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Binding: HardcoverDewey Decimal Number: 813.52 EAN: 9780375423512 Edition: 1 ISBN: 0375423516 Label: Pantheon Manufacturer: Pantheon Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 368 Publication Date: November 06, 2007 Publisher: Pantheon Release Date: November 06, 2007 Studio: Pantheon Editorial Review: Product Description: Raymond Chandler was one of the most original and enduring crime novelists of the twentieth century. Yet much of his pre-writing life, including his unconventional marriage, has remained shrouded in mystery. In this compelling, wholly original book, Judith Freeman sets out to solve the puzzle of who Chandler was and how he became the writer who would create in Philip Marlowe an icon of American culture. Freeman uncovers vestiges of the Los Angeles that was terrain and inspiration for Chandler’s imagination, including the nearly two dozen apartments and houses the Chandlers moved into and out of over the course of two decades. She also uncovers the life of Cissy Pascal, the older, twice-divorced woman Chandler married in 1924, who would play an essential role in how he came to understand not only his female characters–and Marlowe’s relation to them–but himself as well. A revelation of a marriage that was a wellspring of need, illusion, and creativity, The Long Embrace provides us with a more complete picture of Raymond Chandler’s life and art than any we have had before. Average Rating:
 Rating:  - You need to be a Chandler fanThis is a book especially for Raymond Chandler fans, who not only have read his books, but have read them a second time and enjoyed them even more. The writer is obviously in love with Chandler and lovingly describes his life in a fascinating travel of where he lived, what he did while there, and the most important, his relationship with his wife and how the relationship influenced his writings ( and perhaps veiwpoint.) I also enjoyed the writer's ... Read More Rating: - LOS ANGELES EMBRACEDThis book captured me on many levels. I found in this book, not only a love and reverence for Raymond Chandler, but also for Los Angeles. I think that the Long Embrace is really the embrace of Los Angeles. An embrace that impacted Chandler and Freeman and readers. I am a native of Los Angeles and in the age bracket beyond midlife. I understand the journey and searching for a person's and a city's history. I enjoyed her almost tangible manipulations of Los ... Read More Rating:  - More research and less imagination Judith Freeman relies heavily on inspiration and imagination to flesh out Raymond Chandler's very full but incomplete life in her book "The Long Embrace." But more thorough research might have gotten better answers to all the questions she raised about Raymond Chandler, creator of the Philip Marlowe stories in novels, short stories and film. For example, during Chandler's "Hollywood" period he worked with Billy Wilder on the film "Double Indemnity". The relationship was somewhat strained but what we ... Read More Rating: - a must for CaliforniansInteresting biography about a very unusual couple. The history of LA was a real added benefit to readers of the book. Rating: - A Pilgrim's View"The Long Embrace" is a strange but somehow enthralling pilgrimage to the houses and apartments where Raymond Chandler and his wife lived during their long marriage. Descriptions of those buildings that still exist are interspersed with anecdotes about Chandler and Cissy, and about the author's career as a novelist and screen writer. Chandler was a footloose soul and the couple seldom remained for more than six months in any of their Southern California homes. Freeman admits to an obsession with Chandler's ... Read More |
