Marija Dalbello

Reading Interests of Adults

Detective / MysteryFiction

RutgersSchool of Communication and Informationdalbello@rutgers.edu

Image credit: Victor GAD

Overview _______________________________________ What is detective fiction?

Relevant approaches and theories Horizons of expectation Hermeneutic specialization Transformed play

History and types of detective fiction and detectives

Narrative structure and genre formula• 7-step formula (plot typology)• 4 constitutive elements of detective story• Action of the large scale• Convention and invention at the core of detective story

Conclusion

What is detective fiction? _______________________________________

Detective fiction is an art of symmetry, it seeks the appearance of logical necessity, like classical tragedy, and like tragedy, it seeks the unity of place - the locked room, the ship, or train in motion.(Barzun, in Dove, 4)

Game of ratiocination Transformation of crime into game Fundamentally an intellectual undertaking As if watching a magic trick which a magician

immediately explains puzzle

Genre of hermeneutic specialization WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?

Relevant approaches and theories Horizons of expectation

_______________________________________• Interpretation is pre-structured

• Historical relations of text and reader: first reading determines all subsequent readings

• Negativity (what is not told in the text) provide opportunities for a reader to question what comes next

• Multiple interpretations possible (no regulative context such as in conversation)

• Text is not object but product of interpretation

• Theories and theorists• Reception theory (W. Iser)• Reader-response (S. Fish)

Relevant approaches and theories Hermeneutic specialization

_______________________________________The reader’s need to find out what happens next

Most stories have hermeneutic qualities

In the detective story the reader asks of any information

How it fits inHow it will all come out

• Detective fiction is rich in structured blanks which indicate patterns in the text

• Blanks are programmed• Suggestions related to later developments

• Transformation of signs into clues: Is this fact important?

Relevant approaches and theories Transformed Play

_______________________________________Absence of stress - Presence of strain

Similarity of crossword puzzle and detective novel:Sets tasks or set of related tasks for the readerShaped by conventionNeither has goal beyond itself

• Gadamerian concept of play transformed into art:• Story becomes work of art• Story is transformed into structure (abstraction)

Detective story refuses to go beyond the bounds of play - it is not about the real world but end in itself

Classic (determined, symmetrical, disciplined reading)

Hard boiled (includes goal-free non-hermeneutic elements)

History and types _______________________________________

Formal-problem detective story Problem solved by means of reason E.A. Poe, C. Doyle Golden age of mystery (1920s-1940s)

Hard-boiled private eye detective story• Problem solved by means of pursuit and conflict rather than reason• American invention• Time frame: 1940s-1950s

Gothic and romantic suspense involving crime Time frame: 1960s-1970s

History and types _______________________________________ Decline of the mystery genre in the 1970s and

counter-measure activities in the 1980s of: Mystery Writers of America Sisters in Crime (founded in 1985)- to promote

gender equality in crime publishing

Revival in the 1980s: Cozier mysteries placing emphasis on sleuth’s

personal relationships

• Diversity and popularity of the genre in the 1990s: Detectives: ethnic, male, female, gay Genre-blending with romance, SF, historicals

Police procedural more recent transformation: Detective is an expert, professional,

specialist Rules of the police department in play

Rules of detective genre formula _______________________________________

These rules determine the genre formula:

Detective-protagonist is prime mover of the action of the narrative

The detection-plot supplies the major theme of the story

Minor themes may exist but detection is always basic Blanks are the propellants of the text

There is the problem to be solved, presented as insoluble

There is the solution, which is always reached before the story ends

Detective story plot _______________________________________7-step basic plot of all detective fiction (George Dove)

Problem First solution Complication Period of gloom Dawning light Solution Explanation

Hermeneutic interpretation of clues in terms of action of large scale (Knight & McKnight)

Red herring (first puzzle) ~ Focal mysterywith the ironic connection

between the two Test scenario (red herring) ~ Solution (focal

mystery)

Convention and invention _______________________________________

Constitutive conventions define a genre and are essential to it

Detective integral to the story - detective’s storyCentrality of the main plotProblem difficult to solveSolution cannot be revealed too earlyThere must be a satisfying solution

Regulative conventions characterize a genre but are not essential to it

Detective story without a murder is possible

• Recurrent stereotypesMost Likely Suspect, The Death Warrant

Conclusion _______________________________________

Convention regulates genres

Limits of genre formula and how genres break out

• Creativity and invention at the boundaries integral to interpretive play

• Creativity and invention at the boundaries integral to continued relevance