DOCSLIB.ORG

Teaches Fiction and Storytelling Right on Crime How Walter Mosley’S Inventive Writing and Complex Characters Have Breathed New Life Into Classic Detective Novels

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Teaches Fiction and Storytelling Right on Crime How Walter Mosley’S Inventive Writing and Complex Characters Have Breathed New Life Into Classic Detective Novels WALTER MOSLEY Teaches Fiction and Storytelling Right on Crime How Walter Mosley’s inventive writing and complex characters have breathed new life into classic detective novels his story, like all great stories, that investigates the Black experience neighborhood of color that would be begins with a single sentence: in postwar Los Angeles. Its protago- the focal point of the 1965 riots. Even- T “On hot sticky days in south- nist, an out-of-work World War II vet tually, the family moved to Mid-City— ern Louisiana, the fire ants swarm.” named Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins, is an L.A. neighborhood, Walter says, In the mid-1980s, Walter Mos- hired to find a missing white woman that has always been in flux ley, a computer programmer, types all while navigating the deeply tar- “First, it was mostly white, mostly out these words in a quiet moment. nished and conflicted promised land Jewish. Then Black people moved in. He’s 34 years old. He’s never thought of Southern California. Critics fall in When we came, it was mostly white about being a writer, but something love with the rich storyline, the evoc- people. After a while, mostly Black about the sentence stays with him. ative language, and the unofficial -de people lived here,” he recalled in a Los He thinks it sounds like something tective who is not the typical loner but Angeles Times interview. “But then, that could be in a book—and it's the a man deeply connected to friends, his the white people moved back, which first time he thinksmaybe I could be a past, and the city he has adopted. I thought was wonderful. I never saw writer. He’s been reading Alice Walk- Over the next three decades, this anything like that. And so it became er’s The Color Purple and is excited by first novel snowballs into an expan- truly mixed.” what that book opens up in his mind sive literary universe. Soon, there are In the Rawlins novels, Walter’s pro- about the kinds of stories one can tell. other kinds of Black male heroes in- tagonist also moves through the shift- He starts taking classes, he joins a habiting not only mysteries, but liter- ing neighborhoods of Los Angeles, writers’ group. He writes poems and ary fiction, science fiction, and young looking for new homes for his grow- short stories. He experiments. A teacher, adult novels. There is nonfiction, ing family. But the character’s reloca- the famed Irish novelist Edna O’Brien, comic books, political commentary— tion isn’t just an echo of Walter’s own encourages him to write a novel. And so in all, more than 60 books translated experience; it’s a way of opening his he writes what would later be seen as into 25 languages—a body of work fiction to broader concerns. This has the “first” novel in the world that Easy that earns both a PEN America Life- become, perhaps, the most essential Rawlins inhabits: Gone Fishin’. Fifteen time Achievement Award and the Na- element of Walter’s work: his desire publishers reject the work. Walter de- tional Book Foundation’s Medal for to share the neighborhoods and lives cides to adapt the lead character into Distinguished Contribution to Amer- that had been left out of the fictional a new manuscript, a mystery this time. ican Letters. chronicle, the lives that faced not only But he isn’t thinking of genre. He is Walter was born in 1952, the son of crimes that need solving, but racism thinking of the story he can tell about a Black man from Louisiana and a Rus- in all its social and financial forms, this character moving west. sian-Jewish file clerk who both worked and love in all its complications. The resulting novel, Devil in a Blue for the City of Los Angeles school dis- The terrain of the detective story, Dress, is a revelation: a detective story trict. His early years were in Watts, a according to the literary biographer 1 Frank MacShane, “can involve an ex- ries about what mattered, about the will get knocked down. But we’re all traordinary range of humanity, from hardships and losses ordinary people storytellers and, utilizing the right the very rich to the very poor, and can endured and fought. Those concerns tools, capable of shaping history encompass a great