Detective fiction
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Detective fiction is a branch of crime fiction that centres upon the investigation of a crime, usually murder, by a detective, either professional or amateur. It is closely related to mystery fiction but generally contains more of a puzzle element that must be solved, generally by a single protagonist, either male or female.
A common feature of detective fiction is an investigator who is unmarried, with some source of income other than a regular job, and who generally has some pleasing eccentricities or striking characteristics. He or she frequently has a less intelligent assistant, or foil, who is asked to make apparently irrelevant inquiries, and who acts as an audience surrogate for the explanation of the mystery at the end of the story.
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Whodunit?
The most widespread subgenre of the detective novel is the whodunit (or whodunnit), where great ingenuity may be exercised in narrating the events of the crime and of the subsequent investigation in such a manner as to conceal the identity of the criminal from the reader until the end of the book, when the method and culprit are revealed.
Early archetypes of these stories were the three Auguste Dupin tales by Edgar Allan Poe: The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Mystery of Marie Rogêt, and The Purloined Letter. Poe's detective stories have been described as ratiocinative tales. In stories such as these, the primary concern of the plot is ascertaining truth, and the usual means of obtaining the truth is through a complex and mysterious process combining intuitive logic, astute observation, and perspicacious inference. As a consequence, the crime itself sometimes becomes secondary to the efforts taken to solve it. The Mystery of Marie Rogêt is particularly interesting, as it is a barely fictionalized analysis of the circumstances of the real-life discovery of the body of a young woman named Mary Rogers, in which Poe expounds his theory of what actually happened. The style of the analysis, with its attention to forensic detail, makes it a precursor of the stories about the most famous of all fictional detectives, Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, who in turn set the style for many others in later years, including Holmesian pastiches such as August Derleth's Solar Pons.
Another early archetype of the whodunit is found as a sub-plot in the vast novel Bleak House (1853) by Charles Dickens. The conniving lawyer Tulkinghorn is killed in his office late one night and the crime is investigated by Inspector Bucket of the Metropolitan force. Numerous characters appeared on the staircase leading to Tulkinghorn's office that night, some of them in disguise, and Inspector Bucket must penetrate these mysteries to identify the culprit.
Dickens' protégé, Wilkie Collins (1824-1889), is credited with the first great mystery novel The Woman in White. He is sometimes referred to as the "grandfather of English detective fiction." His novel The Moonstone (1868) was described by T. S. Eliot as "the first and greatest of English detective novels" and by Dorothy L. Sayers as "probably the very finest detective story ever written". Although technically preceded by Charles Felix's The Notting Hill Mystery (1865), The Moonstone can claim to have established the genre with several classic features of the twentieth-century detective story:
- A country house robbery
- An 'inside job'
- A celebrated investigator
- Bungling local constabulary
- Detective enquiries
- False suspects
- The 'least likely suspect'
- A rudimentary 'locked room' murder
- A reconstruction of the crime
- A final twist in the plot
Some readers have suggested even earlier prototypes for the whodunit, most notably the Old Testament story of Susanna and the Elders (Daniel 13; in the Protestant Bible this story is found in the apocrypha) and the story of the dog and the horse related in the third chapter of Voltaire's Zadig (1747). However, popularity of this genre has only grown in time, and even has made it into the online community (http://privatedick.blogspot.com).
The Private Eye Novel
An American invention like jazz, the earliest private eye (PI) novels by the likes of Dashiell Hammett were considered novels of the proletariat, exploring "mean streets" and the underbelly of corruption within the United States. Several movies have been based on his work, including three versions of The Maltese Falcon and a series of movies based on The Thin Man.
Raymond Chandler updated the form with his private detective Philip Marlowe, who brought a more intimate voice to the detective than Hammett's distant-third viewpoint. His cadenced dialog and cryptic narrations were musical, evoking the alleys and tough thugs, rich women and powerful men about whom he wrote. Laced with commentary, his books still hold up. Several feature and television movies have been made about the Phillip Marlowe character.
Ross Macdonald, pseudonym of Ken Millar, updated the form again with his detective Lew Archer, while still writing in what is considered the PI's Golden Age, begun by Hammett. Archer, like Hammett's fictional heroes, was a camera eye, with hardly any known past. "Turn Archer sideways, and he disappears," one reviewer wrote. Two of Macdonald's strengths were his use of psychology and his beautiful prose, which was full of imagery. He took the PI novel into people's neighborhoods, exposing the reality that crime can happen next door, not just on the mean streets. The movie Harper starring Paul Newman was based on the Lew Archer character.
