I Married a Bat Man

Here I am just a month and a half back to this here blog and I already have a stack of a dozen books on my desk awaiting review.  How does this happen?  So, we can now reinaugurate the multi-book review.

Today’s theme: Noir.  And therein lies a puzzle.  What exactly is Noir?  I recently read Woolrich’s I Married a Dead Man, which is included in the Library of America’s volume: Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1930’s and 1940’s.  I also reread the Loeb/Sale collaborations: Batman: The Long Halloween and Batman: Dark Victory.  The preface to the first volume says that the book was born when an editor met with Loeb and said, “I always liked what you two did with gangsters.  Ever thought about doing a kind of film noir tale?”

So, what is it that connect these books?

The Woolrich story was good.  A penniless (technically, nearly penniless) pregnant women is in a train crash which kills a newly wedded couple, and (for absurd reasons) is mistaken for the dead wife, brought into the home of the dead husband’s rather wealthy family, falls in love with the dead husband’s brother, and is all set for a wonderful future when her deception catches up with her ending in a terribly ambiguous ending about the prospects for happiness for one and all.  Not a lot of mystery here—the central mystery foreshadowed in the introductory chapter means there is either an unreliable narrator or the brother did it—and there is no way to tell from the story which and it doesn’t really matter which for the purposes of the story.  This is clearly a book designed to evoke a mood, not tell a tightly constructed story.  In both regards it does a pretty good job.

The Loeb/Sale Batman books are one part the continuation of the story begin in Frank Miller’s Batman: Year 1, and one part giant murder mystery (or technically since we are talking about two books, two different murder mysteries, which are linked, so in a technical sense it is two books, but it is really just one long story with a natural break point).  Endless references to The Godfather (parts 1 and 2—thankfully, Loeb and Sale also seem perfectly willing pretend part 3 never happened).  [The Godfather references are sometimes pretty funny—some of them are fairly overt, but a lot of them are just something in the picture.]   I read these books years ago and I thought they were OK.  Rereading them, I thought they were fantastic.  I have no idea why I was less impressed the first time I read them, but after this rereading, they are definitely some of the best of Batman.  The art is really good and the story is well done.

The link?  What makes them both Noirish?  Google “Noir” and you get a lot of gobbledygook (that’s a technical phrase).  Noir is, as far as I can tell, one of those things you know when you see it.  Except I am not sure I do.  Obviously Noir is dark (I think Comedic Noir is an oxymoron) and has a crime of some sort.  Gritty?  That might be part of it.  The OED defines it thus: “A genre of crime film or detective fiction characterized by cynicism, sleaziness, fatalism, and moral ambiguity.”  That certainly sounds Noirish, but I Married a Dead Man isn’t terribly cynical or sleazy—there is one character who is both, but the story as a whole is neither.  The Loeb/Sale Batman comics have zero moral ambiguity, and not much fatalism.  And when I think over the other novels in the Library of America volume containing the Woolrich tale, I am not sure any of them—all of which have the LOA stamp (and is there a Higher Authority on such things?) saying they are authoritatively Noir—fit that description perfectly. 

Oddly, my ability to come up with anything resembling a definition does not seem to faze me much.  If I was asked if I like Noir as a genre, I wouldn’t hesitate to say I did.  Why?  There I get stuck because in order to explain why I like a genre, I would necessarily need to define the genre and I have a hard time doing that.  But, I do like it.  I really enjoyed all three of these books.

Is it a moral failing to enjoy reading tales suffused with moral ambiguity about cynical, sleazy, fatalistic characters?  I don’t think so. But why not?  If human depravity is a bad thing (which I hope is not a controversial proposition), then why shouldn’t reading a tale about human depravity also be a bad thing?  Undoubtedly there are many who would argue they are equivalent.  However, understanding humanity is surely a good thing (also non-controversial), and thus shouldn’t reading a tale which teaches us something about the human condition also be a good thing?  Raising the question like this really feels like sophomoric rambling—probably because it is sophomoric rambling.  Yet, I am, in fact, mildly troubled by the fact that I am not in the least bit troubled about enjoying reading Noir—it doesn’t bother me, and I am not really bothered that I am not bothered, but I am a bit bothered by the fact that I am not bothered than I am not bothered.  Yeah, I know that sounds like I just have too much time on my hands, but nonetheless, it is real.

Recommending these books—well, assuming your conscience is not bothered—the Woolrich book was a nice end to the LOA volume, and I would highly recommend the LOA volume.  Good stories throughout.  The Batman books I would also highly, very highly, recommend if you liked Miller’s Year 1. (Don’t bother reading them if you haven’t read the Miller volume, which is easily one of the most important Batman comics, so if you haven’t read that book yet, you should certainly do so.)

Is Music Noir a category?  If so, does this fit the description?