Big Sleep Response

Big Sleep Response

In what ways as the ending of the Big Sleep satisfying?

At the end of the novel, The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler, the hard-boiled, strong minded character, Philip Marlowe, seems to have finally solved the puzzling puzzle of the blackmail incident. However, Chandler ends the book in a negative tone when Marlowe has thoughts go through his mind about how there is no real way out of the mess that he has created but to be “sleeping the big sleep”(pp. 230-31). So the question remains; was the ending satisfying? The exact definition of this term would be to “meet the expectations, needs, or desires of”, in this case the reader. As a reader, for it to be satisfying, the novel would have to lead to some kind of resolve. I would like to have all the questions asked throughout the novel to be answered and perhaps learn something new through the main characters. Another way I would be satisfied with an ending of a book is when I have finally complete it, I feel exactly the same way the character feels at the end. Not necessarily a happy ending, but it exceeds or meets the expectations of what I think should happen to the characters or scenario in the end when the journey is finally complete. The Big Sleep proved to go both ways, Marlowe has solved the case and all the questions were answered but it ended sadly for him as well because he turned his heroic efforts into a predicament.
In some ways, Raymond Chandler made this book very satisfying at the end of the book. The climax revealed all the information to the mystery. Marlowe makes the effort to meet with Vivian to discuss Carmen. He explained her what had happened the following day when she wanted to “learn how to shoot a gun”(p. 216). He revealed that this phrase was already used before when she pulled the gun on Rusty Regan in the same place. Vivian’s face “whitened”(p. 222) when she heard this because she knew where this was going. Marlowe, being Marlowe, used his witty ways to reach a...