So… This first post is going to be on The Glass Key, which I just finished. As I was reading the book tonight, a few things caught my eye. First, on page 162, I noticed that Madvig was being referred to as “the blond man”. At first I thought that there was some character in the scene that I had somehow overlooked. The reason this grabbed my attention is because Madvig is a main character and he had never been identified by this characteristic before. Also, blond hair is such a common, unspecific way of describing a prevalent character. The scene in which this is occuring is an important scene. Beaumont manipulates Madvig into confessing that he killed Henry. I thought that Hammet might have done this to excentuate the idea that even though we see the surface of someone, or on the surface Madvig confesses, we do not know more than what we see or have been told. After finishing the novel, I feel like there is more this subtle choice. When Beaumont comes out and explains that it was in fact the senator that killed his own son, it is obvious that Beaumont knew that Madvig didn’t kill Henry, yet he pushed him anyway. I feel like Hammet saying that Beaumont “frowned at the blond man” really emphasizes this. He is smiling at the surface, at the facade, and the entire person. Hammet really plays with this idea of hidden feelings, facts, and underlying conditions. He seems to believe that there is always something unexpected, whether it be a person or the truth, hiding behind a door that one needs to choose to open.