The old Pulp magazines offered everything from a gritty back street world of violence to the unimaginable planets of the far stars. Pulp fiction was the people’s stories. And because of this the everyday miseries and joys followed. There was crime, and hunger, and fear, but there was also adventure, love and romance, and best of all, coffee.
When one thinks of the hard-drinking private eye of Black Mask fame, you don’t immediately think of coffee, but bourbon in a desk drawer or gin from a speakeasy. But far more often coffee is mentioned than booze. Think about it. That PI’s got to get up after a hard night to find the clues that lead to the Maltese Falcon or Rusty Regan or whatever. And to do that, he almost always resorts to black coffee.
Raymond Chandler’s Philip Marlowe was one of the originals. His morning routine: I got up at nine, drank three cups of black coffee, bathed the back of my head with ice-water and read the two morning papers that had been thrown against the apartment door. …I dressed and ate two soft-boiled eggs and drank a fourth cup of coffee and looked myself over in the mirror. I still looked a little shadowy under the eyes. (Farewell, My Lovely, 1940)
Chandler inspired a lot of other detectives. The redheaded Mike Shayne loved cognac but drank a lot of coffee too, whether at home or in a diner. “Ordering bacon and eggs, buttered toast, and lots of coffee, he spread the newspaper out with his left hand and began to catch up on the events of last night.” and “Shayne drank his coffee with the healthy appreciation of a strong man for strong coffee.” (Dividend on Death, 1939) Ah, that old Pulp machismo. “Let me see how much coffee you’ve got in there,” he growled. “Most women treat coffee as though it was more precious than diamonds.” (The Private Practice of Mike Shayne, 1940) And sexism.
“Playback” … In the first chapter, Marlowe justifies his rudeness to an equally rude potential client by explaining he just awoke and is “full of no-coffee.”