The Long Goodbye

“I don’t read them often, only when I run out of things to dislike.”

Marlowe is a misanthropic figure who seeks out reasons to be miserable. The gossip columns in the newspapers aggravate him, so he actively reads the stories of the rich and the famous to fuel his dispassion for the world. For Marlowe, this is a form of discipline. He punishes himself for his perceived failures by reminding himself how he works to preserve a world and a system which he evidently dislikes.

“Hard little men in hard little offices talking hard little words that don’t mean a goddamn thing.”

Marlowe’s cynicism strips away the thin veneer of sensibility which masks the true reality of the world. Everyone in Los Angeles is putting on a show, from the movie stars to the police to his clients. Marlowe is experienced enough to understand the hollow performance of the world around him, knowing that none of their performances mean anything.

“It doesn’t have to be true. It just has to be consistent with the known facts, and the known facts you could count on your fingers.”

Truth is a subjective experience. Marlowe believes that, with enough money, the rich and powerful can reshape the truth of the world as they please. Someone like Potter or Sylvia has enough money to cover up scandal and hide their crimes, even if said crimes are in the public interest. The “known facts” (48) are only true insofar as they are permitted to be true by the rich and powerful.

“I’ve lived with them and they are bored and lonely people.”

To Marlowe, the rich elite of Los Angeles make up a distant and alien culture. They are so far removed from his experience of reality that he struggles to relate to them. Importantly, Marlowe observes how frequently their money fails to make them happy. This observation makes him feel better about having less money. He knows that money will not buy him happiness.

“Along the ridges there will be television aerials instead.”

The changing shape of the physical world reflects encroaching and inevitable modernization. Privacy and isolation are impossible when the same monoculture, represented by television, is beamed into every home. The ridges of the empty landscape around the ranch will no longer offer the same privacy they once did, and the former artists’ retreat will just become another suburb, swallowed up by the march of progress.

“Only it smells of death.”

Marlowe frequently operates in the criminal underworld. He feels at home with petty criminals and their morally grey perspective. Unlike them, however, Marlowe has a distinct moral code. What Varley does is legal but immoral. Conversely, Marlowe may occasionally break the law, but he never breaks his moral code. Marlowe is distinguished by his moral sincerity.

“I’d rather be a heel.”

Marlowe prefers to be “a heel” (86), but he rarely manages to do so. By "heel,” he means a person who projects an unsympathetic persona. Because of his moral code and his empathy for other, he cannot help but do what he feels is right, even though he knows that his life would be easier if he was able to play the villain. He believes that Lennox would still be alive if Marlowe had never helped him. The desire to be a heel is a protective form of self-loathing, in which Marlowe tries to be bad to insulate himself from the pain that comes with doing good in a bad world.

“Drunks don’t educate, my friend. They disintegrate. And part of the process is a lot of fun.”

Wade is pessimistic about his prospects. He knows that he is an alcoholic, spiraling out of control toward his own destruction, but he tries to frame his existence as “a lot of fun” (103). The hollowness of Wade’s comments is evident, as neither he nor his wife is entertained by his very real problem. Wade drinks heavily to numb the trauma of his past, rather than to amuse himself in the present. He knows that he is broken, but he tries to present himself as a happy, functioning member of society to appease Marlowe.

“I was the heel to end all heels.”

By the midway point in the novel, Marlowe has achieved his goal of becoming the “heel” (119). Although he acts as if he does not care to protect himself against losing another friend like Terry Lennox, he cannot help himself. He may be presenting himself as “the heel to end all heels” (119) but he cannot maintain this persona for long and he cannot stop helping others, even when doing so makes him vulnerable or puts him in danger.

“I was handling the drink carefully, a sip at a time, watching myself.”

After spending so much time around alcoholics like Wade, Marlowe monitors his own drinking carefully. He does drink heavily, but he has the self-restraint to prevent him from completely giving his life over to alcohol. Marlowe is saved by his own inward pessimism, as he cannot trust himself to drink without being suspicious about his addictive habits.

“I don’t know how it feels to be worth a hundred million or so, but he didn’t look as if he was having any fun.”

Marlowe attempts to understand the world of the rich and the powerful, but it seems like an alien culture to him. Mostly, wealthy people simply seem unhappy. Harlan Potter may be the richest man Marlowe has ever met, but he gets no enjoyment from his wealth, and the exercise of power seems to Potter more like an imposition than a privilege. Meeting people like Potter validates Marlowe’s socioeconomic status, showing him that he does not need the money that he does not have.

“Don’t be a hero, young man. There’s no percentage in it.”

