Abstract

James M. Cain’s depiction of changing gender roles in The Postman Always Rings Twice (1934), Double Indemnity (1936), and Mildred Pierce (1941), classics of literary noir, explores the fatality of sentimentalized romance in relation to the Great Depression’s erosion of the American Dream. Serenade (1937) is a puzzling deviation from this theme. Despite criticism of the “iron-hard pattern of necessity” that underlies his work, Cain’s early fiction illuminates the nation’s cultural legacy.

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