The Road to Hammer: Neoliberalist-Masculinity and The
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THE ROAD TO HAMMER: NEOLIBERALIST-MASCULINITY AND THE POLITICS OF MIKE HAMMER by Marcus Gary Heiligenthal B.A., University of Wisconsin – Whitewater, 2008 A thesis submitted to the Department of English and Foreign Languages College of Arts and Science The University of West Florida In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Masters of the Arts 2012 The thesis of Marcus Gary Heiligenthal is approved: ____________________________________________ _________________ Robert F. Yeager, Ph.D., Committee Member Date ____________________________________________ _________________ David M. Earle, Ph.D., Committee Chair Date Accepted for the Department/Division: ____________________________________________ _________________ Robert F. Yeager, Ph.D., Chair Date Accepted for the University: ____________________________________________ _________________ Richard S. Podemski, Ph.D., Dean, Graduate School Date ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My interest in literary and cultural studies grew out of a series of undergraduate courses with Dr. Edie Thornton. The enthusiasm that Dr. Thornton displayed in discussing texts and her unwavering support of my academic pursuits gave me the confidence to pursue a degree in the field of literature. The guidance of Dr. Robert Yeager has laid the foundation for my achievements at the graduate level. Dr. Yeager’s professional and accessible approach as a professor and an administrator were instrumental in my education and serve as an example of the quality of guidance that should be championed in institutions of higher learning. Dr. Yeager’s humility, respect, understanding, and humor as an instructor are attributes I strive to emulate in my career going forward. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the continued mentorship and support of Dr. David M. Earle. As a mentor, Dr. Earle’s work with periodical studies and his innovative approach to modernism guided my scholarship to develop in new and dynamic ways. Through encouragement, respect, and understanding, he helped foster my love of literary studies and taught me to temper my enthusiasm with rigorous textual research and critical grounding. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iii ABSTRACT .........................................................................................................................v INTRODUCTION ...............................................................................................................1 HARDBOILED-RATIONALITIES AND MIKE HAMMER’S LINEAGE ......................6 MIKE HAMMER AS SALESMAN FOR THE AMERICAN DREAM ..........................14 MIKE HAMMER AS A RETURN TO SHERLOCK HOLMES .....................................20 THE ME, MYSELF, AND HAYEK OF THE “NEOLIBERAL” SCHOOL OF DETECTIVE FICTION .....................................................................................................26 MIKE HAMMER: DESTROYER OF COLLECTIVES, CHAMPION OF THE AMERICAN DREAM .......................................................................................................35 THE FAÇADE OF SPILLANE’S POPULAR NEOLIBERALISM .................................43 WORKS CITED ................................................................................................................45 iv ABSTRACT THE ROAD TO HAMMER: NEOLIBERALIST-MASCULINITY AND THE POLITICS OF MIKE HAMMER Marcus Gary Heiligenthal Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer novels rank among the most popular texts in American fiction. Despite Spillane’s enormous popularity, or perhaps because of it, there remains little critical consideration of his works. Spillane’s work has been dismissed as overly simplistic, highly formulaic, and hyper-violent by the literary community. I assert that Spillane’s work serves both as an archive of the popular cultural turmoil of late modernity and as a vehicle to forward Spillane’s own hyper-masculine politics. Considering Spillane in the context of other hardboiled writers illuminates the ideological nature of Spillane’s Mike Hammer novels. While other writers of the genre used the detective story as a means to articulate nuanced modernist discourses, Spillane flouts this tradition in a dangerously simplistic attempt to forward a highly nationalistic, neoliberalist-masculine ideology. v INTRODUCTION Ayn Rand was a fan of Mickey Spillane (Corliss 3). Ayn Rand, the highly politicized hyper-capitalist, was a supporter of Mickey Spillane‘s Mike Hammer novels. Ayn Rand, the dogmatic right-winger whose name is trumpeted at conservative and libertarian gatherings and whose novel Atlas Shrugged is required reading for every staffer of Rep. Paul Ryan (among others1), was Spillane‘s ―one cheerleader amongst