Celebrating the Unpopular Arts
 

So why Hammett?

I really like the cover for this collection —— but why pick Dashiell Hammett to select the stories (or stick his name on the cover even if he didn’t)? While he’s a major hardboiled novelist, it’s not as if he has any particular rep as a horror writer or reader I know of so what does he bring to the table?

I thought it might be that this was a set of horror stories by detective writers, but it includes familiar names such as H.P. Lovecraft, Donald Wandrei and John Collier. So what’s the angle?

(Why yes, Thanksgiving activities did get in the way of a longer blog post, so this is the best I could do)

#SFWApro. Art is uncredited.

9 Comments

    1. Someone else made the same suggestion elsewhere online.
      It’s not a great connection — Hammett hardly screamed Suspense! let alone Horror! the way Hitch’s name did (especially after Psycho) — but I can’t think of anything else either.

      1. Le Messor

        I don’t think it’s a great connection, either, but it’s all I could come up with.

        You know a lot more about this stuff than I do – so if you can’t think of it, I can’t think of it.

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