The Maltese Falcon - Dashiell Hammett

Published by Collector's Library: London, 2013.
Originally published 1930.

I picked this up to be 'H' in the Alphabet Soup reading challenge, and, as a fan of the 1941 film version starring Humphrey Bogart, was curious to see how similar the screenplay of that film reflected the original novel. 

The answer to that question turns out to be: extremely similar. Like, way more similar than any other book-to-movie adaptation I can think of. Even the dialogue of the book seems to have been replicated word-for-word throughout the film (at least from what I could remember), which makes reading the book a strange experience for someone who has come to it as their second exposure to this story.

Because, with the book and movie being so similar, I'm put in an interesting position of actually finding myself preferring the film version to the book version. 

That's not a common feeling.

To unpack my feelings a bit: Sam Spade is a very closed character, by design. We, as the audience, are never privy to his inner thoughts, and in true noir fashion we don't fully understand the ins and outs of the plot until the final moments of the story, when the last twists have been unravelled. However, while this works on film, where we try our best to read Humphrey Bogart's stoic expression and glean what little hints we can, it can be a little bit frustrating at times to be reading the adventures of a character that always keeps us at arms length. When the twists come we are still surprised, but perhaps not as invested in our main character as we would have been had we instead been watching him go about his case.

Most of the (few) differences between the book and movie are found in certain scenes being trimmed in order to streamline the plot, with one exception being that some of the villains in the book are portrayed as likely homosexuals, something that would have been excised by Hayes Code-era Hollywood. This doesn't affect the plot but does give a little more context than the film to certain debates and decisions made by those characters. 

Overall, if you don't know the story of The Maltese Falcon you might enjoy this book, but aside from a few moments here and there it was so similar to the film that it didn't really impact me much at all.

Completed 20 November 2021.



(Alphabet Soup Books)


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