Sunday Story Ratings #33: Marijuana and a Pistol

[aesmael]

Originally published at a denizen's entertainment. You can comment here or there.

Marijuana and a Pistol by Chester Himes

Originally published 1940 in the Esquire; this edition 1995

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Collected in: Hard-Boiled: An Anthology of American Crime Stories (ed. Bill Pronzini & Jack Adrian)

 

MA15+

(D, V)

Drug Use {MA}

Violence {MA}

 

Representations

Gender:

Only one woman is mentioned in the text, and she is not present (only three people are directly mentioned). The male viewpoint character is in a downward spiral over his girlfriend dropping him for lack of money.

Sex:

Through what was written above, only.

Race & Ethnicity:

The author, himself black, noted for being a pioneer in the genre for writing black characters as people and for addressing race; no character in this short piece however is marked that I noticed.

Disability, Physical Diversity and Health:

No mention.

 

 

Notes

Upsetting in its brief, inexorable bleakness.

Comments

[coniferous_you]

I think I've seen this anthology somewhere. And normally, I don't care either way about crime drama, but:

brief, inexorable bleakness

A good description of most adult fiction I like. Too bad it doesn't take place in the country; then it'd be the latest in a long line of favorite books (perhaps if it was An Anthology of Canadian Crime Stories...)