There's the narrative operations of the detective, the clues that refer to the unknown but soon to be signified story of the villain, and all the while the reader is constructing their own narrative about 'what happened'. Contemporary Detective Fiction writers narratively construct - through cultural discourses, plot, themes and characterisation - stories that are intended to influence their readers.
Hi C.,
Great question. And I think you answer it well, yourself.
And all just my view (of course) -
I'd be tempted to deepen the Question a little: ie - How complex, compared to what? (ie Another Genre? eg Western, Melodrama, Science Fiction, etc) (Or to other media?)
And, can you somehow (maybe) limit the term: Detective/Crime Fiction?
ie If you refer to ALL the creative work in that genre, that's deeply complex - as you could (and will) find stories that do anything - and everything. (Simple to complex)
So do you mean: Popular - or Critically Acclaimed - or `Just the 1960s', or, just the last ten years (or... what)? Or just by Mickey Spillane, or by Agatha Christie, etc etc.
Arguably there's these elements to any story: Premise, Theme/s, Plot, Character, Voice, Dialogue, Pacing, Structure, Tone, POV, Genre, Sub-genre/s, Setting (Time & Place/s).
Plus all the things you mention of course...
If you haven't seen it check out this article which talks about the evolution of the detective/crime story: (and the evolution of clues)
Franco Moretti - The Slaughterhouse of Literature
https://english.duke.edu/uploads/assets/Moretti%20-%20Slaughterhouse%20of%20Lit.pdf
Also this may even be of interest: (most paperback bestsellers are `detective' stories)
http://othernetwork.com/2014/04/22/the-top-10-common-elements-in-best-seller-novels-via-j-t-velikovsky/
Hope this helps, somehow.
Cheers
JT Velikovsky
http://storyality.wordpress.com/
Wow! Thanks so much JT.
I look forward to reading Moretti's article. I'm mostly interested in contemporary detective fiction and how the generic narrative is used and manipulated to construct socially polemical discourses. Reason I'm interested in knowing more about this is I am in the midst of a Creative PhD, writing a detective novel that challenges discourses about mental illness, and I'm also using narrative therapy concepts within the narrative construct.
If you have more to add I would be immensely grateful.
cheers
Cassy
Hey Cassy,
Great! Thanks so much for your kind response (including the upvote! :) and - that all sounds fascinating, and I hope you are having great fun with the novel...
Yes, I (just personally) got a lot out of Moretti's article...
Right now I can't think of anything, my brain's jammed. (Im doing a PhD too, and I need a new head, this one is full.) Happily, I see it may be possible, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/06/head-transplant-italian-neuroscientist_n_3533391.html
My own (ongoing) research is here: http://storyality.wordpress.com/an-index-to-this-blog/ ...It's more on film though... (pls don't feel obliged to read any of it)
- If I think of anything, I will post!
Cheers
JT
Oh wait, Cassy, I thought of something... (may or may not help, who knows)
Since you mention influencing people (readers/audences), (just in my view) there is some great stuff on `Narrative Transportation Theory' in Scientific Study of Literature journal...
https://benjamins.com/#catalog/journals/ssol/main
ie:
Green, MC, Chatham, C & Sestir, MA 2012, 'Emotion and transportation into fact and fiction', Scientific Study of Literature, vol. 2, no. 1, pp. 37 – 59.
and
Green, MC & Carpenter, JMA 2011, 'Transporting into narrative worlds', The Future of Scientific Studies in Literature. Special issue of Scientific Study of Literature, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 113–22.
I thought that was interesting - on how stories influence us.
Cheers
JT
Oh and actually, one more thing Cassy - you might even like my friend Jeni Mawter's chapter, in this book:
http://storyality.wordpress.com/2013/11/18/storyality-96-transmedia-practice-a-collective-approach-2014/
She wrote a YA (transmedia) novel, that included issues around a particular mental illness (Narcissistic Personality Disorder)... her chapter sort of explains it all - (not exactly a detective novel, but - is kind of crime fiction) - And come to think of it, maybe the `clues' needing solving (when this person's behaviour turned out to be: NPD)
If you can't easily get hold of the Transmedia Practices book, just email me (joetv [at] bigpond.com) and i'll organize a copy for you... (if desired...!)
[but i assume your PhD reading pile is already intimidating, i have nightmares about mine. it's a very tall stack of very heavy books on my bedside table, that could seriously injure me]
Cheers
JT
PS I didnt actually know about narrative therapy before, but now i do, so - thanks!!!
