Charles Williams (writer, 1909)

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Charles Williams (born August 13, 1909 in San Angelo , Texas , † April 7, 1975 in Los Angeles ) was an American writer and screenwriter . He was one of the most successful crime novelists in the 1950s and 1960s . Many of his works have been filmed, for example On Love and Death and Death Silence .

biography

Williams grew up in Texas and entered the US Merchant Navy after leaving school, where he trained as a radio operator . After 10 years of service, he married and worked as a radio technician for RCA in Galveston , Texas and later, until the end of World War II , at the Puget Sound Naval Shipyard .

In 1951 he published the novel Hill Girl , which immediately became a bestseller with more than one million copies sold and enabled Williams to work as a professional writer. He traveled the world with his wife and stayed for a long time in France, where he was widely recognized as a writer. After his wife's death in 1972, lived Williams some time alone in a caravan on the border between California and Oregon . In 1975 he committed suicide in Los Angeles .

plant

Williams is one of the hardboiled authors' circles with his novels . In his early novels, a man usually succumbs to the sexual stimuli of a beautiful woman and is then instigated by her to commit a crime for which he must then atone alone.

The works The Diamond Bikini and Moonshine Whiskey are "cheerful" novels, told from the point of view of a little boy, that revolve around the illegal distilling of whiskey.

His late novels often take place at sea, where usually an innocent couple gets caught up in a crime, but is then able to save themselves with intact skin.

In 1956 he received the Grand prix de littérature policière for his novel "The Great Turn" ( Nothing in Her Way ) .

Works

  • 1951 Hill Girl
    • Die Liebe der Brüder, German by Ruth Göth; Lichtenberg, Munich 1963.
  • 1951 Big City Girl
    • The girl from the big city, German by Fritz Moeglich ; Heyne, Munich 1970.
  • 1951 River Girl (also published under the title The Catfish Tangle )
    • The girl from the river, German by Werner Gronwald; Heyne, Munich 1965.
  • 1953 Hell Hath No Fury (also released under the title The Hot Spot )
    • Until the murder do you part, German from Christiane Nogly; Heyne, Munich 1966. ISBN 3-453-10473-0
    • also as: The Hot Spot, same translation; Heyne, Munich 1990. ISBN 3-453-04811-3
  • 1953 Nothing in Her Way
  • 1954 Go Home, Stranger
    • Only the dead knew, by Walter Schulz-Brown; Lehing, Hanover 1957.
    • New translation: His great bluff, German by Werner Gronwald; Heyne, Munich 1962. ISBN 3-453-10521-4
  • 1954 A Touch of Death (also published under the title Mix Yourself a Redhead )
    • 100 miles fear, German by Helmut Degner; Heyne, Munich 1967.
  • 1955 Scorpion Reef (also published under the title Gulf Coast Girl )
    • The wind blows hot from the Yucatan, from Günter Hehemann; Heyne, Munich 1959. ISBN 3-453-10404-8
  • 1956 The Big Bite
  • 1956 The Diamond Bikini
  • 1958 Girl Out Back (also published under the title Operator )
    • The dollar tree, German Helmut Degner; Heyne, Munich 1967.
  • 1958 Talk of the Town (also published under the title Stain of Suspicion )
    • Three days stay, German by Werner Gronwald; Heyne, Munich 1963.
  • 1958 All the Way (also published under the title The Concrete Flamingo )
    • The Flamingo Killer, German by Fritz Moeglich; Heyne, Munich 1965.
  • 1958 Man on the Run (also published under the title Man in Motion )
    • No alibi, German from Werner Gronwald; Heyne, Munich 1964.
  • 1959 Uncle Sagamore and His Girls
    • Mondschein-Whiskey, German from Fritz Moeglich; Heyne, Munich 1967.
  • 1960 The Sailcloth Shroud
    • To die three times is too much, by Werner Gronwald; Heyne, Munich 1962.
  • 1960 Aground
  • 1962 The Long Saturday Night (also published under the titles Confidentially Yours and Finally, Sunday! )
    • The long Saturday night, German by Werner Gronwald; Heyne, Munich 1963.
    • also as: On love and death, same translation; Heyne, Munich 1984. ISBN 3-453-10690-3
  • 1963 Dead Calm
  • 1966 The Wrong Venus (also published under the title Don't Just Stand There )
    • The false Venus, German by Ingeborg Frauke Meier; Mosaic, Hamburg 1968.
  • 1971 And The Deep Blue Sea
    • Burial on the high seas, German Leni Sobez; Heyne, Munich 1972.
  • 1973 Man on a Leash

Film adaptations (selection)

Web links