Evan Hunter, a bestselling author who sold more than 100 million books under his own name and the pseudonym Ed McBain, died on July 6 of cancer of the larynx. He was 78.
Born Salvatore Lombino, the native New Yorker was studying at the Cooper Union Art School when World War II interrupted his education. He enlisted in the U.S. Navy and began to write while serving on a destroyer in the Pacific. Upon his return to the states, Lombino majored in English at Hunter College in New York. In 1952, he legally changed his name to Evan Hunter because he thought publishers would be less likely to accept books from an author with an Italian moniker.
To make ends meet, Hunter taught English classes at inner city high schools, sold lobsters to restaurants and worked as an editor for the Scott Meredith Literary Agency, but he never stopped honing his writing skills. Under the names Curt Cannon, Hunt Collins and Richard Marsten, he wrote dozens of magazine stories. Once he had enough credits to his, well, many names, Hunter published his first novel, "The Blackboard Jungle." The harrowing tale of big city school violence became a 1955 film starring Glenn Ford and Sidney Poitier. Hunter later penned the second revision of the 1963 Alfred Hitchcock thriller, "The Birds."
Starting in 1956, Hunter began writing as Ed McBain. Under this pen name, he pioneered the gritty, police procedural genre with his bestselling "87th Precinct" series. Over the course of 55 books ("Cop Hater," "Jigsaw," "Widows," "Mischief," "Money, Money, Money," "Hark!"), McBain chronicled the cases of the station's detective squad. His fast-paced novels were driven by dialogue and his realistic plotlines combined modern investigative techniques with sardonic humor. The final "Precinct" book, "Fiddlers," will be released in September.
Up until he suffered a heart attack in the 1980s, Hunter wrote for eight hours a day in his Connecticut home. His talent and prolific nature earned him scores of fans and numerous writing awards. Hunter received the Mystery Writers of America's Grand Master Award for lifetime achievement in 1986, and was the first American to win the Cartier Diamond Dagger from the British Crime Writers' Association in 1998.
In the essay, "Nature of the Beast," his alter ego, McBain, made a contract with readers. "I know all the rules of mystery writing and I promise that I will observe them so long as they provide a novel that will keep you fascinated, intrigued and entertained. If they get in the way of that basic need, I'll either bend the rules or break them, but I will never cheat the reader. Never," he wrote. The author made several other declarations about his writing, but he ended the essay with a simple guarantee: "I promise to keep you awake all night. I promise to keep writing till the day I die. I will sign this contract in blood if you like."
• Listen to an Interview With Hunter
• Listen to a Tribute From NPR
Posted on July 7, 2005 11:47 PMWhen I saw the announcement this morning~ I was thunderstruck. Mr Hunter aka Ed McBain was one of the authors I first read when I started reading "grown-up" books. He was an author I could read and then share the book with my father. Intersting,quick,thorough books. He is the author of the '87th Precinct'series under the name of Ed McBain. There are 439 books listed under just E Mc B on Amazon!
Posted by Deborah on July 9, 2005 7:01 AMI only now revisited the Blog of Death page, and saw this annoucement. I also grew up with Ed McBain stories, and back in the late 80s read all the 87th Precinct I could find, especially savoring the Deaf Man books. The last few 87th books were really starting to explore the character's relationships. I was hoping for another Deaf Man book. Sorry to hear that may not be possible (but I'm hoping he was almost finished with one right before he died. I can hope, anyway!) Bless you, Evan Hunter, for turning me on to detective fiction other than private investigators.
Posted by Jaycatt on July 12, 2005 12:31 PMI cannot begin to say how sad I was to read of Evan Hunter's death. I had just finished his autobiography which moved me greatly. I always feel good when a new book by Ed Mcbain is published here in England. My thoughts are with his widow who supported him through his illness.
