Author | Dashiell Hammett |
---|---|
Language | English |
Genre | Detective |
Published | February 1, 1929 (Alfred A. Knopf)[1] |
Publication place | United States |
Media type | Print (hardcover) |
Followed by | The Dain Curse |
Red Harvest (1929) is a novel by American writer Dashiell Hammett. The story is narrated by the Continental Op, a frequent character in Hammett's fiction, much of which is drawn from his own experiences as an operative of the Pinkerton Detective Agency (fictionalized as the Continental Detective Agency).[2] The plot follows the Op's investigation of several murders amid a labor dispute in a corrupt Montana mining town. Some of the novel was inspired by the Anaconda Road massacre, a 1920 labor dispute in the mining town of Butte, Montana.[3]
Time included Red Harvest in its 100 Best English-Language Novels from 1923 to 2005, noting that, in the Continental Op, Hammett "created the prototype for every sleuth who would ever be called 'hard-boiled.'"[4] The Nobel Prize-winning author André Gide called the book "a remarkable achievement, the last word in atrocity, cynicism, and horror."[5]