many different plac- also became a guiding principle of through works of fiction. The partic- es.” This makes the form fertile ground Walter’s work. He firmly believes that ulars of genre aren’t so important as to cultivate all kinds of heroes, men people are motivated to read novels overcoming the blank page, seeing it and women who might not otherwise not only for entertainment, but as a as an opportunity instead of the ene- have been seen as important enough to means to better understand human my. Your story, like all stories, begins stand up to injustices and corruption. nature. So he hopes you will take his with a single sentence. Perhaps a surprising source of in- techniques and philosophy—writing spiration to Walter was not so much habitually, invoking poetic language, other detective fiction but the 19th- separating plot from story, turning the century French novelist Émile Zola’s setting into a character—and make Ready to develop your short story episodic novels. In his exploration them your own. into a novel and query an agent (or of the everyday lives of those with That might sound daunting. And just write a great first line)? Head little means or power, Zola told sto- Walter makes no bones about it: You over to masterclass.com. 2 Book ’Em 10 essential Walter Mosley reads, from mystery to science fiction to political commentary The Easy Rawlins books (1990–present) This 14-book series (and count- ing) follows the character of Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins, a family man and re- luctant detective, from 1948 to 1968. He traverses a Los Angeles fraught with crime, corruption, and racism. RL’s Dream (1995) Walter’s first non-Rawlins effort fo- kind of hybrid species—if not quite Fortunate Son (2006) cuses on Soupspoon Wise, a Delta superheroes, then heightened ver- Walter again returns to Southern bluesman caught between his con- sions of themselves. California, telling the story of two ditional existence on the Lower East men—one Black and one white. Side of Manhattan and his dream- Workin’ on the Chain They grow up together and, after like memories of Robert Johnson, Gang: Shaking Off the Dead many years apart, reunite as adults, the highly mythologized real-life Hand of History (2000) offering contrasting realities of priv- 1930s guitarist. In his nonfiction monograph, Walter ilege and hardship. makes an elegant case for American The Socrates Fortlow books capitalism as a system of cultural The Leonid McGill books (1997–2008) and economic oppression—not only (2009–2020) These three collections of interwo- for Black people, but for everyone. For his third mystery series, Walter ven short stories revolve around takes on New York City, which he the ex-con Socrates Fortlow. After The Fearless Jones books writes with gritty grandeur. Here serving time at an Indiana prison, (2001–2006) we’re introduced to Leonid McGill, Fortlow is in South Los Angeles and Walter’s second mystery series also a former boxer turned private detec- trying, like so many of Walter’s pro- takes place in Los Angeles in the mid- tive adrift in a city—and a world—he tagonists, to live according to his 1950s. The hero is a detective, Fearless doesn’t quite recognize anymore. own moral code. Jones, but the story is told through a timid bookseller named Paris Minton. The Last Days of Ptolemy Gray Blue Light (1998) These novels are lighter and looser (2010) Walter’s science fiction debut, set than the Easy Rawlins books, with After watching his mother struggle in the Bay Area, concerns an oth- plots that grow out of the collabora- through early-stage dementia, Wal- erworldly blue light that transforms tion between Jones and Minton rather ter conjures up a protagonist wres- many of the novel’s characters into a than self-protective solitude. tling with age and illness. In a novel 3 The Writ Parade Walter’s fiction and storytelling transcend genre. So do his inspirations. Here he gives you his abridged reading list Breath, Eyes, ery writer. Freud did it it through a world Memory with a place that ex- that doesn’t care if he by Edwidge Danticat ists in our souls—the makes it or not.” “Born a French speak- unconscious. If any er, Ms. Danticat came writer can approxi- Four Quartets to America, learned mate this feat she will by T.S. Eliot English, and proceed- have immediate en- “I’ve read this slen- ed to translate into trée into the canon.” der volume 100 times. fiction the most com- I’ve never understood mon experience of the The Stranger all of it, but with each American imagina- by Albert Camus