Joyce Glendinning
Southampton
England
i learned of evan hunter's death from a display at the public library. books by the late . . .i still can't believe it. in the late 90s, i hosted a web site about the 87th precinct. purely amateur - a work of love. i was astounded when mr. hunter contacted me to express his pleasure. we corresponded for a couple of years, then drifted apart. the web site has since been dismantled, don't know if i can do it anymore. his loss is immeasureable. truly a gifted man.
may he live on in the hearts of all of us.
jennie
Posted by jennie lucas on August 2, 2005 4:17 PMHe was the greatest.And He was my friend.
I admired Him immensially.
I started reading Ed McBain/Evan Hunter/Curt Cannon/Hunt Collins/Richard Marsten/Ezra Hannon/John Abbott/S.A. Lombino's in 1967 'ntill today and will reread everything starting tomorrow.
I assume having one of the completest collections: Books, audios, movies, Interviews, Articles, posts,letters, etc.
Never met 'The Man', and regretting it.
He will be missed.
May He rest in peace.
J.P.
When I first started reading adult books in the 70's I caught on to the 87th precinct craze. After that I would read anything Evan Hunter wrote under any name. I had written to the book company for a list of all Ed McBain/Evan Hunter books and somehow the letter was forwarded to Evan Hunter himself. After that, for about a year or so I would write to him -- and he would actually write back! It was an honor to have such a busy successful person actually take the time to answer a silly 14 year olds questions.
Earlier this year, in April, I think, I e-mailed Mr. Hunter to say hello after almost 25 years, and he remembered me.
I've just read of Ed McBain's death. I am heartbroken. I loved him under all his pen names. His 87th Precinct series though--it was cause for celebration when each one appeared. I've read them since high school. The first one I read was AX. I was hooked for life. And most especially HAIL TO THE CHIEF. As Evan Hunter, he was the master of the mainstream novel. He could write from any point of view, from any age and any culture. He was so mordently funny. And he could break you in half with a single sentence. He described Isola and the seasons in his 87th Precinct novels so lovingly and perfectly, they became characters. I join with Steve Carella, Myer Myer, Cotton Hawes, Bert Kling and a whole monumental list of unforetable characters (especially Carella, who, I think this time, with me, is the most sad in his eyes and in his heart than he has ever been, in saluting the passing of a master. He will live forever. He knew that guy in New York who wrote the Hitchcock movie, THE BIRDS, you know. Bless him always. I say thanks, much too late.
Posted by Barry Eysman on December 31, 2005 9:10 PM GIVE ED McBAIN A GREAT BIG HAND
by
Barry Eysman
Ed McBain died last summer. LAST SUMMER was one of his books, written as Evan Hunter. GIVE THE BOYS A GREAT BIG HAND, which I paraphrased for the title of this tribute, was an 87th Precinct novel about the detectives finding this severed great big hand. Steve Carella was played on the TV series EIGHTY SEVENTH PRECINCT by the truly excellent actor, Robert Lansing, who, though he didn’t look exactly like Carella, lead detective, had his strength, courage, compassion and insight, and will always be Carella to me. As will the other actors who played the other characters.
The boys of the 87 were always making jokes. Funny jokes. Mordent jokes. Knowing jokes. Such as the continuing dialogue about that New York guy, what was his name?, who wrote the Hitchcock movie, THE BIRDS. Didn’t Hitchcock write that? No, I thought the actors just made it up as they went along? In a paperback mystery by Richard Marsten, there’s this quote on the front cover, “Marsten is a helluva writer--Ed McBain.” Ed McBain was Richard Marsten. He also wrote the greatest James Bond joke ever, did Ed McBain.
In the fifties Evan Hunter wrote a novel that is still a classic, THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE. I read it one summer during break in high school. On the front porch swing. Glass of Coke beside me. Me rocking gently back and forth. Reading of New York city, for the first time. Being caught up in a world that I knew nothing about, and being absolutely knocked out by a book from a decade ago. It was great. It was gritty and real and captivating. But that was how he was--he was known as the writer with the golden ear. Because he could capture dialogue perfectly. Of anyone, any age, any ethnicity; from be bop, to hip hop; even in his seventies, he could make you believe in New York street kids perfectly, that he was one of them; that he knew them from the inside out. He made his 87th Precinct city, Isola, and the lovely lilting descriptions of the seasons like characters themselves.
