by the Night Writer
“…and there is a Catskill eagle in some souls that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges, and soar out of them again and become invisible in the sunny spaces. And even if he forever flies within the gorge, that gorge is in the mountains; so that even in his lowest swoop the mountain eagle is still higher than the other birds upon the plain, even though they soar.”
— Herman Melville
I’m just about finished with Part 2 of “Going My Way or the Highway, and Avoiding the Ditches” and hope to have that up later tonight or sometime tomorrow. I must, however, pause to take note of the passing today of author Robert B. Parker. Parker was the modern master of the hard-boiled, wise-cracking detective and a prolific writer, cranking out something like three novels a year. I first came across his Spenser series back in the early 80’s and it became my second-favorite all-time detective/adventure series behind John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee. Parker also created two other mystery series for protagonists Jesse Stone and Sunny Randall, and wrote some pretty successful westerns (one of which, Appaloosa, was made into a movie). His books were the basis for the mid-80s TV series Spenser for Hire (a show that totally impressed me with the perfect casting of Robert Urich and Avery Brooks, who looked almost exactly as I had pictured Spenser and Hawk in my mind’s eye when reading the stories).
Some will dismiss the detective mystery genre as inconsequential, but the best of it features compelling characters, a lot of chewy philosophy and a rugged worldview. Among those who write at this level, Robert B. Parker is that Catskill eagle who, even when he swoops low, remains higher than any other. While some of his later books were rather formulaic (though very entertaining), he had a style and a philosophy that was engaging and even educational. A Catskill Eagle is, of course, also the title of one of the Spenser novels, and in my mind a seminal one. It is the book in the series that simultaneously turns the Spenser character into a darker, but also more hopeful, hero.
I first got hooked on mysteries by reading Raymond Chandler stories and novels and when I came upon the early Spensers I was thrilled with Parker’s revival of the smart-mouthed, hard on the outside, soft on the inside detective. In addition to engaging in wisecracks, cultural commentary, compelling plots and PG-13 sex, Spenser shared details on manly gourment cooking and sharp dressing. As the book series went on it seemed to me that the plots became less intricate and the main characters spoke almost in a kind of shorthand meant for old friends and regular readers. Meanwhile, the “Parker code” became as much of a character in the stories as Spenser, Susan and Hawk. The code was essentially Parker’s “a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do” philosophy of honor, duty and obligation that was understood by Spenser and Hawk and eventually by Susan. I could describe it as a Spenser code except that it was there, big as life — unspoken-word for un-spoken word — in two of Parker’s westerns; Gunman’s Rhapsody and Appaloosa (it’s probably in Brimstone and Resolution as well, but I haven’t gotten around to reading these yet. It was almost anachronistic, and I can’t say I bought it completely (in fact, I almost wrote an essay once on where I disagreed with it) but it was part and parcel of the Parker experience. Parker/Spenser himself probably recognized the limits of the philosophy but would have stuck with it anyway out of loyalty. In a way, while I should be quoting Parker, I think his view of it and faith in it is more like the speech that Uncle Hub gave in the movie Second-hand Lions:
Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things that a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil. And I want you to remember this, that love…true love…never dies. You remember that, boy. Doesn’t matter if they’re true or not because those are the things worth believing in.
Perhaps the first book where the code began to come to the fore (I’ve read all the books but I’m not at a place where I can write a thesis) is Early Autumn where Spenser takes a confused teen-age boy under his wing and shows him what it means to be a man. As I said, it’s not a perfect code, but it’s better than most.
It was fitting when Parker took on the project to complete Chandler’s unfinished novel, Poodle Springs, and did it seamlessly, allowing Chandler and Marlowe to live on into a new generation. Similarly, there may be posthumous Parker manuscripts. Parker was 77 years old, but still maintaining his writing pace. Reports are that he was found dead at his writing desk this morning by his wife when she returned from her morning run. He has another book that’s due out in a couple of months, and reportedly there are two finished but unpublished Spenser manuscripts set aside as well.
I’ll keep my eyes open for those when they come out, and I plan to go back and re-read some of the early Spensers and keep my eyes open for the new works (I may have missed one of the newer releases), and I may look up the two westerns I haven’t read. Robert B. Parker has been a significant part of my life and has influenced my thinking and writing in ways that I may not even be aware of. Though I know how the old books end, and know the formula so well as to predict the plots and outcomes of the newer ones, I think it’s important to revisit these.
After all, a man’s got to do what a man’s got to do.
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