new reading, I under- tion—that of the emi- “The North African stand a little more. It’s grant soul.” existentialist novel. a deftly written quar- In a world dominat- tet of poems that Living My Life ed by corporations, contain within it past, by Emma Goldman despots, and cultur- present, future, and “A memoir that is at al fads, we find our the universe at large.” once wild, feminist, deeply flawed hero that recalls some of the dynamics anarchist, and a view fighting, and maybe Belly Song from RL’s Dream, the character un- of America and the dying, for the right to by Etheridge Knight dergoes an experimental treatment Western world that be himself.” “Etheridge was in for dementia, unlocking difficult— few authors would turns a heroin addict, and unavoidable—memories.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Many Readers Have “Go-To” Authors, Writers They Turn to When No One Else Grabs Their Attention
    SUMMER READING GUIDE 2018 Many readers have “go-to” authors, writers they turn to when no one else grabs their attention. This summer we’d like to help you find a “go-to” writer of your own. Below is a list of authors who have many titles to their credit. Some have written a series with recurring characters; some have written books with similar themes; some have written exclusively within one genre (mystery, fantasy, and so on); and some have just produced lots of good, lively writing over the years. In addition, we have included some individual titles, recommended by students, by faculty, and by the library staff. THE HEADMASTER’S CHOICE THIS YEAR IS BEARTOWN BY FREDRIK BACKMAN, WHICH BEGINS LIKE THIS: “It’s a Friday in early March in Beartown and nothing has happened yet. Everyone is waiting. Tomorrow, the Beartown Ice Hockey Club’s junior team is playing in the semi-final of the biggest youth tournament in the country. How important can something like that be? In most places, not so important, of course. But Beartown isn’t most places.” Backman’s novel explores the hopes that a small community pins on a group of teenaged athletes, and it explores the secrets that can tear a small town apart. Backman’s characters—coaches, athletes, parents, and local fans—are often flawed, often heroic, and always fully human. In addition to Beartown, you are to read two other books from the list below. You may choose two books by the same author, or two books by different authors.
    [Show full text]
  • Contemporary American Crime Fiction
    Contemporary American Crime Fiction Crime Files Series General Editor: Clive Bloom Since its invention in the nineteenth century, detective fiction has never been more popular. In novels, short stories, films, radio, television and now in computer games, private detectives and psychopaths, prim poisoners and overworked cops, tommy gun gangsters and cocaine criminals are the very stuff of modern imagination, and their creators one mainstay of popular consciousness. Crime Files is a ground-breaking series offering scholars, students and discerning readers a comprehensive set of guides to the world of crime and detective fiction. Every aspect of crime writing, detective fiction, gangster movie, true-crime exposé, police procedural and post-colonial investigation is explored through clear and informative texts offering comprehensive coverage and theoretical sophistication. Published titles include: Hans Bertens and Theo D’haen CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN CRIME FICTION Anita Biressi CRIME, FEAR AND THE LAW IN TRUE CRIME STORIES Ed Christian (editorr) THE POST-COLONIAL DETECTIVE Paul Cobley THE AMERICAN THRILLER Generic Innovation and Social Change in the 1970s Lee Horsley THE NOIR THRILLER Susan Rowland FROM AGATHA CHRISTIE TO RUTH RENDELL British Women Writers in Detective and Crime Fiction Crime Files Series Standing Order ISBN 978-0-333-71471-3 (outside North America only) You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order. Please contact your bookseller or, in case of difficulty, write to us at the address below with your name and address, the title of the series and the ISBN quoted above. Customer Services Department, Macmillan Distribution Ltd, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS, England Contemporary American Crime Fiction Hans Bertens Professor of Comparative Literature Utrecht University and Theo D’haen Professor of English and American Literature Leiden University © Hans Bertens and Theo D’haen 2001 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2001 978-0-333-67455-0 All rights reserved.
