Saturday, October 10, 2009

Obama meets Philip Marlowe

Considering Barak Obama's unique role in a milieu of cynicism and acquisition and violent rhetoric, I was reminded of some lines in Raymond Chandler's classic essay, "The Simple Art of Murder."

Chandler was writing about the qualities of a detective hero (his was Philip Marlowe), but these words--probably the best known of any Chandler wrote--seem to apply equally well to Obama:

"Down these mean street a man must go who is not himself mean, who is neither tarnished nor afraid.  He must be a complete man and a  common man and yet an unusual man.  He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor....If there were enough like him, the world would be a very safe place to live in, without becoming too dull to be worth living in"

Do you think the Nobel committee has been reading Raymond Chandler?  

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