He wrote about violence and hate and poverty and bigotry and took chances, took dares, wrote about what most other writers avoided. He could paint a city ghetto in sweltering summer; he could make you feel, when a character like Jimmy the Gimp, squealer, who was at Carella’s bedside in one of the 87th novels, gets killed, like crying. Ed McBain made me cry often. As the decades rolled along, Carella, who observes, doesn’t it seem like we are aging more slowly than other people?, and the detectives faced grittier cases, sometimes grotesque cases. Ed McBain could not stand still. He wrote what was current. From his own viewpoint. And if it hurt your eyes and brain and heart, good. That was the idea. He once said, he wanted to show the horror of violence, the scream of sadness of death. He succeeded--brilliantly.
Evan Hunter (not his real name any more than Ed McBain, Ezra Hansen, Richard Marsten, or Curt Cannon, and probably others I don’t know about--yet) had taught briefly in a ghetto school in New York, had enough of it, said he was going to go write a bestseller and make his living as a writer. And, voila! He wrote THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE based on what he had learned when teaching. It was an immediate bestseller. Though he had been published before this, it was this novel that set him off and running.
He was just so good. He has woven himself into my life and millions of others. THE PAPER DRAGON is about a trial concerning plagiarism, which is thick and full of thickets and complex and involving and enclosing and knowledgeable and exciting, with an ending where nothing we’ve seen or believe about the truth is what we thought. His novel SECOND ENDING is about the coming to terms with adulthood and the fear of leaving youth behind, the haunting of friends who have grown up, by someone who hasn’t, and never will. COME WINTER, in addition to being one of the loveliest titles ever; I’ve adopted it for my email address; is scary and creepy and sad and lonely and the sequel to LAST SUMMER, which is when all these great writers, who were one, died.
I read my first 87th Precinct novel one Christmas, not knowing the previous summer McBain as Hunter had already entered my life with THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE. The McBain novel was AX. I was hooked for life. Books were becoming fun. There are three writers I love with all my heart. They are ROD SERLING, RAY BRADBURY and EVAN HUNTER/ED MCBAIN.
He could seemingly write anything. STREETS OF GOLD is written in first person from the viewpoint of a musician who is totally blind. How tough was that to write? Endlessly hard, but Hunter made it and everything else he wrote seem so easy. He wrote a blood chilling and literate novel about Lizzie Borden, LIZZIE, which belongs in the file of great books on this subject. He was a writer, who, I’ve tried my own clumsy way, to show in this piece, made such a friend of words. He wrote proficiently and extremely well. He once said he was sorry he chose to write his police procedural and mysteries under different names, even the Ed McBain name, because in the past he had thought them less serious than the novels he wrote under the Evan Hunter name. McBain was the writer of the novel FUZZ, which was made into a quite good film, thankfully, and thanks mostly to a very good screen writer, Evan Hunter. The line about whether or not you throw just the arms of the hustler down the stairs, or the whole hustler? is the funniest of all time.
In one 87th Precinct novel, Carella is standing over the latest corpse, whose murder the detectives are called to investigate, as the men are going about their business in this dingy little room of an apartment. McBain writes only when you looked at Carella’s eyes, did you see how sad all of this made him. I took some time to weep at that line. Hunter/McBain were geniuses. They played life as it really was. You got to know these characters. You got to care. You remember years later the moments, the sweetness of Carella and his mute wife Teddy. You love their kids. You are so terribly sorry that Carella’s father was murdered. Two summers ago, I gathered up my entire 87th Precinct novels and collections and all the Ed McBain novels, RUNAWAY BLACK, MURDER IN THE NAVY, I’M CANNON--FOR HIRE, and proceeded to read one after the other. Remembering that front porch swing where I read THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE, about kids and situations totally unlike me and mine, but somehow identical, the true mark of a great writer, and remembering the first McBain novel I read, AX, a Christmas gift.