serious novelists‖; yet Rand‘s ally, Spillane, is considered apolitical and devoid of critical depth (Corliss 3). Spillane‘s work was detested by critics, who likened his character Mike Hammer to a ―homicidal maniac with a passion for ripping the clothes from women and shooting them in the abdomen‖ (Cowley 106). Spillane was despised by modernists, who saw Spillane as a figure of artistic betrayal and commercialism because he referred to his readers as ―customers‖ and boasted of ―requiring between three days and two weeks to complete a novel‖ (Van Dover 99). Yet Spillane, an outcast of the literary community, was one the best-selling novelists of the twentieth century and, by 1980, author of seven of the top fifteen all-time best-selling novels in the United States (Sutherland 1). Spillane‘s neglect left his immensely popular works uninvestigated, texts that present insight into the tumultuous cultural climate of post–World War II America. Returning to 1 Rand continues to emerge as a touchstone in modern Republican and Tea Party politics. Besides Paul Ryan requiring that each staffer read Ayn Rand‘s Atlas Shrugged, Sen. Rand Paul (although denying he was named after her) has professed his admiration for Rand‘s novels and Sen. Ron Johnson called Atlas Shrugged a ―foundational book‖ that serves as ―a warning for what could happen in America‖ (Beam, ―The Trouble with Liberty‖). Furthermore, both Sen. Mike Johanns and Rep. John Kline named Atlas Shrugged as among their favorite summer reads (Koebler, ―Lawmakers Name Their Favorite Summer Reads‖). 1 Spillane‘s novels exposes that Rand‘s fondness for his work was not arbitrary, nor due solely to the famous ―surprise endings,‖ but based upon their similar political ideologies of hyper-capitalism (Collins xi). Ayn Rand loved Mickey Spillane because Mike Hammer is reminiscent of the same political ethos as her own enigmatic character John Galt, but with a .45, a flask of rye, and private investigator‘s license. Spillane is often associated with the hardboiled school of detective fiction, though this relationship demands further elucidation. This subgenre, originating in Black Mask magazine during the 1920s, offered a new, modernist interpretation of detective fiction. Black Mask became famous for depicting violent realism and shaping ―hardboiled- rationalities‖: new approaches toward masculinity, independence, class, and social standing reshaped in the context of modernity. Notable hardboiled authors like Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler were sources of popular cultural insight into American society and critically engaged modern anxieties concerning urbanization, industrialization, individualism, masculinity, and the American Dream. While the hardboiled school has been critically reconsidered in recent scholarship, hardboiled fiction was originally dismissed by scholars for being overly formulaic and ―unsophisticated.‖ Yet, unlike Spillane, the hardboiled school was regarded as politically charged. Dashiell Hammett‘s fiction espoused political sentiment that eventually landed him on the blacklist during Joseph McCarthy‘s House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) trials, and Raymond Chandler‘s Farewell, My Lovely offers scathing criticism of the American Dream. Spillane‘s novels, however, have been noticeably absent from these political, and critical, considerations. 2 Spillane is championed as the antithesis of the sophisticated aspects of the hardboiled genre. The limited criticism that deals with Spillane describes the Hammer novels as hollow manifestations of the hardboiled school. Spillane has been said to ―[employ] the same mechanics pioneered by Hammett‖ but ―in the service of . ferocious sadism‖ and has been lampooned for his seemingly wanton violence (O‘Brien 12). Critics found it ironic that while ―Sam Spade‘s literary descendant Mike Hammer was kicking in the teeth of Commie subversives . Sam Spade‘s creator [Hammet] was going to prison for refusing to testify against Leftist acquaintances‖ (O‘Brien 12). Spillane‘s and Hammett‘s political approaches vary drastically, but Spillane‘s politics are far from absent. Rather, Spillane represents an unconsidered popular form of neoliberalist ideology. Spillane emerged on the literary scene with I, the Jury in 1947, when American political discourse was concerned with combating the threat of Communism. The political landscape of the early Cold War was rife with fervent nationalism and aggressive masculine attitudes. While Hammer is described as nationalistic and hyper- masculine, these connotations serve to ―sell‖ Spillane‘s individualist ideology as an inextricable extension of nationalism and masculinity. Spillane merges individualism with these discourses to create a social imperative for self-interest: being masculine and nationalistic