    [Show full text]
  • Toni Morrison: the Pieces I Am
    TONI MORRISON: THE PIECES I AM A Film by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders LOGLINE This artful and intimate meditation on legendary storyteller Toni Morrison examines her life, her works and the powerful themes she has confronted throughout her literary career. Morrison leads an assembly of her peers, critics and colleagues on an exploration of race, history, America and the human condition. SYNOPSIS Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am offers an artful and intimate meditation on the life and works of the legendary storyteller and Nobel prize-winner. From her childhood in the steel town of Lorain, Ohio to ‘70s-era book tours with Muhammad Ali, from the front lines with Angela Davis to her own riverfront writing room, Toni Morrison leads an assembly of her peers, critics and colleagues on an exploration of race, America, history and the human condition as seen through the prism of her own literature. Inspired to write because no one took a “little black girl” seriously, Morrison reflects on her lifelong deconstruction of the master narrative. Woven together with a rich collection of art, history, literature and personality, the film includes discussions about her many critically acclaimed works, including novels “The Bluest Eye,” “Sula” and “Song of Solomon,” her role as an editor of iconic African-American literature and her time teaching at Princeton University. In addition to Ms. Morrison, the film features interviews with Hilton Als, Angela Davis, Fran Lebowitz, Walter Mosley, Sonia Sanchez and Oprah Winfrey, who turned Morrison’s novel “Beloved” into a feature film. Using Timothy Greenfield-Sanders’ elegant portrait- style interviews, Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am includes original music by Kathryn Bostic, a specially created opening sequence by artist Mickalene Thomas, and evocative works by other contemporary African-American artists including Kara Walker, Rashid Johnson and Kerry James Marshall.
    [Show full text]
  • Being Black There: Racial Subjectivity and Temporality in Walter Mosley's
    Being Black There: Racial Subjectivity and Temporality in Walter Mosley’s Detective Novels DAYLAnnE K. ENGLISH African American literature has conventionally, if not universally, been under- stood as following a distinct timeline. That African American literature has its own genealogy and history is readily demonstrated by the existence of a number of current anthologies of African American literature, with the Norton only the most well-known. Even when the various anthologies dispute textual selection within and theorizing of the tradition, they concur that African American litera- ture forms a separate tradition both literarily and temporally and that it ought to be anthologized separately. They all also identify Lucy Terry’s 1746 poem “Bars Fight” as the “earliest known work of literature by an African American” and believe that it thus starts the African American literary tradition (Gates 186). But ascribing a distinct temporality to black people has been far more controversial, and rightly so. To the degree that black people have been perceived to be of another time, they have also quite often been excluded from dominant understandings and constructions of modernity. As Michelle Wright argues, “[A] logical fallacy develops in . the dialectical [racial] discourses” of figures like Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Comte Arthur de Gobineau, and Thomas Jefferson, for whom modern subjectivity was contingent on whiteness and maleness (9). I would add that it is contingent on contemporaneity as well—on being in time, or being there: dasein, as Martin Heidegger would term it (148). But the idea that black people inhabit a distinct temporality, albeit an imposed one, has also been advanced by black intellectuals, at least since Frederick Doug- lass’s 1845 Narrative of the Life.
    [Show full text]
  • Make Mine Hard-Boiled
    Dennis Lehane James Sallis Moonlight Mile Drive : a novel Make Mine The Drop Willnot : a novel Joe Lansdale Mickey Spillane Hard-boiled Dead on the Bones : Pulp on Fire The Last Stand Dennis Lehane Richard Stark Moonlight Mile Nobody Runs Forever The Drop Peter Swanson Jonathan Lethem Her Every Fear Motherless Brooklyn (LP) The Kind Worth Killing Attica Locke Andrew Vachss Another Life Bluebird, Bluebird : a novel David Morrell Robert James Waller, Before I Wake : a story collection The Long Night of Winchell Dear Walter Mosley Urban Waite Debbie Doesn’t Do It Anymore Sometimes the Wolf (LP) Diablerie : a novel Don Winslow Robert Parker The Winter of Frankie Machine Stranger in Paradise (LP) George Pelecanos The Martini Shot : a novella and stories At the Mount Vernon Thomas Pynchon Inherent Vice City Library 315 Snoqualmie Street Daniel Pyne Mount Vernon, WA 98273 Fifty Mice 360-336-6209 07/19/in Hardboiled stories usually feature a Henry Chang Elizabeth Hand detective hero—This detective hero is Red Jade Hard Light : a Cass Neary crime novel usually every bit as tough as the vil- lains he comes across, and he’s al- Lee Child Kenneth Harmon most always the wittiest guy in the A Wanted Man The Fat Man : a tale of North Pole noir room. Noir fiction usually feature a victim, suspect or perpetrator as the Harlan Coben Jordan Harper protagonist. Find these titles on our Long Lost Love and Other Wounds : stories shelves by author or non-fiction call #. Final Detail Michael Harvey Benjamin Black Reed Coleman The Fifth Floor The Black-Eyed Blonde Empty Ever After Gar Haywood Eoin Colfer Lawrence Block Cemetery Road Plugged : a novel Eight Million Ways to Die Screwed (LP) The Girl with he Deep Blue Eyes Patricia Highsmith Strangers on a Train David Corbett Josh Bazell Done for a Dime Roger Hobbs Beat the Reaper James Ellroy Ghostman Robert Jackson Bennett L.A.
