Claire Gradidge, Thesis
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UNIVERSITY OF WINCHESTER Innovating from Tradition: Creating an Historical Detective Novel for a Contemporary Audience. Claire Gradidge ORCID Number: 0000-0003-3978-8707 Doctor of Philosophy December 2017 This Thesis has been completed as a requirement for a postgraduate research degree of the University of Winchester. This page is intentionally left blank. DECLARATION AND COPYRIGHT STATEMENT Declaration: No portion of the work referred to in the Thesis has been submitted in support of an application for another degree or qualification of this or any other university or other institute of learning. I confirm that this Thesis is entirely my own work. Copyright: Copyright © Claire Gradidge 2017, ‘Innovating from Tradition: Creating an Historical Detective Novel for a Contemporary Audience’, University of Winchester, PhD Thesis pp 1- 335 ORCID Number: 0000-0003-3978-8707. This copy has been supplied on the understanding that it is copyright material and that no quotation from the thesis may be published without proper acknowledgement. Copies (by any process) either in full, or of extracts, may be made only in accordance with instructions given by the author. Details may be obtained from the RKE centre, University of Winchester. This page must form part of any such copies made. Further copies (by any process) of copies made in accordance with such instructions may not be made without the permission (in writing) of the author. No profit may be made from selling, copying or licensing the author’s work without further agreement. 1 Acknowledgements I should like to thank a number of people for their help and support during the course of my PhD studies. Firstly, my supervisory team: Professor Neil McCaw, my Director of Studies, and Professor Inga Bryden. They have guided me through the process with great patience and calm, believing I could succeed even when I did not. Thanks also go to Professor Andrew Melrose, who offered encouragement and a friendly ear when things were difficult, and Judith Heneghan who arranged for me to discuss my novel’s commercial potential at the Winchester Writers’ Festival 2016. Secondly, I want to thank colleagues at the University of Winchester, and my peer-group research students, who have listened to my ideas, doubts and fears without complaint, and who have cheered me on throughout. A special mention to Chrissie Ferngrove, whose reassurance and advice about the multiplicity of regulations and form-filling has smoothed the administrative side of my candidature. Thirdly, thanks go to past and present members of Chandlers Ford Writers group, without whose support, encouragement and practical suggestions Close to Home would be a much poorer thing. Particular thanks to Anne Summerfield for reading the first finished draft of the novel and giving me the benefit of her creative and critical comments – and for her eagle-eyed proof reading. I should also mention Nigel Spriggs, without whose early intervention the novel would never have got off the ground. Finally, I would like to thank my family and friends, who have put up with a lot as I worked through the research process. I can’t name you all but you know who you are. I owe you. Remembering my mother and father, who I hope would be proud I’ve got this far, although I did spend a lot of time with my head in a book! Most important of all, to Nick, my ever-patient husband, Will and Phil, my sons who make me proud to be their mother, Laura and Kat, my lovely daughters-in-law, and light of my life, my grandson Danny – thank you all for everything. 2 UNIVERSITY OF WINCHESTER ABSTRACT Innovating from Tradition: Creating an Historical Detective Novel for a Contemporary Audience. Claire Gradidge ORCID Number: 0000-0003-3978-8707 As a writer seeking to construct a detective text as part of a research study, I looked to the work of previous authors to inform and contextualise the making of a fiction which would both respect and test genre boundaries. A remarkably adaptable genre, detective fiction has, from its early beginnings to the present day, offered the opportunity for writers to create texts which, while introducing changes to the genre and expanding its boundaries, nevertheless remain of the genre. My thesis is presented in two parts. The first is the creative element: a historical detective novel entitled Close to Home, set in the small town of Romsey during World War II. Historically and geographically accurate, the characters and events are entirely fictional. The novel demonstrates how my practice of reading as a writer – a reiterative and multi-layered