And I remember thinking, you stay well, Ed McBain; you stay well and happy and writing. His wife has said he never had a writer’s block that she knew of. He went to work in the morning, and finished work in the evening and proceeded to do the same thing the next day and the next. He made me shiver in the cold of his cities. He made me more knowledgeable of heritage and the past and the fevers of life and the impulses that made people do things; the sheer, in all his books, tapestry known as the human element. He made my eyes take in worlds that I wanted to know more about, and worlds I barely made my way out of with my soul intact. He was that good.
When there is a stand off in one of the 87th Precinct novels, in the middle of the hot miserable city summer, deftly described (you feel those burning fire escapes, you feel that concrete simmer and boil, along with the human tempers and coming death summer, you feel those hot miserable rooms, you feel the pain, the clinging of soggy clothes, the sweat consuming, and the constant brushing of it away from face and eyes, the horror, the sickness of spirit) when a gang member holds the cops in abeyance and everybody in the neighborhood, which was his home, are cheering him on, you feel the intensity of utter desolation, like the end of the world; we’re all gonna fry man; we’re all gonna fry; like with the savage irony of one of the stories in THE BLACKBOARD KIDS, in which two rival gang members, just teenagers, sit down to debate where their zip gun duel is going to be. Hating each other. But as they talk, their guns on the table, in the club house, before them, they start finding they have things in common; before the quick flash gone forever bone jarring tragic ending of violence, the tragic ending of all violence. The stupidity of violence.
But no matter how grim his books could be, and they could be quite grim, there was always the conscience of the writer; there was always the sequence of words; there was always that feeling like I had after reading THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE ( “we believe in signs around here, by God”) I was going to have a good life reading books. That this novel and all the Hunter/McBain (cause Isola is Manhattan) New York novels stand side by side with William Goldman’s magnificent, towering depiction of New York in BOYS AND GIRLS TOGETHER--well, if you want the great New York novels--this is them; the soul of it, the heart and hate and beating pulse of it, the dead dreams, the live hopes, the moments, as in Hunter’s A MATTER OF CONVICTION in which the debate roils within Hunter’s character who must work to send his former lover’s son to the death house, concerning how a society that considers itself civil and civilized can do such a barbaric thing as cold bloodedly murdering a kid and think they are doing the right thing, and the dreadful burden on this man’s shoulders. The title again a wonderful play on words that Hunter/McBain loved, but a deadly serious novel..
For some time, Hunter/McBain lived in Florida, to get away from the snow and cold. There he created another character, Matthew Hope, thus entering another series of excellent novels, though I really wanted them to be set in New York, because he could make it such a breathing living place; Florida is my least favorite place in the world, not that I’ve seen much of the world, but McBain made it still and all his turf, and that made it okay with me.
You read a novel like STREETS OF GOLD. A huge novel. Panoramic. Plunging itself into personal history and the way people live in their own specific world, and their own specific music, and all told through the eyes of a man who has never seen anything, and you think, well, how the hell did Hunter do it? And how the hell did he make this world his own private turf? Research. Like he did with his police procedural novels. Heart. Skill. Words playing beautiful. Complex writing. You read how Houdini did his escapes. You read in detail step by step. Try it. You can’t do it. Know why? You ain’t Houdini.
The 87th series, though superbly written, were directly written; in STREETS OF GOLD and the other Hunter novels, more time was taken to delve into a person’s soul and longings. There was as time went on more and more sexual passages in his books. There was as time went along more and more profanity. CANDYLAND is a difficult book for me to read. But as I said before, Hunter went with the times, even though there was that famous time warp (Steve and Teddy’s kids are now just becoming teenagers; in his last novel, or maybe not, FIDDLERS.) They’ve aged far more slowly than even Bart and Lisa Simpson, and that’s saying something too. McBain/Hunter represent tremendous nostalgia also. Even at the time the books were first published. That time warp thing for one. And also, he knows the present is built on the past and we must never forget that, because only half wits forget the past and get ground into the mulch they well deserve.