Yippee and thanks for taking the time to assist me. I'm excited. I did have a look at your blog and I'm intrigued, and forwarded it to a couple of others. Yes, I also need a new brain. This one is jumbled, stressed, doubtful and needs to capitulate! What year are you in with your PhD? I'm half way through 2nd. I have actually completed (what I think is a decent draft) of the novel, and I'm being a bit silly in trying to write a sequel during the scholarship period - but heck, I need to get onto the Exegesis. I'm fortunate that my entire PhD is't theoretical. The exegesis is only 30 thousand words, and the novel is apparently of greater weight. But still, I need to get cracking. All the best with your work. Cassy
Good stuff Cassy. And - Congrats on your novel draft !
I'm in 3rd year, so, 6 months to go...I have a draft of the dissertation (250,000 words) and it needs to be 100,000 words. Eeep. (So: I only need to delete 3 words out of every 5...!)
cheers & thanks
JT
To get back to the original question: if you can find it, 30 years ago Glenn W. Most and William Stowe edited a very 70sish collection called The Poetics of Murder: Detective Fiction and Literary Theory. It might be helpful still...
Personally, after two or three books by the same author of detective/crime fiction, I have little enthusiasm to read more; and I think it is because the pattern has become predictable and, as Keats would say, 'the fancy cannot cheat so well' any more.
Though I am not particularly a great fun of detective fiction I want to point out two facts:
First, as a work of art, detective fiction is ,to my mind, the greatest genre that makes use of literary techniques. Think about Chekov's gun, cliff hungers, ticking clock scenario, Genette's acceleration and deceleration in the narrative etc...
Second, I think that detective fiction , as a full-fledged genre, started with "One Thousand and a Night." I wrote a small paper that deals with this subject though its main focus is young adult literature. Anyone who is interested let me know.
Spanish philosopher and Greek classicist Miguel de Unamuno finds that detective fiction begins with Sophocles' "Oedipus, Rex." The protagonist King Oedipus performs detective work on constantly emerging clues to narrow down possibilities about who murdered his predecessor Laius until everything points to Oedipus himself, to the horror of his wife (and mother!) Jocasta. See the prologue to Unamuno's best play "The Other" [El Otro].
As to the monotony of detective fiction, read Argentine Jorge Luis Borges´s detective short stories for a staggering variety of themes, solutions, and interpretations.
If we follow this kind of analysis , we can even go to In the Old Testament story of Susanna and the Elders whereby the account told by two witnesses breaks down when Daniel cross-examines them. We can also mention Chinese Gong 'an fiction etc..
By full-fledged genre I meant a story artistically devoted to the field of detective fiction ( see the three apples in one thousand and a night) and not as a subplot to a perfect tragedy in the Aristotelian sense.
As to the monotony you mention-I never mentioned it in my post. All I said is that I m not a big fan of detective fiction because, and this is my personal opinion, literature should have the potential to question the universe rather than only Homo Sapiens.
The apocryphal narrative of "Susanna and the Elders" certainly is not detective fiction at all. There is no `progressive revelation of clues there as there is in "Oedipus, Rex." So the progressive revelation of the tragic hero´s murder of his father and marriage of his mother is not the main plot? I would love to know, Mr. Bouali, what is. As to the monotony of detective fiction, I was responding to Rev. Akwanya, with whom I respectfully disagree as I do with you.
Dear Nelson,
First, Let me remind you of something you already know. The perfect tragedy for Aristotle is when the tragic hero is the victim of circumstances and have no agency in the tragic plot. The detective-like endeavor in Sophocles lacks agency. Characters throughout the play and among them Oedipus are pushed/helped by gods to know the fatal truth. In other words, the characters have no choice but to discover the truth. Human agency, to my mind, is an essential component in the categorization of detective fiction.
Second, and here I quote from your post:" The apocryphal narrative of "Susanna and the Elders" certainly is not detective fiction at all". let me remind you again, and this is an excellent reminder for all of us of how ideology can affect our perception, that we are dealing with humanities and not hard science. We cannot have, I wish we could, any final and complete answer to anything after all. We have different views but we tend to choose what we think is closest to common sense( again even common sense is ideological).
Brahim, I would ask you to read Sophocles directly and unmediated by Aristotle. Oedipus has free will: he can choose between learning his identity or ruling without learning it. If he learns it, he will be a good ruler. But he could choose between being a good ruler or a bad ruler. His wife (mother) Jocasta urges him to choose ignorance. But he pushes onward from clue to clue relentlessly seeking to find out who he is. So no, Sophocles does not lack agency. I agree with you that human agency is an essential component of detective fiction. And Oedipus, in my judgment, has agency. Otherwise his drama would lack specific tension. Without choice, he could not be a hero.
Nevertheless, Unamuno of course exaggerates: "Oedipus,Rex" is not detective drama in the strict 19th-century sense of the genre, largely governed by scientific positivism. "Elementary, my dear Watson, I deduce..." And the reader tries to move ahead of Sherlock, deducing before he does who is the murderer, then changing his mind as Sherlock discovers more clues. We owe it to C. Noonan to return to the theme of detective drama sensu stricto and not to get mired in Aristotle nor even in Sophocles.
