famous private eye, Sam Spade. The Thin Man (1932) offered another immortal sleuth, Nick Charles. Red Harvest (1929), The Dain Curse (1929), and The Glass Key (1931) are among his most successful novels. During World War II, Hammett again served as sergeant in the Army, this time for more than two years, most of which he spent in the Aleutians. Hammett’s later life was marked in part by ill health, alcoholism, a period of imprisonment related to his alleged membership in the Communist Party, and by his long-time companion, the author Lillian Hellman, with whom he had a very volatile relationship. His attempt at autobiographical fiction survives in the story “Tulip,” which is contained in the posthumous collection The Big Knockover (1966, edited by Lillian Hellman). Another volume of his stories, The Continental Op (1974, edited by Stephen Marcus), introduced the final Hammett character: the “Op,” a nameless detective (or “operative”) who displays little of his personality, making him a classic tough guy in the hard-boiled mold—a bit like Hammett himself.
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Details
- Bookseller
- Joe Staats, Bookseller (US)
- Bookseller's Inventory #
- 021007
- Title
- WOMAN IN THE DARK
- Author
- Hammett, Dashiell
- Format/Binding
- No Binding
- Book Condition
- Used - Fine
- Jacket Condition
- Fine
- Quantity Available
- 1
- Edition
- First Thus Edition 1st Printing
- Binding
- Hardcover
- ISBN 10
- 0747200866
- ISBN 13
- 9780747200864
- Publisher
- Headline
- Place of Publication
- London, U.K.
- Date Published
- 1988
- Size
- 8vo - over 7¾" - 9&f
- Product_type
- 2
Terms of Sale
Joe Staats, Bookseller
About the Seller
Joe Staats, Bookseller
About Joe Staats, Bookseller
We specialize in collectible, contemporary signed first editions. First edition means the first printing. (Later printings of the first edition are typically not printed on acid-free paper, and should be avoided by collectors.) Signatures are obtained by us in person. Inscribed books sold by us may contain a line, a phrase, or a sketch that the author has chosen to add. Our signed books are not dedicated to anybody in particular (not to your grandmother, your Aunt Gladys, your ex-lover or your former cellmate), except in the rare case of a presentation copy from an author to a noteworthy person. All our books are hardcover, unless the book is an Advance Reading Copy, Uncorrected Proof, or PBO. You can expect that the books we send you will be as described, and in a physical condition worthy of the author’s having signed them. We do not sell remainder-marked books, signed or otherwise
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