Raymond Chandler Speaking is a collection of letter excerpts, various notes, essay

Essay

An essay is a piece of writing which is often written from an author's personal point of view. Essays can consist of a number of elements, including: literary criticism, political manifestos, learned arguments, observations of daily life, recollections, and reflections of the author. The definition...

s and an unfinished novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

. It was compiled in 1962 by Dorothy Gardiner and Kathrine Sorley Walker.

Contents

Apart from excerpts from letters by Chandler on a variety of subjects, including literature

Literature

Literature is the art of written works, and is not bound to published sources...

, film

Film

A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...

, fellow writer

Writer

A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....

s and cat

Cat

The cat , also known as the domestic cat or housecat to distinguish it from other felids and felines, is a small, usually furry, domesticated, carnivorous mammal that is valued by humans for its companionship and for its ability to hunt vermin and household pests...

s, the collection contains the following larger pieces (previously unpublished except as noted):

• "Casual Notes on the Mystery Novel"
• "Notes on English and American Style"
• "Writers in Hollywood" (previously published in the Atlantic Monthly)
• "Ten Per Cent of Your Life" (Atlantic Monthly)
• "A Couple of Writers"
• "The Poodle Springs Story", a Philip Marlowe
  Philip Marlowe
  Philip Marlowe is a fictional character created by Raymond Chandler in a series of novels including The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye. Marlowe first appeared under that name in The Big Sleep published in 1939...
  
   novel Chandler left unfinished at his death in 1959. It was completed in 1989 by Robert B. Parker
  Robert B. Parker
  Robert Brown Parker was an American crime writer. His most famous works were the novels about the private detective Spenser. ABC television network developed the television series Spenser: For Hire based on the character in the late 1980s; a series of TV movies based on the character were also...
  
   as Poodle Springs
  Poodle Springs
  Poodle Springs is the eighth Philip Marlowe novel. It was started in 1958 by Raymond Chandler, who left it unfinished at his death in 1959. The four chapters he had completed, which bore the working title "The Poodle Springs Story", were subsequently published in Raymond Chandler Speaking , a...
  
  .