Nelson,
Oedipus obeyed a divine command through the oracle:
Where are they? Where in the wide world to find
The far, faint traces of a bygone crime?
CREON In this land, said the god; "who seeks shall find;
Who sits with folded hands or sleeps is blind."
OEDIPUS Was he within his palace, or afield,
Or traveling, when Laius met his fate?
I do not see the notion of agency you emphasize in your post. Oedipus believe he is a divinely led king and it is his duty to follow the wills of Gods. He had no power to say No. The moment he says no to the divine call is the very moment of his loss of his identity as a king not only in his own eyes but in the eyes of the people who think he is divinely appointed.
Brahim,
I could cite many other passages from a more literal translation of Sophocles' text which would argue Oedipus' free will. (By the way, tradition in Sophoclean criticism also supports me.) But even according to the passage you kindly cite, oracles allowed many interpretations. Priestesses breathed in gases emitted by the earth, saw visions, and made enigmatic pronouncements. The wise would then interpret these puzzling words, supposedly sent by the gods. Otherwise, Oedipus would not be in such a quandary as to the meaning of the oracle. He could choose to inquire, or not do so at all, or even offer his own interpretation. In the possibility of choice lies the difference between his being an automaton or a hero. By making him a puppet of the gods, you impoverish the text. But I will say nothing more about Sopocles. We owe it to C. Noonan to stick strictly to detective fiction. Any further contributions I make to this string, if any, will adhere to narrative techniques in that genre.
I respect your opinion and there is some truth ,I must admit , in what you say. Just one last thing to point out, and here I refer to the concept of tragedy in the Aristotelian sense: the perfect tragedy that entails the perfect catharsis is when the hero is a in fact a puppet in the hands of gods. And I believe Aristotle is quiet right. Even nowadays, in this post-colonial, structuralist, modern.....era we still feel deep empathy for those who are pure victims. In a way we experience a form of catharsis, because, if we are smart enough, We learn how blessed we are, we learn to enjoy what we thought is not enough etc.. The problem to my mind, and here I think Aristotle did not see it, is that there is no perfect tragedy as he strove to define. Typological ( from types) reasoning does not achieve perfect fruition with Homo Sapiens who will continue to have, topologically ( in degrees) a free will. Seen from this perspective, there is no perfect puppet and therefore no perfect tragedy. However, if we change our vantage point, we will see that it is all about degrees: How much space of decision does Oedipus have in comparison with other characters in other books of the same era or after.
Finally, right now, in humanities in general, we can only offer the best probabilities or guesses that satisfies our academic commonsensical judgment. But very soon we will be able to find the right mathematical equations that captures the order of what seems chaotic.
Hey Cassy
Sorry if someone already said this - but maybe take a look at p 13 of David Bordwell's `Poetics of Cinema' (2008).
- He talks about how Auden in "The Guilty Vicarage" looks at the classic detective fiction story... Bordwell summarizes Auden's research on p13 of `Poetics', but I guess good to chase the original (by Auden) as well...
Cheers!
JT
Cassy
Here is the Auden article: (on detective stories)... pretty old now though... :)
http://harpers.org/archive/1948/05/the-guilty-vicarage/
Cheers
JT
Hi!
Maybe you can also check this volume: Detecting texts. The metaphysical detective story from Poe to Modernism, edited by
The typology of Tzvetan Todorov in his The Typology of Detective Fiction is quite helpful in this regard.
Narratology in this sort of fiction is not easy, because it should be woven around mysterious and unexpected things. Most detective stories are recycled versions of Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Aonan Doyle's works!
For what it may be worth, I posted a few pieces on the detective story as a genre last fall on my blog may-on-the-short-story.blogspot.com
You can find them by doing a search for "detective" on the blog.
I find this debate between Nelson and Brahim quite fascinating. And I must agree with Nelson in this instance. I studied the Classics at the university and have taught them in World and British Literature for decades. Responding to Brahim's point about Aristotelian criticism of the hero as a "puppet," I don't really agree with that assessment of Aristotle on tragedy. While a tragic hero will fall because of the so-called "tragic flaw" or "hamartia," our interpretation of that ancient Greek term "hamartia" is not on point. Most students immediately think, for instance, that this flaw is a human failing only that lives within the individual's psyche or character (whatever term you find appropriate here). But in classical Greek, that term relates most closely to "an action based on a human failing that is so dramatically an affront to the gods" that the tragic hero will fall because of it. The important term here is "action that is an affront." Oedipus, Creon, Antigone, all act (for good or bad) but they are definitely not "puppets." Creon's refusal to bury Polyneices violates not only the regular honor given to the dead but it also violates the need for burial (to prevent disease). Even by the time of Sophocles, the Greeks realized that leaving the dead lying around unburied led to disease. His inner "flaw" is truly the Greek definition of "hubris" but that hubris is not simply human pride--it is pride that has led him to ACT against the rules of his society and the honoring of the noble house of Oedipus and its only survivors. Antigone's inner flaw is her stubborness but then she is rightfully defending her brother and his rights to basic burial, no matter what his wrongdoing might have been. And remember that all she does is to throw dust over his body; she isn't involved in a major burial--and she does it in private. It is Creon's arrogance that leads him to such a harsh punishment far beyond the limits of propriety for even a tyrant (and Creon does not start the play as a tyrant).
