One of the most maligned writers of the twentieth century, Mickey Spillane has always been popular with readers. His name appears more than any other on lists of best-selling authors since World War II, yet his writing has been labeled "atrocious" by...

In terms of sales, Mickey Spillane is one of the most popular writers of the twentieth century, and of all time. In terms of the content of the books themselves and the two fictional heroes for which he is best known, he has been widely reviled for his...

Frank Morrison Spillane (March 9 1918 – July 17 2006), better known as Mickey Spillane, was an American author of crime novels, many featuring his signature detective character, Mike Hammer. More than 225 million copies of his books have sold...

Today is Tuesday, July 17, the 198th day of 2007. There are 167 days left in the year.Today's Highlight in History:On July 17, 1996, TWA Flight 800, a Paris-bound Boeing 747, exploded and crashed off Long Island, N.Y., shortly after leaving John F. Kennedy International...

Choreographer Michael Kidd, whose joyously athletic dances for ballet, Broadway and Hollywood delighted audiences for half a century and won him five Tonys and an Oscar, has died.Kidd's nephew, Robert Greenwald, told The New York Times that Kidd died at his Los Angeles home Sunday...

Hollywood's starmakers always are on the lookout for a fresh new face and they found one in Mae Laborde, albeit of the wrinkled variety. The 97-year-old Laborde is just four years into her acting career and hotter than ever. Standing 4-feet-10, with snow-white hair, rosy-red...

With "The Feminine Mystique," Betty Friedan gave rise to the modern women's movement, striking a chord that continues to ring four decades later.Friedan and Coretta Scott King gained fame as crusaders for human rights. Shelley Winters and Wendy Wasserstein made their mark in the performing...

One only need remember that rebellion is not the exclusive property of the Left in this or any other country to feel no surprise that it is a strong feature of the works of the most popular fiction writer on the Right. Practically all of Mickey Spillane's heroes are anti-Establishment in sentiment, often outspoken in their views, and sometimes activist. The actions taken range from such petty harassment of a police officer as smashing his cigars by a carefully planned accident, through threatening bo...

No doubt one reason for the popularity of the early Spillane novels lies in their close mirroring of cultural attitudes of the 1950's. Spillane's treatment of women is particularly significant, moreover, since the hard-boiled detective formula, of which Spillane is the master seller, is the first fictional formula for men to focus explicitly on sexual relationships between men and women. In order to understand the importance of Spillane's definition of women, however, it is first necess...