Years ago, Hunter was interviewed on the greatest writer interview show ever on TV, hosted by the brilliant Bob Cromie. Cromie interviewed writers we cared about, and had actually read their books. The talks with the writers were warm and friendly and you just wanted them to go on forever. How I miss the kind joyful Bob Cromie.
Hunter said he had already written a final novel of the 87th to be published after his death, in which all the lead characters are killed off, so no one can try to carry on the series. I think that will be a McBain novel I will read of course, if it exists, but it will hardly be a cause for celebration every time a new novel by him came out. I do hope no one does extend the series.
They tried it with Michael Shayne and did it quite well for a time, but then they tried to turn him into James Bond. They tried it with James Bond and did fairly well for a time. However these were programmed characters. I loved and do love both of them immensely. But there are blue prints. The characters are put through their very entertaining paces. McBain though, no, the writing counted for so much. The insight counted for so much. Oh, and I guess you want to hear that Bond. James Bond joke McBain included in one of his novels. The F word appears. I give you fair warning. Want to complain? Take it up with the McBain estate.
James Bond walks into this very upscale, of course, bar. Lights a cigarette. Looks around for the loveliest woman there. Sees her at the bar, with the stool, natch, next to her unoccupied. He saunters over, sits beside her, asks for a drink, shaken not stirred, and says ‘give the lady what she wants.’ She says ‘I’ll pay for my own drink.’ Cool. Doesn’t even look at him. His drink comes. He bides his time. Smokes his cigarette. Sips his drink. Then knowing with the timing of a master seducer turns to look at her appraisingly. He raises his left eyebrow archly. Scans her up and down and when he sees she is looking at him, he says, with complete and utter confidence, ‘Bond. James Bond.’ She raises her left eyebrow archly and looks him up and down appraisingly, and responds with equally complete and utter confidence, ‘Off. Fuck off. ‘
So thank you Evan Hunter. Thank you for THE SENTRIES. Thank you for NOBODY KNEW THEY WERE THERE. Thank you for, especially the slyness and the huge surprise that made me laugh and rejoice in HAIL TO THE CHIEF. Thank you for seeing the world in your own unique way. Thank you for helping me attain the joy of reading. Thank you for entertaining me and enlightening me and making me shiver and making me weep sometimes. I am weeping now. I am saying good bye to an old friend. I’ve said far too many good byes to old friends in my life. I’m getting really tired of it.
Want to read his work, and haven’t before? I recommend the 87th starting with COP HATER. I think he has had all his 87th book series, to the date of that time, published by every major paper back house in the country. So they are easy to find. His Evan Hunter novels? I think PAPER DRAGON and SECOND ENDING. And of course THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE. He has done audio books. He had a fine voice. And to hear him reading his own works is great pleasure. He died of cancer of the larynx. He never smoked. A horrible rip off of a McBain irony.
All these writers who were him (“if this is another book by Ed damn McBain under yet another pen name, I’m bringing it back for a full refund; I am so tired of finding books by what I think are by new writers, and it’s ALWAYS HIM”) live in his words.
He knew about jazz, police techniques up and down and inside out and all around the town (as he might have written, when you and I were young, Kathleen, as he did write in sweet endearing moments, as if straight to the heart of each of us reading); he always put these wondrous surprises in his 87th Precinct novels--transcripts, notes in long hand, photographs, drawings--that for some reason or other just made me happy; I don’t know why; I guess he was sharing these things with us and pulling us into the novels, while other writers just had to tell us in descriptive words everything--about the Mafia, in his hilarious books EVERY LITTLE CROOK AND NANNY, which features photos of his sons and himself among others--very suspiciously made up looking characters I have to say-
---he knew all about how it was to be a deaf mute, and how Carella and Teddy broke through eventually that barrier, as Carella fell immediately in love with her; Teddy took a little time to fall in love with Carella--it is not a “meeting cute”--it is about a real man trying to learn how to communicate with a real woman who is handicapped, and not come off like a jerk in the attempt--indeed, no matter how horrific the cases in these novels became over the years, there was always Steve Carella (Robert Lansing) and Teddy and they were constantly in love that just made you envy them so; they were our moral compass--he knew so much in other words and I sigh at how many more novels he could have given us, and how the continuing plot lines would have worked out...will Kling be doomed in every romance he tries?...will Carella’s brother-in-law get off drugs?...how will Fat Ollie Week’s book be received in reader reviews at a certain popular book selling and review site; the riff on those in FAT OLLIE’S BOOK, as Ollie takes them apart, is truly hilarious. And it’s even more funny because Fat Ollie Weeks is a moron!
