Literary Experimentation in the Detective Story Genre
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FROM POE TO AUSTER: LITERARY EXPERIMENTATION IN THE DETECTIVE STORY GENRE A Dissertation Submitted to The Temple University Graduate Board in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY by Kelly C. Connelly May, 2009 ABSTRACT Two dominating lines of criticism regarding the detective novel have perpetuated the misconception that detective fiction before the 1960s was a static and monolithic form unworthy of critical study. First, critics of the traditional detective story have argued that the formulaic nature of the genre is antithetical to innovation and leaves no room for creative exploration. Second, critics of the postmodern detective novel have argued that the first literary experiments with the genre began only with post-World War II authors such as Umberto Eco, Italo Calvino, and Paul Auster. What both sets of critics fail to acknowledge is that the detective fiction genre always has been the locus of a dialectic between formulaic plotting and literary experimentation. In this dissertation, I will examine how each generation of detective story authors has engaged in literary innovation to refresh and renew what has been mistakenly labeled as a sterile and static popular genre. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… ii TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………………………………………………………… iii INTRODUCTION ………………………………………………………………………………………………………… vi The “Static” and “Sterile” Detective Story …………… vii The Postmodern as Apotheosis of Experimentation ……………………………………………………………………… x The Anti-Detective Novel ……………………………………………… xi The Metaphysical Detective Story ………………………… xvii The Experimental Tradition of the Detective Story …………………………………………………………………… xxii CHAPTER 1. THE GAME BEGINS ………………………………………………………………………………………… 1 Edgar Allan Poe ………………………………………………………………………………………… 2 Creation of a Genre ………………………………………………………………… 2 Experimenting with Genre …………………………………………………… 8 Wilkie Collins …………………………………………………………………………………………… 16 Sir Arthur Conan Doyle ……………………………………………………………………… 30 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 46 2. THE GOLDEN AGE OF EXPERIMENTATION ………………………………………… 48 Rules of the Game …………………………………………………………………………………… 51 G. K. Chesterton ……………………………………………………………………………………… 53 Dorothy L. Sayers …………………………………………………………………………………… 72 Agatha Christie ………………………………………………………………………………………… 92 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 114 3. MODERNIST EXPERIMENTS WITH THE DETECTIVE STORY………… 116 Literary Modernism ………………………………………………………………………………… 117 Modernism Comes to Detective Fiction ………………………………… 121 William Faulkner ……………………………………………………………………………………… 124 Gertrude Stein …………………………………………………………………………………………… 142 Vladimir Nabokov ……………………………………………………………………………………… 151 Gabriel García Márquez ……………………………………………………………………… 162 iii Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 171 4. HARD-BOILED INNOVATION ……………………………………………………………………… 172 The Hard-Boiled Formula …………………………………………………………………… 173 Dashiell Hammett ……………………………………………………………………………………… 180 Raymond Chandler ……………………………………………………………………………………… 201 Ross MacDonald …………………………………………………………………………………………… 216 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 232 5. THE POSTMODERN DETECTIVE NOVEL ………………………………………………… 234 The Critical Fallacy …………………………………………………………………………… 234 Clarence Major …………………………………………………………………………………………… 237 Paul Auster …………………………………………………………………………………………………… 254 Haruki Murakami ………………………………………………………………………………………… 275 Margaret Atwood ………………………………………………………………………………………… 292 Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………………………………… 311 CONCLUSION …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 313 WORKS CITED ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 318 iv INTRODUCTION Two dominating lines of criticism regarding the detective novel have perpetuated the misconception that detective fiction before the 1960s was a static and monolithic form unworthy of critical study. First, critics of the traditional detective story have argued that the formulaic nature of the genre is antithetical to innovation and leaves no room for creative exploration. For this reason, many critics have argued that the detective story has reached a necessary dead end and has little to offer to serious authors in the contemporary (post World-War II) world. Second, critics of the postmodern detective novel have argued that the first literary experiments with the genre began only with post-World War II authors such as Umberto Eco, Italo Calvino, and Paul Auster. What both sets of critics fail to acknowledge is that the detective fiction genre always has been the locus of a dialectic between formulaic plotting and literary experimentation. Given the diversity of novels seemingly