Michael Collins, pseudonym of Dennis Lynds, is generally considered the author who led the form into the Modern Age. His PI, Dan Fortune was consistently involved in the same sort of David-and-Goliath stories that Hammett, Chandler, and Macdonald wrote, but he took a sociological bent, exploring the meaning of his characters' places in society and the impact society had on people. Full of commentary and clipped prose, his books were more intimate than his predecessors, dramatizing that crime can happen in one's own living room.
The PI novel was a male-dominated field in which female authors seldom found publication until Marcia Muller, Sara Paretsky, and Sue Grafton in the late 1970s and early 1980s were finally published. Each's detective was brainy, physical, and could hold her own. Their acceptance then success caused publishers to seek out other fine female authors.
The PI today is rich in variety. The strongest characteristic that binds them is that the detective now has a past and a life, while solving cases. The premier authors organization of PI writers is the Private Eye Writers of America.
Police procedural
Many detective stories have police officers as the main characters. Of course these stories may take many forms, but many authors try to go for a realistic depiction of a police officer's routine. A good deal are whodunits, in others the criminal is well known and it is a case of getting enough evidence.
Some typical features of these are:
- The detective is rarely the first on the crime scene - it will be milling with uniform, paramedics and possibly members of the public.
- Forensic reports - and the wait for them.
- Rules and regulations to follow - or not.
- Suspects arrested and kept in custody - sometimes wrongly.
- Pressure from senior officers to show progress.
- A large investigating team - two, three or four main characters, plus other officers to order about.
- Pubs - places to discuss or think about the case - especially in the Inspector Morse mysteries.
- Informants - to lean on.
- Political pressure when the suspects are prominent figures
- Internal hostility from comrades when the suspects are fellow police officers
- Pressure from the media (tv, newspapers) to come up with an answer
- Interesting and unusual cars driven by the principal detective
Other subgenres
There is also a subgenre of historical detectives. See historical whodunnit for an overview.
Suspense - the core tenet of detective fiction
A beginner to detective fiction would generally be advised against reading anything about a piece of detective fiction (such as a blurb or an Introduction) before reading the text itself. Even if they do not mean to, advertisers, reviewers, scholars and aficionados usually have a habit of giving away details or parts of the plot, and sometimes -- for example in the case of Mickey Spillane's novel I, the Jury -- even the solution. (After the credits of Billy Wilder's film Witness for the Prosecution, the cinemagoers are asked not to talk to anyone about the plot so that future viewers will also be able to fully enjoy the unravelling of the mystery.)
The unresolved problem of plausibility and coincidence
Up to the present, some of the problems inherent in crime fiction have remained unsolved (and possibly also insoluble). Some of them can be dismissed with a shrug: Why bother at all, even if it is obvious to everyone that an ordinary person is not likely to keep stumbling across corpses? After all, this is just part of the game of crime fiction. Still the fact that an old spinster like Miss Marple meets with an estimated two bodies per year does raise a few doubts as to the plausibility of the Miss Marple mysteries. De Andrea has described the quiet little village of St Mary Mead as having "put on a pageant of human depravity rivaled only by that of Sodom and Gomorrah". Similarly, TV heroine Jessica Fletcher is confronted with bodies wherever she goes, but over the years people who have met violent deaths have also piled up in the streets of Cabot Cove, Maine, the cosy little village where she lives. Generally, therefore, it is much more convincing if a policeman, private eye, forensic expert or similar professional is made the hero or heroine of a series of crime novels. On the other hand, who cares for authenticity?
Also, the role and legitimacy of coincidence has frequently been the topic of heated arguments ever since Knox categorically stated that "no accident must ever help the detective" (Commandment No.6). Yet time and again authors resort to that deus ex machina-sort of device. Is it just because they have to meet their publisher's deadline and cannot think of any other ending to their latest novel? Or is it because they are mediocre writers in the first place? Or is one coincidence per novel acceptable now? A special case of illogical plotting seems to be the murderers' reluctance to kill off the hero or heroine of the story: Even serial killers, who normally do not hesitate for a second to kill an innocent bystander if they happen to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, show a lot of scruples when it comes to ridding themselves of their most dangerous -- and ultimate -- enemy, even if he or she is already in their power. Instead of killing him or her right on the spot -- in the manner in which they bumped off all their previous victims --, they keep putting off the execution until it is too late and they are outsmarted by their rival. In many cases, instead of just pulling the trigger, they embark on a lengthy discussion of their criminal record, detailing all their crimes -- no doubt mainly for the reader's benefit, but shouldn't a good author be able to think of other narrative devices that help the reader catch up on what they have missed so far?
