James Myers Thompson was born on September 27,1906, in Anadarko, Oklahoma. He died on April 7, 1977, in Los Angeles, California. Thompson was a writer of novels, short stories and screenplays.

He turned to crime fiction relatively late in his life, at the age of 43. Buried under the shabbiest conventions of pulp fiction, all but 3 of the 26 novels he published between 1942 and 1973 were paperback originals. Despite some positive critical notice, he was little-recognized in his lifetime.

It was only after death that Thompson's literary stature grow, when in the late 1980s, several of his novels were reprinted by Black Lizard. Thompson's writing culminated in a few of his best-regarded works: The Killer Inside Me, Savage Night, A Hell of a Woman and Pop. 1280.

In these works, Thompson turned the derided pulp genre into literature and art, featuring unreliable narrators, odd structure, and surrealism. A number of Thompson's books became popular films, including The Getaway, After Dark My Sweet & The Grifters. Writer R.V. Cassills has suggested that of all the pulp fiction novels written, Thompson's was the rawest and most harrowing; that neither Dashiell Hammett nor Raymond Chandler ever "wrote a book within miles of Thompson".

Similarly, in the introduction to Now and on Earth, Stephen King says that he most admires Thompson's work because, "The guy was over the top. The guy was absolutely over the top. Big Jim didn't know the meaning of the word stop.

There are three brave lets inherent in the forgoing: he let himself see everything, he let himself write it down, then he let himself publish it." To learn more about Jim Thompson, read his biography "Savage Art" by Robert Polito. (Winner of 'The National Book Critic's Circle Award for Biography' & 'The Edgar Award Winner for Best Critical/Biographical Work').

Similar to 0 things you like: