Samuel Dashiell Hammett

The Maltese Falcon (1894-1961 )

Background

• Born in 1894 in St. Mary, Maryland; died of lung cancer in 1961
• Married Josephine Dolan in 1921; separated in 1927 and divorced in 1937; had two daughters.
• Attended Baltimore Polytechnic Institute.
• Served in the U.S. Army Ambulance Corps in World War I (1918-1919) and in the U.S. Army Signal Corps in World War II (1942-1945), became sergeant; buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

Career

• In his early years, worked as a freight clerk, stevedore, timekeeper, yardman, and railroad worker.
• Spent two stints as a detective with Pinkerton National Detective Agency (1914-1918, 1919-1921).
• Worked as a San Francisco  advertising copywriter in the 1920s.
• Worked sporadically as a screenwriters from 1930 until the end of World War II.
• A Marxist who became active in various left-wing organizations after 1937, including the Civil Rights Congress, in which he was a local and national officer.
• Convicted and imprisoned for contempt of Congress.
• Faculty member (1946-47, 1949-56) and  member of the board of trustees (1948) of the Jefferson School of Social Sciences.

Major Writings

Novels
Red Harvest (1927)
The Dain Curse (1929)
The Maltese Falcon (1930)
The Glass Key (1931)
The Thin Man (1972)

Short Story Collections
$106,000 Blood Money (1943), published as The Big Knockover (1948)
The Adventures of Sam Spade (1944)
The Continental Op (1945)
A Man Called Spade (1945)
The Return of the Continental Op (1945)
Dead Yellow Women (1947)
Nightmare Town (1948)
Creeping Siamese (1950)
Woman in the Dark (1951)
A Man Named Thin (1962)

Biographical Sources, Critical Sources and Reviews

• For critical and biographical information, see the following Gale publications:  Contemporary Authors, Volumes 81-84; Contemporary Authors, New Revision Series, Volume 42; Contemporary Literary Criticism, Volumes 5, 10, 19, and 47; and Dictionary of Literary Biography, Documentary series, Volume 6.   Gale Literary Database (Contemporary Authors Online) can be accessed online through a subscribing library at www.galenet.com.

• Some print resources:
  Dashiell Hammett, Underworld USA, Jean-Pierre Deloux, Monaco, 1994.
  Hammett, Joe Gorres (1975)
  Murder for Pleasure, Howard Haycraft, 1941.
  The American Romam Noir: Hammett, Cain, and Chandler, William Marling, Athens, GA,1995.
  Hellman and Hammett, Joan Mellon, New york, 1996.
  The Critical Response to Dashiell Hammett, ed. Christopher Metress, Westport, CT, 1994. [Table of Contents]
  Dashiell Hammet: A Casefook, William F. Nolan, 1969.
  
• Online resources:
  
  Some of the major sites:
  Dashiell Hammett -- A Guide to Classic Mystery and Detection Home Page
  The Continental Detective Agency -- Dashiell Hammett biography, books, and more.
  Authors and Creators --Dashiell Hammet
  Dashiell Hammett (1894-1961)
  The Maltese Falcom FAQ [version 3]
  The Black Bird
  
  Sites with summary or special information:
  The Arlington National Cemetery --picture of grave and biography
  PBS "American Masters" series description of their special "Dashiell Hammett. Detective. Writer." including an interview with Hammett's daughter Josephine.  PBS Press Release for "Dashiell Hammett. Detective. Writer."
  Genesis: Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon (Chapter Two of Feminine Transgression and the Hypermasculine Response in the American Hard-Boild Novel by Don Haynes
  Dashiell Hammett -- The Vintage Library.
  Mystery Greats: Mystery Time Line --Dashiell Hammett
  Dashiell Hammett, Mystery and Suspense Writer
  Dashiell Hammett
  Mystery Guide -- The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett
  
  Of possible interest:
  The following review of recent Hammett biographies are available in the New York Times online book archives:
  "Books of the Times" by John Leonard, July 8, 1981, a review of Shadow Man, the Life of Dashiell Hammett.
  "Mysteries of a Hard Case" by George Stade, October 16, 1983; and "Books of the Times" by Christopher Lehmann-Haupt, October 5, 1983, both reviews of Diane Johnson's Dashiell Hammett: A Life.
  "Why the Writing Had to Stop" by Julian Symons, May 8, 1983, a review of William F. Nolan's Hammett, A Life At the Edge.
  "Scoundrel Time" by Terry Teachout, June 23, 1996, a review of Joan Mellen's Hellman and Hammett.