    [Show full text]
  • Women As Marginalized Sex in Alice Walker's the Color Purple
    Journal of Literature, Languages and Linguistics www.iiste.org ISSN 2422-8435 An International Peer-reviewed Journal DOI: 10.7176/JLLL Vol.52, 2019 Women as Marginalized Sex in Alice Walker’s The Color Purple Aasif Rashid Wani Research Scholar, Department of English, Sanchi University of Buddhist-Indic Studies, Barla-Raisen (M.P.) Akanksha Gupta Ph.D. Research Scholar, Department of English, Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar University Agra (U.P) Abstract Indian writing in English is a literature produced by Indian authors who native or co- native of India similarly Afro-American literature produced by African authors in America. The authors like Philips Whitely and Olaudah Equiano, produced such a literature in the eighteenth century, they highlighted the slave narratives and the Harlem rebirth. But now there are many authors who produced an ample literature like Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Alice Walker, and Walter Mosley who are considered as the top writers in Afro- American genre. The specialty of this form of literature, they focused how black people were oppressed America. Through the novel ‘The Color Purple’ Alice Walker brought the suffering of black women into existence. Alice Walker’s main intention was to highlight the sexual and racial issues and the struggle of women for survival. She depicted the problems of women on the demotic level. It represents the coercion and the use of black women, violence, subjugation and sexual exploitation. The main aim of this paper is to highlight the complicated life and sufferings of a female leading character Celie and other female characters in the novel who wants to freedom from society.
    [Show full text]
  • Alicia Giménez Bartlett Y Mercedes Castro
    UNIVERSITAT JAUME I FACULTAD DE CIENCIAS HUMANAS Y SOCIALES INSTITUTO UNIVERSITARIO DE ESTUDIOS FEMINISTAS Y DE GÉNERO «PURIFICACIÓN ESCRIBANO» PROGRAMA DE DOCTORADO ESTUDIOS SOBRE LAS MUJERES, FEMINISTAS Y DE GÉNERO ALICIA GIMÉNEZ BARTLETT Y MERCEDES CASTRO. DIFERENTES FORMAS DE APROXIMARSE A LA NOVELA NEGRA DESDE UNA PERSPECTIVA DE GÉNERO TESIS DOCTORAL Presentada por: Dori Valero Valero Dirigida por: Dora Sales Salvador Universitat Jaume I – 2017 AGRADECIMIENTOS En primer lugar, mi más profundo agradecimiento a mi madre, Dora, y a mi padre, Juan, porque sin ellos esta tesis seguro que no estaría hecha. A mi hermana, Mar, porque siempre me anima a seguir adelante. A mis compañeras del Instituto Universitario de Estudios Feministas y de Género «Purificación Escribano» por las sugerencias y la información que me han facilitado para la investigación. A Inma Alcalá, empezamos el camino juntas y lo hemos acabado a la vez. ¡Lo hemos conseguido! A José Manuel por todos sus sabios consejos. A las amigas y amigos por su apoyo y ánimos en todo momento. Y a todas las personas que han mostrado interés en esta tesis. Y muchas gracias a mi directora de tesis, Dora Sales Salvador, por la paciencia y la disponibilidad que siempre me ha prestado, y porque siempre ha estado ahí para resolver cualquier duda. No quiero olvidar, para acabar, dar las gracias a todas las mujeres que han trabajado para que yo pueda estar aquí y tenga una voz propia. Índice Introducción …………………………………………………………………..………………..………………….…… 11 CAPÍTULO 1. El origen y desarrollo de la novela negra ………………….....…………..………... 21 1.1. Origen de la novela negra: el relato enigma ………………….……………….….…….….… 26 1.2.
