{"id":51962,"date":"2015-11-17T15:56:15","date_gmt":"2015-11-17T21:56:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/?p=51962"},"modified":"2026-10-26T20:49:26","modified_gmt":"2026-10-27T01:49:26","slug":"podcast-156-the-lost-detective-the-life-and-times-of-dashiell-hammett","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/culture\/books\/podcast-156-the-lost-detective-the-life-and-times-of-dashiell-hammett\/","title":{"rendered":"Podcast #156: The Lost Detective \u2014 The Life and Times of Dashiell Hammett"},"content":{"rendered":"

If you like TV shows like True Detective <\/em>or The Wire<\/i>, you can thank one man for them: Dashiell Hammett. He’s credited for bringing the detective into the modern era with his stories about the Continental Op and his most well-known hard-boiled character: Sam Spade of Maltese Falcon<\/a> <\/em>fame. Hammett brought an edgy grittiness to the detective literature genre that hadn’t been there before. His detectives had demons and it was often hard to know if they were the good guy or the bad guy. The reason Hammett was able to bring a realness to his stories was that he himself was a private detective before he became a writer. But little is known about Hammett’s time as an Op for the famed Pinkerton Detective Agency.<\/p>\n

My guest on the podcast wanted to find out why, as well as unearth this forgotten part of the life of one of America’s greatest writers. His name is Nathan Ward and he’s the author of the book, The Lost Detective: Becoming Dashiell Hammett<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you like TV shows like True Detective or The Wire, you can thank one man for them: Dashiell Hammett. He’s credited for bringing the detective into the modern era with his stories about the Continental Op and his most well-known hard-boiled character: Sam Spade of Maltese Falcon fame. Hammett brought an edgy grittiness to the detective literature genre that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":195870,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42384,42376,156],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-51962","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-books","category-culture","category-podcast"],"featured_image_urls":{"large":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/156-538x280.png","medium_large":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/156-768x432.png","aom":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/156-372x230.png","reactor-320":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/156-320x180.png","reactor-640":"https:\/\/www.artofmanliness.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/156-640x360.png"},"yoast_head":"\nPodcast: The Life and Times of Dashiell Hammett | The Art of Manliness<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"If you like TV shows like True Detective or The Wire, you can thank one man for them: Dashiell Hammett. 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