Technological progress has also rendered many of plots implausible and antiquated. For example, the use of mobile phones by practically everyone these days has significantly altered the dangerous situations that investigators traditionally find themselves in. A snowbound mansion somewhere in the country, with a murderer at large? A deserted street in a slum area in the middle of the night, with dark figures looming in the distance? Get out your mobile and phone for help. Some authors have not really succeeded in adapting to the changes brought about by modern technology; others, among them Carl Hiaasen (born 1953), have.
Famous fictional detectives
The full list of fictional detectives would be immense. The format is well suited to dramatic presentation, and so there are also many television and film detectives, besides those appearing in adaptations of novels in this genre. Fictional detectives generally fall within one of four domains:
- the amateur or dilettante detective (Marple, Jessica Fletcher);
- the private investigator (Holmes, Marlowe, Spade, Rockford);
- the police detective (Ironside, Kojak, Morse);
- more recently, the medical examiner, criminal psychologist, forensic evidence expert or other specialists (Scarpetta, Quincy, Cracker, CSI).
Notable fictional detectives and their creators include:
Amateurs
- Father Brown — G. K. Chesterton
- Albert Campion — Margery Allingham
- Kate Fansler — Amanda Cross
- Dr. Gideon Fell — John Dickson Carr
- Jessica Fletcher — Peter S. Fischer, Richard Levinson & William Link: Murder, She Wrote (TV)
- Kinky Friedman — Kinky Friedman
- Jannie Jansen — Janwillem van de Wetering
- Jimmy Kudo (Shin'ichi Kudo) a.k.a. Conan Edogawa — Gosho Aoyama
- Hajime Kindaichi — Yozaburo Kanari & Fumiya Sato: Kindaichi Case Files manga series
- Donald Lam — Erle Stanley Gardner
- Drury Lane — Ellery Queen
- Miss Marple — Agatha Christie
- The Great Merlini — Clayton Rawson
- Sir Henry Merrivale — Carter Dickson
- Special Agent Pendergast — Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child
- Ellery Queen — Ellery Queen
- Jim Qwilleran — Lilian Jackson Braun
- Simon Templar aka The Saint — Leslie Charteris
- Easy Rawlins — Walter Mosley
- Rabbi David Small — Harry Kemelman
- Paul Temple — Francis Durbridge
- Philip Trent — E.C. Bentley
- Augustus S. F. X. Van Dusen — Jacques Futrelle
- Lord Peter Wimsey — Dorothy L. Sayers
- Philo Vance — S.S. Van Dine
Private eyes
- Lew Archer — Ross Macdonald
- Joe Caneili — Hayford Peirce
- Rex Carver — Victor Canning
- The Continental Op (he never reveals his name, but he's an operative for the Continental Detective Agency) — Dashiell Hammett
- Dan Fortune — Dennis Lynds, aka Michael Collins
- Mike Hammer — Mickey Spillane
- Sherlock Holmes — Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
- Thomas Magnum — Donald P. Bellisario, Glen A. Larson
- Travis McGee — John D. MacDonald
- Philip Marlowe — Raymond Chandler
- Hercule Poirot — Agatha Christie
- Kinsey Millhone — Sue Grafton
- Laura Principal — Michelle Spring
- Cliff Hardy — Peter Corris
- Precious Ramotswe — Alexander McCall Smith
- Jim Rockford — Stephen J. Cannell & Roy Huggins: The Rockford Files (TV)
- Sam Spade — Dashiell Hammett
- Spenser — Robert B. Parker
- Nero Wolfe — Rex Stout
- John Shaft — Ernest Tidyman
Police detectives
- Includes FBI agents, etc.
- Roderick Alleyn — Ngaio Marsh
- Sir John Appleby — Michael Innes
- J. P. Beaumont — J. A. Jance
- Martin Beck — Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö (Sjöwall and Wahlöö)
- Henri Bencolin — John Dickson Carr
- Harry Bosch — Michael Connelly
- Commissario Guido Brunetti — Donna Leon
- Charlie Chan — Earl Derr Biggers
- Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn — Tony Hillerman
- De Cock — A. C. Baantjer
- Inspector Ghote — H. R. F. Keating
- Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs et al. (NCIS) — Donald P. Bellisario & Don McGill: Navy NCIS: Naval Criminal Investigative Service (TV)
- Det. Robert Goren — Rene Balcer, Elizabeth Benjamin, et al.: Law & Order: Criminal Intent (TV)
- Grijpstra and de Gier, the Amsterdam Cops (who later became private eyes) — Janwillem van de Wetering
- Robert Ironside (strictly, an ex-police detective) — Collier Young: Ironside (TV)
- Maigret — Georges Simenon
- Jack Malone et al. (FBI) — Hank Steinberg: Without a Trace (TV)
- Colonel March — John Dickson Carr
- Adrian Monk (another ex-police detective) — Andy Breckman: Monk (TV)
- Inspector Morse — Colin Dexter
- Inspector Rebus — Ian Rankin
- Charlie Resnick — John Harvey
- Commissaire Tama — Hayford Peirce
- Dick Tracy — Chester Gould
- Inspector Wexford — Ruth Rendell
- Saito Masanobu — Janwillem van de Wetering (also as Seiko Legru)
- Wachtmeister Studer — Friedrich Glauser (some kind of Maigret in Switzerland)
Medical examiners, etc.