    [Show full text]
  • Depictions of the Criminal Justice System As a Character in Crime Fiction
    University of Colorado Law School Colorado Law Scholarly Commons Articles Colorado Law Faculty Scholarship 2017 The Chow: Depictions of the Criminal Justice System as a Character in Crime Fiction Marianne Wesson University of Colorado Law School Follow this and additional works at: https://scholar.law.colorado.edu/articles Part of the Criminal Law Commons, Law and Society Commons, and the Legal Writing and Research Commons Citation Information Marianne Wesson, The Chow: Depictions of the Criminal Justice System as a Character in Crime Fiction, 51 NEW ENG. L. REV. 263 (2017), available at https://scholar.law.colorado.edu/articles/1247. Copyright Statement Copyright protected. Use of materials from this collection beyond the exceptions provided for in the Fair Use and Educational Use clauses of the U.S. Copyright Law may violate federal law. Permission to publish or reproduce is required. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Colorado Law Faculty Scholarship at Colorado Law Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Articles by an authorized administrator of Colorado Law Scholarly Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Chow: Depictions of the Criminal Justice System as a Character in Crime Fiction M ARIANNE WESSON∗ INTRODUCTION have been asked to contribute to this volume some observations about how writers of crime fiction portray the criminal justice system as a I character in their work. It’s a provocative assignment, to be sure, and great fun to think about. The most vivid example that comes to mind is Tom Wolfe’s depiction of the system as a gigantic hungry beast, in The Bonfire of the Vanities.1 His narrative puts us at one juncture in the company of Larry Kramer, Assistant District Attorney in the Bronx, watching morosely as the vans that carry pretrial detainees from jail to the courthouse where Kramer practices discharge their cargo into the bowels of the building for morning court dates.
    [Show full text]
  • Crime Fiction: a Global Phenomenon
    IAFOR Journal of Literature & Librarianship Volume 5 – Issue 1 – Autumn 2016 Crime Fiction: A Global Phenomenon Bill Phillips Universitat de Barcelona, Spain Abstract Crime fiction, if you choose to classify it in its broadest sense, has a very long history. Detectives can be found in ancient texts from around the world. One of the things these texts reveal is a common global desire for justice to be done, and to be seen to be done. Often serving as political and/or religious propaganda, they provide assurance that the authorities are protecting their people from wrongdoers and injustice. Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”, published in 1841, is often held to be the first detective story, and Poe’s cerebral hero, Auguste Dupin, provided the model for later literary sleuths such as Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot, all three of whom collaborate on a regular basis with the police. Ironically, however, Poe’s model represents a significant change in direction with regard to earlier crime/detective fiction. No longer concerned with justice, or a just society, Dupin, Holmes and Poirot are concerned solely with the solving of a puzzle to the satisfaction of their own egos. Rarely, if ever, are the social causes behind the crimes they investigate revealed. While it is true the stories are comforting in their conservatism, change is resolutely avoided. By the nineteen-seventies, detective writers began to deconstruct the traditional English golden age and American hard-boiled crime genre and were returning it to its former concerns. Around the world crime writers are now using the genre as a means to explore themes such as discrimination, corruption, inequality, poverty and injustice.
