Philip Marlowe is a fictional character created by Raymond Chandler who was characteristic of the hardboiled crime fiction genre. The genre originated in the 1920s, notably in Black Mask magazine, in which Dashiell Hammett's The Continental Op and Sam Spade first appeared. Marlowe first appeared under that name in The Big Sleep, published in 1939. Chandler's early short stories, published in pulp magazines such as Black Mask and Dime Detective, featured similar characters with names like "Carmady" and "John Dalmas", starting in 1933.
Humphrey Bogart in the trailer for the 1946 film The Big Sleep
Ed Bishop had the title role in BBC Radio's Philip Marlowe radio drama series.
Marlowe, as he appeared in volume 9 of Detective Conan
Photo of Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall from the 1946 film ''The Big Sleep''
Raymond Thornton Chandler was an American-British novelist and screenwriter. In 1932, at the age of forty-four, Chandler became a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Great Depression. His first short story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in 1933 in Black Mask, a popular pulp magazine. His first novel, The Big Sleep, was published in 1939. In addition to his short stories, Chandler published seven novels during his lifetime. All but Playback have been made into motion pictures, some more than once. In the year before his death, he was elected president of the Mystery Writers of America.
Chandler c. 1943
A blue plaque marks the house in Cathedral Square where Chandler stayed in Waterford, Ireland.
Raymond and Cissy Chandler's tombstone