Potter’s view of the world is just as cynical as Marlowe’s, but it lacks the undergirding morality. Marlowe is suspicious and pessimistic about society, but he cannot help but act in a moral fashion, adhering to his moral code at all times. Occasionally, this might mean that he acts like “a hero” (131). Potter cannot understand such a position because “there’s no percentage in it” (131). Potter’s world is reduced to the accumulation and protection of wealth as the reason for everything, whereas Marlowe at least sees some sense in maintaining a moral code. Both men are pessimistic, but Potter’s cynicism is hopeless.

“Only the nicest people. Absolutely no Central Europeans.”

Marlowe observes how the rich neighborhoods also seem to consciously limit the presence of certain demographics. At the time, the concept of whiteness was still in flux; to many, only protestant, Anglo-Saxon people were considered white, while Catholic, Jewish people, and Central and Southern Europeans were excluded. The wealth and privilege of the rich communities creates a racially homogenous neighborhood which deliberately limits the presence of people that are not considered white. Such people, Marlowe notes, present themselves as “the nicest people” (139), despite their prejudices.

“They don’t leave notes.”

Of the two supposed suicides that take place in the novel, Marlowe is much less suspicious of Wade’s suicide because he did not leave a note. To Marlowe, the lack of a note adds authenticity. The unspoken implication here is that Lennox’s suicide is inauthentic because he left a long note and wrote a letter to Marlowe. As Marlowe solves one case, he uses his experience to understand the other.

“No feelings at all, Captain. No feelings at all.”

The traumatic experiences of dealing with the Lennox and Wade cases have left Marlowe feeling hollow. His offhand comment to the police captain is framed as a witty riposte, but it contains an unsettling truth. Being around the rich and famous alienates Marlowe, who is left feeling numb and empty. The longer he goes on, the more he has “no feelings at all” (153).

“Big money is big power and big power gets used wrong. It’s the system.”

Ohls voices a criticism of capitalism which has been alluded to throughout the novel. Money and power are corrupting influences, so much so that not a single wealthy person in the novel seems happy. They drink and have affairs in a desperate quest to add meaning to their lives, but with so much money they are completely alienated from society. As Ohls observes, the “system” (155) alienates everyone. However, neither Ohls nor Marlowe has a better proposal. All they can do is navigate their alienation as best they can.

“It’s always the kind and gentle ones that get killed.”

Marlowe states throughout the novel that he prefers to be perceived as a bad person as a form of self-protection. His decision is justified by the comment that the “kind and gentle ones” (169) always get killed. Being kind or moral has no benefit in a socially alienated world. Instead, a tough exterior and a sense of detachment is perceived as the only way to survive.

“What a cold black noiseless word it is in any language. The lady is dead.”

The pain of loss can transcend any language. After spending the novel fighting against Candy, Marlowe feels a sudden pang of empathy toward him in the wake of Eileen’s death. The ability to relate to a supposed enemy in this fashion distinguishes Marlowe from the other characters. His empathy makes him a good man in an immoral world.

“You don’t fool around with an open-shut case.”

The police is an institution which, to outsiders, is tasked with maintaining social order and upholding the law. However, the leaders of this institution admit that they are prone to the easy solutions rather than the correct ones. The police are willing to attribute the death of Wade to suicide and to continue to list Lennox as Sylvia’s killer, as this explanation is convenient, even if it is not correct. Marlowe rejects this convenient solution, emerging as a bastion of morality.

“Once a patsy, always a patsy.”

Marlowe has a low opinion of himself but he learns from his mistakes. He has been taken advantage of earlier in the novel, but he is keen not to make the same mistake again. For all his efforts, however, he cannot quite escape his role as a “patsy” (183), as Ohls uses him to flush out Menendez. Marlowe’s cynical comment about his own status proves to be true, but not quite in the way he expects.

“The tragedy of life, Howard, is not that the beautiful things die young, but that they grow old and mean. It will not happen to me.”

Eileen insists that she cannot accept the possibility that she will grow “old and mean” (184). Through her actions, however, she has brought about the death of her husband and Sylvia. Eileen decides to kill herself rather than grow old, but this is not a privilege she extends to others.

“The only thing wrong with cop business is the cops that are in it.”

Marlowe takes a cynical view toward the institutions meant to preserve justice. The police are an institution which, to most people, should be a moral arbiter in society. As Marlowe has experienced, however, the individuals who make up the society are as corrupt, lost, or alienated as himself. As such, the institution is hollow. There are no good institutions in Marlowe’s world because such institutions are still inhabited by broken and flawed people.

“To say goodbye is to die a little.”

Marlowe has said goodbye to several people over the course of the novel. Marlowe says goodbye so often and he dies a little each time, wearing him down over the course of time. The goodbye to Lennox has been the most difficult and longest of all. Even as he says goodbye to Linda, his farewell to Lennox still eats at him.