    [Show full text]
  • Welcome to Changing Lives Through Literature (CLTL)! We'll Be Working
    Welcome to Changing Lives Through Literature (CLTL)! We'll be working together every other week for twelve weeks reading literature, maybe writing about our lives and the world around us. I hope you find it interesting and inspiring. Here are some guiding principles behind CLTL: literature is empowering discussions enhance that power the process of reading leads to reflection reflection leads to change. The course responsibilities include: attendance, participation, and maintaining reading/writing materials. I'll be providing assignments that give you food for thought (I hope!), and each session we'll work together to create an environment where you feel free to express ideas, opinions and hopes to each other. This means there should be cooperation, mutual support, and encouragement as we work with each other. Everyone is expected to READ and then DISCUSS their thoughts. A helpful hint: write down your thoughts as you read. You can write them down in the margins of the reading materials, in a notebook, or on post-it notes. If you do this, then you will have something to share. These could be questions, observations, connections, opinions…ANYTHING! You will NEVER be wrong! You are required to attend all sessions and the graduation, to read all the materials, and contribute to the class conversations. You must call Probation Officer Jeff Whiteman if there is a problem and you must make up work missed. MISSING A CLASS MAY CAUSE YOU TO BE DROPPED FROM THE PROGRAM. Read a little each night so you finish the novel in your two weeks. Your notes should include questions you have about the reading, and also your specific thoughts.
    [Show full text]
  • Crime Fiction: a Global Phenomenon
    IAFOR Journal of Literature & Librarianship Volume 5 – Issue 1 – Autumn 2016 Crime Fiction: A Global Phenomenon Bill Phillips Universitat de Barcelona, Spain Abstract Crime fiction, if you choose to classify it in its broadest sense, has a very long history. Detectives can be found in ancient texts from around the world. One of the things these texts reveal is a common global desire for justice to be done, and to be seen to be done. Often serving as political and/or religious propaganda, they provide assurance that the authorities are protecting their people from wrongdoers and injustice. Edgar Allen Poe’s short story “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”, published in 1841, is often held to be the first detective story, and Poe’s cerebral hero, Auguste Dupin, provided the model for later literary sleuths such as Sherlock Holmes and Hercule Poirot, all three of whom collaborate on a regular basis with the police. Ironically, however, Poe’s model represents a significant change in direction with regard to earlier crime/detective fiction. No longer concerned with justice, or a just society, Dupin, Holmes and Poirot are concerned solely with the solving of a puzzle to the satisfaction of their own egos. Rarely, if ever, are the social causes behind the crimes they investigate revealed. While it is true the stories are comforting in their conservatism, change is resolutely avoided. By the nineteen-seventies, detective writers began to deconstruct the traditional English golden age and American hard-boiled crime genre and were returning it to its former concerns. Around the world crime writers are now using the genre as a means to explore themes such as discrimination, corruption, inequality, poverty and injustice.
    [Show full text]
  • The Expansion of American Mythology in Walter Mosley’S Easy Rawlins Series
    THE EXPANSION OF AMERICAN MYTHOLOGY IN WALTER MOSLEY’S EASY RAWLINS SERIES A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of The School of Continuing Studies and of The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Liberal Studies By William Plummer, B.S. Georgetown University Washington, D.C. April 16, 2010 Copyright © 2010 by William Plummer All Rights Reserved ii THE EXPANSION OF AMERICAN MYTHOLOGY IN WALTER MOSLEY’S EASY RAWLINS SERIES William Plummer, B.S. Mentor: Dr. Abby Johnson, Ph.D. ABSTRACT The American Adam, the American Frontier, and the American Dream are fundamental components of the mythology of U.S. American culture. These legends are found in the nation’s greatest novels, including The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Deerslayer, and The Great Gatsby. However, while scholarship on these works has been intensive, the same analysis of contemporary literature is not as vast. The importance of such an analysis is that literature embodies society’s collective mythology, which is in turn reflective of the nation’s cultural ideals. Analysis of contemporary literature provides one with insight into not only the fundamental themes of the nation’s mythology, but it also provides an opportunity to uncover any recent or ongoing alterations in the mythology that might be indicative of changes in the country’s collective consciousness, thus making the analysis distinctive in comparison to other works. Furthermore, given the diversification of characters in American literature and their more accurate reflection, such an analysis can provide greater insight into the multicultural realities of the nation.
    [Show full text]