- Dr. Temperance Brennan — Kathy Reichs
- Horatio "H." Caine et al. — Ann Donahue, Carol Mendelsohn & Anthony Zuiker: CSI: Miami (TV)
- Dr. Eddie "Fitz" Fitzgerald (a criminal psychologist) — Jimmy McGovern: Cracker (TV)
- Gil Grissom, Ph.D. et al. — Anthony Zuiker: C.S.I.: Crime Scene Investigation
- Dr. Jane Halifax (a forensic psychologist) — Halifax f.p. (TV)
- Dr. R. Quincy, M.E. — Glen A. Larson & Lou Shaw: Quincy, M.E. (TV)
- Dr. Kay Scarpetta — Patricia Cornwell
- Det. Mack Taylor et al. — Andrew Lipsitz & Janet Tamaro:CSI: NY (TV)
Others
- Anthony Blake (Anthony Dorian in pilot episode) (magician) — Larry Brody: The Magician (TV)
- Jonathan Creek (designer of illusions for a magician) — David Renwick: Jonathan Creek (TV)
- Perry Mason (lawyer) — Erle Stanley Gardner
- Ben Matlock (lawyer) — Dean Hargrove: Matlock (TV)
- Tony Petrocelli (lawyer) — Harold Buchman & Sidney J. Furie: Petrocelli (TV)
- Tarot (magician) — Trevor Preston: Ace of Wands (TV)
- Arsène Lupin (gentleman-thief) Maurice Leblanc
- Batman (vigilante) — Bob Kane and Bill Finger, first appearance in 1939 comic book Detective Comics #27 (Comics, TV, Movies)
And for younger readers
- Encyclopedia Brown — Donald J. Sobol
- Nancy Drew — Carolyn Keene and others
- The Famous Five — Enid Blyton
- The Hardy Boys — Franklin W. Dixon and others
- The Secret Seven — Enid Blyton
- The Three Investigators — Robert Arthur and others
Historical
- In chronological order.
- Gordianus the Finder (Roman Republic of the 1st century BCE) — Steven Saylor: Roma sub Rosa series
- Senator Decius Caecilius Metellus the Younger (Roman Republic of the 1st century BCE) — John Maddox Roberts: SPQR series
- Marcus Didius Falco (the Roman Empire of the 1st century CE) — Lindsey Davis
- Judge Dee (7th-century China) — Robert van Gulik
- Sister Fidelma (7th-century Ireland) — Peter Tremayne
- Li Kao (7th-century China) — Barry Hughart
- Brother Cadfael (12th-century England and Wales) — Ellis Peters
- Brother William of Baskerville (1327) — Umberto Eco: The Name of the Rose
In science fiction and fantasy
- Marty Burns — Jay Russell (writer)
- Elijah Baley and R. Daneel Olivaw — Isaac Asimov
- Lord Darcy — Randall Garrett
- Dirk Gently — Douglas Adams
- Hawk and Fisher — Simon Green
- Jonas, der letzte Detektiv — well done funny & hardboiled radio play in Germany
- Nohar Rajasthan — S. Andrew Swann
- Kline Maxwell — S. Andrew Swann (a journalist in Dragons of the Cuyahoga)
- Sam Space — William Nolan
- Wendell Urth — Isaac Asimov
- His Grace Commander Sir Samuel Vimes — Terry Pratchett's Discworld series
- Gil "the ARM" Hamilton (of the Amalgated Regional Militia [UN police] in the early known space history. — Larry Niven
Other notable authors
Detective debuts and swansongs
Many detectives appear in more than one novel or story. Here is a list of a few debut and swansong stories:
Books
- Bloody Murder: From the Detective Story to the Crime Novel - A History by Julian Symons ISBN 0571094651
See also
External resources
- Classic Crime Fiction Website (http://www.classiccrimefiction.com/)
- Private Eye Writers of America website: [1] (http://members.aol.com/rrandisi/myhomepage/writing.html)
- Most Honored Mystery Books (http://book.awardannals.com/genre/mystery/)de:Krimi
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