Just like Oedipus has an inner flaw--rash behavior--that is exhibited early (before the events of the play being discussed) when he pushes Laius off the road. But to consider that action an affront to the gods is absurd. He is a king and as such, he is expected to conduct himself as a monarch. While it is true that the oracles predicted he would kill his father and sleep with his mother, that doesn't mean that Oedipus MUST do everything to fulfill that prophecy. Sophocles knew that presenting a man of perfect virtue would bore his audience (they could never relate to such an individual) nor would he present a puppet with no free will (again the audience would not remain interested). The tragic hero must ACT. Despite the prophecy, Oedipus does not KNOW that he killed his father and that Jocasta is his mother. He could have remained ignorant (as Jocasta wished), and Sophocles would not have a tragedy.
The question of agency in any text is of vital importance to all character development. In women's literature, one of the greatest differences that I teach my college students is the issue of women's agency; in older texts, all too often, the search for a woman with agency is a sorry task. But there are always those magnificent exceptions--Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz-Julian of Norwich (to a different degree altogether) and the great Mary Wollstonecraft. But as Nelson has said, we can return to detective fiction and its narrative genre--with plenty of agency. A detective without agency--and a hero without agency- are oxymorons.
Dear Aisha,
I like what you said. I just want to point a simple fact. For the Greeks the perfect tragedy is the tragedy where the hero has no agency in the events of his or her tragedy. But perfection does not exist and they are not stupid and they were aware of this fact.
What I said is that the Greeks 'definition of the perfect tragedy is still valid..We feel more sorry when we hear about a tragedy where the protagonist is a perfect victim. In a way, agency diminishes the tragic effect. Why? because people blame the tragic hero for his/her mistakes, flaws-whatever. I'm not against agency or modern literature or even modern delineation of the tragic. I m just saying that the Greeks' definition of the perfect tragedy still makes sense-you see my point?
I do agree with you Brahim on the "perfect victim," but perhaps as a result of late 20th century sensibilities that so many people feel that so many of these tragic heroes still could have done differently--and chose not to do so. For me, there is also the powerful influence of Shakespeare upon the concept of tragic hero. For the Elizabethans, the roles of the human will and understanding, both aligned with the angelic side of the human (in the Great Chain of Being), create both the opportunity to rise equally with the chance to fall to horrible levels. Both Othello and Lear suffer a failure of understanding--chiefly of themselves. Again,the Elizabethans believed strongly in "know thyself," not just a saying but an ethical obligation. Because of the failure of understanding, these two great men fall and commit despicable acts. Perhaps they have more agency than the classic Greek heroes. But in any case, there is always an element of choice--even for Oedipus--but again some of my response may also be based on the powerful Western belief in "rational choice." But in all honesty, I'm not totally convinced that even the Greeks believed in "perfect victimhood" because those victims still act in ways that they know are right for them but wrong in another respect. But I do understand your point especially about the impact of agency upon the tendency of humans to blame.
Aysha
Recently one of our paper entitled "Life and Consciousness - The Vedāntic View" has been published in the Journal Communicative & Integrative Biology. An interesting discussion on this paper can be found at: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/online_sadhu_sanga/Mcv2O-yhqLE
From paper:
"The scientific confirmation of the existence of consciousness in unicellular organisms and plants certainly establishes that the brain is not the source of consciousness. Several decades back, research in medical science has also proven that the brain is not the source of consciousness. In 1970, Robert White and his team successfully transferred the head of a rhesus monkey to the headless body of another monkey. The monkey survived for 8 days.68 Researchers are also attempting to perform the same scenario with human beings.69 It is reported that if a human head has been detached under controlled conditions, it must be reconnected to the circulatory flow of other person's body (which is conscious or living) within one hour.70 Therefore, brain-based analysis for understanding consciousness (neuronal analysis) does not have very bright prospects."
Paper: Life and Consciousness - The Vedāntic View
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/19420889.2015.1085138
Journal: Communicative & Integrative Biology
Publication date - 09 Oct 2015
Author: Bhakti Niskama Shanta - http://orcid.org/0000-0002-2039-3249
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