But....Evan Hunter/Ed McBain/Curt Cannon/Ezra Hansen/Richard Marsten had a very long, stunningly successful career in a business that is virtually impossible to survive in or to break into at all.
. His first 87th was published by Pocket Books when “I Love Lucy” was first run on CBS. His last 87th has just been published. He wrote the screenplay for THE BIRDS. His novel THE BLACKBOARD JUNGLE was made into a classic film, and incidentally, this was the first movie that featured rock and roll. People were absolutely scandalized. Some theaters refused to run it because of that reason and it was also about JDs of course. My God, how far time has gone. How rapidly passed. And a writer with a hydra head of names and personalities, for they were truly distinct, has passed on after passing our way. One of the early Curt Cannon mysteries, retitled THE GUTTER AND THE GRAVE has just been republished in paperback.
But, you know one thing, you read his 87th Precinct novels in a row like I did two summers ago and you see the style has not changed; he has built on it; he has added to it; but the integral framework is still very much and very comfortingly and constantly there; he started out the series by writing like Ed McBain; he ended the series, and his career, altogether, unless there are other novels waiting, writing like Ed McBain. About how difficult is that to have done?
In these books, the major characters were apparently perfectly drawn from the first book onward. They didn’t change looks or personalities or other consistencies. Amazing. He had them thoroughly thought out from the first. I’ve read there was someone in later years who kept track of all the doing of the 87 who McBain would call and would ask to be reminded of what one character did when and so forth. But that was later on when the books started to mount..
So give Evan Hunter a great big hand. Remember. Or discover for the first time. He was a writer. He deserves your attention. And your respect. And he wrote the most wonderful giddy dialogue when he was in a jokey mood, and two seconds later he could break you in half with a single line. He said this is life. I didn’t invent it. I report on it. And so he did, in eloquent language, in insight piercing and wise, in care and resentment, in loneliness of youth and of old age, in irony, in love, in anger, in joy, and in beauty of worlds that could also be so horribly ugly, of grinding poverty and stiletto shadows, worlds of hypocrisy, lies or truths, where characters commented wryly on what icons of culture were passing by, especially idiots masquerading as Presidents of the moment, worlds of great wealth, deserved or stolen or somewhere in the middle, of comfort, of hope, of the lack of, where there was birth, wherever it happened and to whom, and dying, however it happened and where and to whom, and what took place between those two events.
He was one hellva writer.
Posted by Barry Eysman on January 5, 2006 8:00 PM"Blackboard Jungle" was my one of the best books I was given by fellow students at 13. I'd just read "knock on any door" so it went right in. I was hooked a little later when I read'"Second ending", the book never left me completely. I read some more but never any McBain. R.I.P.
Posted by job van de pijpekamp on February 5, 2007 12:33 PMI've just discovered McBain/Hunter, and can't get enough. Can anyone tell me why Teddy Carella is deaf? (Why McBain includes a deaf character so matter-of-factly?) Thanx!
Posted by BallyG on March 18, 2007 2:24 AMI've just discovered McBain/Hunter, and can't get enough. Can anyone tell me why Teddy Carella is deaf? (Why McBain includes a deaf character so matter-of-factly?) Thanx!
Posted by itsme8@mac.com on March 18, 2007 2:26 AMI just found out today that Ed Mcbain/Evan Hunter is gone. I was in the process of trying to learn about "Last Summer." by Evan Hunter. I just found the first edition in the free bin of my local book store.
I've been a fan of the 87th Precinct novels since I was old enough to read.
Sadly, I'll stop watching for new ones now..
Posted by James Kelley on November 7, 2007 6:01 PM