A Quick Appreciation of Parker

From Wikipedia: A ruthless career criminal, Parker has almost no traditional redeeming qualities, aside from efficiency and professionalism. 

I just read The Hunter again, and was so glad to be back in Parker's world. Parker is the creation of Richard Stark, who is a pseudonym of Donald E. Westlake. Westlake didn't make it out of 2008 alive so Parker, like Stark, is dead. However, Parker lives on because he is such a rich, mysterious, effective character and creative people have such a level of love and interest in the character that they continue to release him into the world. Parker has been played on screen (in one form or another) by such heavyweights as Robert Duvall, Mel Gibson, Lee Marvin and, most recently, Jason Statham, among others including even Anna Karina in a Jean-Luc Godard film never seen in the US. The Hunter, the first Parker novel, introduces a character who has been double crossed by his partner, who convinced Parker's wife to leave him and leave him for dead after a heist where they took off with the money thinking Parker was gone. He leaves a trail of dead on his way to find Mal and retrieve his money, simply because he performed a job and wants payment for it. He has already compartmentalized the facts of his wife's betrayal, his partner's thievery, and his desire for payback (the title of the 1999 Mel Gibson adaptation). For Parker, there is no feelings. There is no sense of loyalty or morality. There is only the job. And the job must be completed fully and correctly. He is stoic, harsh, cold and brutal but extremely effective. He contacts his jugger, he gets a job, he plans the job, he puts together a team to execute the job, he performs the job, then he takes the money, lives in a hotel somewhere, spending his money on food, liquor, and women until it runs out, then does it all over again. He is surviving the only way he knows how. He is a product of violence, of the war, of having to steal to survive. It's the only thing a man like Parker can do. 

There is a quick, rough, brutal description of Parker in the opening paragraphs of The Hunter, but the lingering quality of him is his imposing size and sense of menace. He looks like a scarecrow built from stone. Westlake once said that while writing him, he had an image of Jack Palance in his head. We find out absolutely nothing about his past or his family in the 24+ Parker novels. He is essentially ageless, like James Bond, but he seems to always be around 40 and we never learn his first name, even finding out that the name Parker may possibly be an alias. He is basic in every sense of the word, stripped to only the essentials, only what Westlake thought we needed to know about him and not a word more. For Parker, there is nothing more than just what is, there is very little gray area. If you're working with him, you can either do the job or you can't. If you can't you're useless and you will get not one extra second of his time. If you are worthwhile or if your reputation is respectful, Parker will come to you with a job offer. He doesn't kill anyone who doesn't deserve it, but he has no qualms about amassing a body count to finish a job. There is no sense of right and wrong for him, having to kill someone is just simply a part of the plan. His frequent target is members and organizations within The Outfit. They have frequently put out contracts on Parker but to no avail. His targets are anyone with money. Parker once even robbed an entire town overnight.

Parker comes across so well on screen because he is the very definition of antihero, and we have always loved antiheroes. For me, he's the height of cool, the hero who is badder than the bad guys. He skulks around, growling his way into back rooms and top floor offices in search of money, his money. And it doesn't hurt that the likes of Marvin, Statham and Duvall, as noted above, some of the coolest tough-guy actors we've ever had, have played the character. Darwyn Cooke started creating the Parker books as graphic novels and even received full blessing from Westlake himself to use the name Parker, which he never allowed in any of the other iterations of the character. Unfortunately, he passed before he could see the final product but by all accounts he was working closely with Cooke and liked what he saw. The books are fantastic, with spare, colorless art that evokes a long ago era where a man like Parker thrives. The University Of Chicago Press began republishing all of the Parker books in 2008 and they look great, slim paperbacks with individual, serialized art on each cover that do the character and the author justice.