Raymond Chandler

Maurice Guinness, and English detective novelist, once suggested to Raymond Chandler that it might be a good idea if his detective-protagonist Philip Marlowe were to get married. Chandler disagreed.

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I think he will always have a fairly shabby office, a lonely house, a number of affairs, but no permanent connection. I think he will always be awakened at some inconvenient hour by some inconvenient person to do some inconvenient job. I see him always in a lonely street, in lonely rooms, puzzled but never quite defeated.

-- Raymond Chandler

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[Source: Edwin McDowell, "Raymond Chandler: A Master Letter-Writer, Too" in The New York Times]

Philip K. Dick

"You meet people and you realize they don't like being alive"

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Ray Bradbury is talking about Philip K. Dick. Evidently Dick did not become a big draw until after his death at 53. The smash film "Blade Runner" came out four months after he died. He was apparently a sad figure who came so close to the big time. At least his books and name have won literary immortality.

[Source: Michael Schmidt, "The Novel: A Biography"]