falling within the genre, defining “detective fiction” is an understandably difficult task. John Kennedy Melling, in Murder Done to Death (1996), suggests that a detective novel must contain three elements: “Obviously there must be a criminal, a crime, and a detective” (16). Robert S. Paul, in Sherlock Holmes: Detective Fiction, Popular Theology, and Society (1991), similarly argues v that a detective novel must contain “a rational solution of a puzzle originating in a crime” (13). However, a definition of detective fiction that relies on the presence of a literal crime unnecessarily narrows the field, excluding such definitive works as “The Murders in the Rue Morgue”. On the other hand, if a definition is too general, it will include novels that cannot truly be considered in a serious study of the genre. For example, S.E. Sweeney has proposed that a detective novel is one in which there is a raveling and an unraveling, a definition that Thomas M. Leitch notes would include novels like Pride and Prejudice and Nostromo , neither of which is traditionally read or understood as a detective novel (112). Rather than focusing on the characters or on the criminality of the novel’s initiating incidents, I will define the detective novel as one whose primary interest, for both the protagonist and the reader, is the solution of some mystery that has disturbed the normal order of society. This definition is similar to what Roland Barthes has described as the “hermeneutic” text, “the text motivated by the desire for an answer or solution to an enigma” (Jann 22). That this definition is flexible is intentional; the borders of the detective novel are neither as rigid nor as stable as previous literary critics have argued. vi Throughout the history of the genre, authors ranging from Edgar Allan Poe to Agatha Christie to William Faulkner have utilized the detective story formula to conduct literary experiments. The blending of genres, erosion of certainty, and metafictional play presumed to be radical experiments of the postmodernists alone can instead be traced to even the earliest works of detective fiction. Far from being a sterile and paint- by-number genre, the detective story has been flexible enough to allow innovation since its very creation. The “Static” and “Sterile” Detective Story From a distance, the detective story can be viewed as having changed very little since its origins. From Poe to Wilkie Collins to Dorothy L. Sayers to Raymond Chandler, the detective story generally involves a crime that is committed and must be solved. The detective story focuses on the methods used by a uniquely intelligent and perceptive individual who uses his/her skills to see what others cannot see and solve the mystery. In the end, the reader expects resolution (the guilty party will be identified) and justice (the guilty party will be punished). Many critics have argued that this outline, or formula, has remained intact throughout every generation of detective stories. In “The Criticism of Detective Fiction,” George N. Dove, typical of the critics who see little variation in the vii detective story, describes the formulaic stagnancy of the genre: “There just isn’t that much difference between the classic formal problem and the hard-boiled private eye story” (205). In Adventure, Mystery and Romance: Formula Stories as Art and Popular Culture , John G. Cawelti similarly asserts that the classical detective story “has not shown the same capacity for change and development as the other major formulaic types” (43). Critics like Dove and Cawelti focus on the overall plot – crime detected, investigation pursued, solution reached – giving little attention to variations in the detective’s method, the degree of certainty attained, the personality of the detective, or the author’s literary style. In attempting to show how works from each generation share characteristics like crime, detective figure, or carefully calculated plot, authors like Dove and Cawelti underestimate the experimental nature of each generation of detective writers and presume the genre to be incapable of literary innovation. In his groundbreaking study of the genre, Tzvetan Todorov suggests that in most areas of literature, a “major work creates, in a sense, a new genre and at the same time transgresses the previously valid rules of the genre” (43). The only genre in which this simultaneous creation and transgression does not occur, for Todorov, is in “popular literature,” more specifically, in detective fiction (43). A work of detective viii fiction can be judged not on how well it expands the boundaries of the genre, but on how well it stays within those well- established boundaries. Todorov concludes, “Detective fiction has its norms; to ‘develop’ them is also to disappoint them: to ‘improve upon’ detective fiction is to write ‘literature,’