Michael A. Kahn

Mystery #2 for Literary Snobs: The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon

Posted on February 18, 2013 by Michael Kahn

With our second mystery, we move from the surreal river running through the dark continent to the surreal freeways running through sunny California. Same themes, same structure. In Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49, our reluctant detective is Oedipa Mass, a California housewife whose name is our first hint at the crazy world…

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Mystery #1 for Literary Snobs: Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Posted on February 16, 2013 by Michael Kahn

The topic of my last post on the Poisoned Pen Press blog was about the challenge of convincing literary snobs that there are indeed great works of literature that meet all criteria of that lowly genre known as Mystery. The 3 basic requirements of the genre (as more fully explained in the original post) are:…

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Mysteries for Literary Snobs

Posted on February 14, 2013February 16, 2013 by Michael Kahn

Once upon a time, novels were just, well, novels. Pride and Prejudice was once just a novel, as were The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, and The Woman in White. If first published this year, however, each would be slotted into one of the genre ghettos constructed by the literary snobs….

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Great Opening Lines: Thoughts from Other Fans

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Michael Kahn

A few months back, I did a post on the greatest opening lines in literature. Since then, I’ve had a chance to sample through the thoughts of others on the subject. Below are some of my favorite pieces: Let’s start with a fun post by Guy Dammann of the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. Atop…

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“If You Build It, Hollywood Will Come”: More Thoughts on Movie Adaptations

Posted on January 29, 2013February 5, 2013 by Michael Kahn

It’s simple Hollywood math: the most popular novel of the year–or even of the decade–has been read by just a fraction of the number of people who’ve seen the movie version of the novel. The subject of my last post was Mario Puzo’s novel, The Godfather, and the Francis Ford Coppola film adaptation of the…

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Some More Thoughts on Hollywood and the Novel

Posted on January 23, 2013March 30, 2013 by Michael Kahn

As I work on my next post for Poisoned Pen Press–“Mysteries for Literary Snobs”–I pause to return to our consideration of Hollywood adaptations of novels. While authors have long been happy to sell the motion picture rights in their novel, they tend to strike a condescending pose when asked about Hollywood. Ernest Hemingway wrote that…

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End Game: The Art of the Closer

Posted on January 16, 2013January 18, 2013 by Michael Kahn

This is my sequel to my prior post on the Poisoned Pen Press blog. That one was on great opening lines in novels. This one is on great closing lines, including my five favorites. Enjoy!

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The Perfect Ending: Hollywood v. the Novel, Part 3

Posted on January 10, 2013January 10, 2013 by Michael Kahn

And now for the third and final comparison of the closing scene in a major Hollywood movie with the closing scene in the novel on which it was based. Our focus today: The Maltese Falcon. The supposed last line of the movie version invariably makes those lists of Top Ten Greatest Closing Lines: “The stuff…

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The Perfect Ending? Hollywood versus the Novel, Part 2

Posted on January 7, 2013January 9, 2013 by Michael Kahn

Following up on my last post, here is a look at the closing scene of the second of three classic Hollywood movies and the closing lines of the novel on which it is based. While almost all of us have seen and can even recite lines from the 1939 MGM motion picture musical, The Wizard of…

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The Perfect Ending? Hollywood Versus the Novel, Part 1

Posted on January 4, 2013January 7, 2013 by Michael Kahn

T.S. Eliot opened his poem “East Coker” with the line: “In my beginning is my end,” and he closed it, “In my end is my beginning.” I wrote about beginnings in my last Poisoned Pen Press blog post–specifically, the form and function of a great opening line to a novel. My next post for that…

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