exploration of the work of authors Allingham, Sayers, Tey and Peters from the twentieth century, and Penney, Griffiths and McPherson from the twenty-first century – has enabled me to create my own text. Patterned on the milieu and tropes of the earlier detective fictions and contextualised by the later works, Close to Home presents a fiction in which plot and writing technique express elements of innovation to the classic detective text. The second part is a commentary reflecting on my research process, tracing the development of my practice of reading as a writer. It explores the way in which reading and writing were inextricably linked: so that my reading influenced and inspired the creation of my novel, while the writing focused my reading practice. In offering an account of how a specific creative writing research study has been undertaken, it suggests how this can illuminate individual practice and be disseminated to other creative writing practitioners. 3 This page is intentionally left blank. 4 LIST OF CONTENTS Declaration and Copyright Statement 1 Acknowledgements 2 Abstract 3 List of Contents 5 Close to Home – A detective fiction set in WWII 7 Commentary 229 Introduction 231 Research 240 Reading as a Writer 251 Tropes 259 Structures 267 Narrative Techniques 277 Gender Roles 292 Historical Detective Fiction and Milieu 301 Conclusion 307 References 311 Appendix I 318 Appendix II 324 5 This page is intentionally left blank. 6 Close to Home A detective fiction set in WWII Claire Gradidge 7 This page is intentionally left blank. 8 1 14/15th April 1941 It’s midnight when the train leaves London. I’d arrived much too early, had to wait until the carriages filled up and the labyrinthine processes of wartime travel set us on our way. Now, in the blacked-out, blue-lit, third class compartment my fellow travellers are sleeping, stiff upper lip in the face of danger. If it ain’t got your name on it... I can’t sleep. It isn’t the bombs, I’ve got used to them. It’s the thought of what lies ahead. Romsey. So long ago. I’d promised myself I’d never go back. If they didn’t want me, I’d show them. I’d never set foot in the place again. That’s how you think at fourteen, your life crashing down around you. It’s ridiculous to feel the same when you’re forty, but I do. I’m nervous, but there’s no choice. If I want to know the truth, I have to go back. I sit peering out through a crack in the blind. Before the war, this moonlit landscape would have seemed perfect, eerily beautiful; but tonight the wail of air-raid sirens shatters the night, dogging our journey and sending us cross-country, miles out of our way. I watch the repeated flare of incendiaries in the distance, see the dark huddled towns spring to light, watch the slow-motion fall of bombs. Glimpses, like at the pictures; except this is life and death. * Bombers’ moon. From twenty thousand feet, the Solent shines like a mermaid’s tail, shows the way to the city so plainly the blackout is useless. There’s no mistaking the boatyards, the aircraft factories, the docks. The first Junkers follow the water, set down their payload as simple as laying eggs. Targets quickly lose their definition as the fires spread. The city answers back, ack-ack guns pouring defiance into the sky. Caught in a stream of tracer, one bomber jinks wildly, turns for home. Engine stuttering smoke, he jettisons his load ten miles off target, sees a dark spot light up like Christmas. Unknowing, he has seven deaths on his tally sheet when a Beaufighter brings him down barely a minute later. But tomorrow, when the Heavy Rescue Crew digs the last 9 casualty out of what’s left of the little pub on the outskirts of Romsey, they will have an extra body to carry to the makeshift mortuary. Not seven shrouded corpses, but eight: eight unlawful deaths for the town’s coroner to investigate. * The signs have been taken down from all of the stations, but even though our journey has been roundabout, I start to realise where we are about the same time that the first all clear penetrates into our cramped compartment. Not far now. As dawn breaks, the train is still stopping more often than it moves. If I didn’t have my suitcase, too heavy to carry far, I could easily walk. Arrive quicker, and much more direct. But I wait, and at last we struggle into Romsey station. All these years, and it’s just the same. The stationmaster’s still waiting by the exit, alert for tips and fare-dodgers. Old Bunny Burnage studies my ticket, barely glances at my face. I don’t think he can possibly recognise me, but I can’t help remembering all the times he caught me out. When we laid pennies on the line for the express to flatten.