The Economic Merry-Go-Round of the The Maltese Falcon

The Maltese Falcon — through the characters of Sam Spade, Brigid O’Shaughnessy, Joel Cairo, and Mr. Gutman — exposes the blind greed investors displayed leading up to the crash of 1929.

Sam Spade, whose name was a derogatory term used against African Americans, is a working class private detective who smokes Bull Durham tobacco. The tobacco symbolizes the bullish personality of the economy as a whole, an economy that led to the creation of the March 2, 1929 Chicago Tribune article titled, “‘Hoover Bull Market’ Sends Stocks Soaring.”1 The article claims that “the bears became bulls and the bulls became rich in a session of speculative frenzy. . .” In investment banking, bear markets signal declining prices while bull markets are indicative of rising prices. During this frenetic six-month period of the “Hoover bull market,” stock prices continuously rose, causing people of all classes to invest in securities with the hope of acquiring massive profits.

In Chapter 2 of the Maltese Falcon, Spade is described as having the body of a bear. The description both foreshadows Spade’s downturn in terms of economic opportunity and comments on the poor economic situation of a majority of African Americans. Bull Durham, on the other hand, provides hope for an upswing in fortunes and not only symbolizes the speculative economy, but also…