The Glass Key

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The Glass Key is a novel by Dashiell Hammett, said to be his favorite among his works. It was first published in 1931, and tells the story of gambler and racketeer Ned Beaumont, whose devotion to crooked political boss Paul Madvig leads him to investigate the murder of a local senator's son as a potential gang war brews. The novel was dedicated to onetime lover Nell Martin.

There were two film adaptations made based on the novel. It has been asserted—though never officially corroborated—that the kidnapping and brutal beating of one of the characters in The Glass Key was the inspiration for the similar scenes in Yojimbo (1961) by Akira Kurosawa. (See also Red Harvest.) The book was also a major influence on the Coen brothers film Miller's Crossing, a film about a gambler who is right hand man to a corrupt political boss and their involvement in a brewing gang war.

The surrealist painter René Magritte named a 1959 painting The Glass Key.

[edit] External links

• A summary and brief review is available from Case Western Reserve University's Department of English.