Clues 40.2: Columbo, Chandler, Christie, Dexter, Ms. Fisher, Teaching Forum, and more.

Clues 40.2 (2022) has been published, featuring its first Teaching Forum—this one on teaching crime fiction after Black Lives Matter, engaging with issues such as race, gender, and class. As usual, we are delighted to have contributors from around the world. See below for abstracts. Contact McFarland for subscriptions or a print copy of the journal. 

Update, 12-30-22. The ebook versions of the issue are now available: Kindle, Nook, Google Play

Around the World Backwards and Forwards
CAROLINE REITZ (John Jay College of Criminal Justice-CUNY/CUNY Graduate School)

Caroline Reitz, the executive editor of Clues, provides an overview of the issue, including articles on Agatha Christie, Raymond Chandler, Columbo, Colin Dexter, contemporary European crime narratives, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, forensic psychiatrists in crime fiction, Deon Meyer, Ms. Fisher’s Modern Murder Mysteries, and a forum on teaching crime fiction after Black Lives Matter.

Rethinking Raymond Chandler’s “The Simple Art of Murder” (1944/1946)
STEWART KING (Monash University, Australia)

This review article revisits Raymond Chandler’s essay “The Simple Art of Murder” and examines its ongoing relevance for crime fiction studies. It asks to what extent does Chandler’s iconic essay help us to understand and explain the crime genre, both historically and today.

Intersecting Crime: South African State Capture and the Hero-Criminal Binary in Deon Meyer’s The Last Hunt (2019) / SAM NAIDU (Rhodes University, South Africa)

Deon Meyer’s The Last Hunt can be categorized as African noir in its themes of political disillusionment, corruption, and crimes of the state against its citizens, shedding light on contemporary African-European relations. The article examines the novel’s intersections of time, space, national, and transnational with criminal and detective characters, and the blurriness of the hero-criminal binary.

Contemporary European Crime Narratives: “Euro-Glocal”?
THEO D’HAEN (University of Leiden, The Netherlands/Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium)

The article makes a case for the emergence of a particularly European brand of crime fiction, film, and television series that fosters a closer European union.

“Mystery” Beyond Reason:
Mr. Quin, a Revealer of the Powers of Fiction According to Agatha Christie?
MARC VERVEL (Université de Paris, France)

The short story collection The Mysterious Mr. Quin has a special place in Agatha Christie’s work. In these stories where rational investigation opens up to the supernatural, Christie theorizes what is at stake in the desire to read and proposes an expanded conception of the detective story.

The Skeptical Poetics of Colin Dexter’s Morse Novels
MICHAL SÝKORA (Palacký University, Czech Republic)

This article argues that Detective Chief Inspector Morse is a different figure in Colin Dexter’s novels than the popular television series. The author locates Dexter’s novels in British postwar crime fiction, with attention to representations of the social reality of Oxford and gender issues, and reads The Wench Is Dead to argue Morse’s hermeneutic approach to investigation reveals an ironic skepticism about truth.

Colin Dexter’s Classicism / MATTHEW WRIGHT (University of Exeter, UK)

Colin Dexter’s Inspector Morse books, unlike any other detective novels, are saturated with references to Greek and Latin language and literature. This article explores the significance of Classics and classical scholarship in Dexter’s world and argues that the novels present a consistent (and consistently troubling) view of education and culture. 

Exhibition: "Mystery Writers Past and Present."

Frances Fyfield

There is a photographic exhibition from UK's National Portrait Gallery, "Mystery Writers Past and Present," on view at Darlington's Head of Steam Museum until December 14. The photos feature contemporary writers such as P. D. James taken by Nicola Kurtz as well as Victorian photos of authors such as Arthur Conan Doyle and Charles Dickens. The list of Kurtz's photographic subjects in the gallery's collection includes Clare Curzon, Stella Duffy, Frances Fyfield, the late H. R. F. Keating, Val McDermid, Andrew Taylor, and Minette Walters.

A similar 2002 exhibition included photos of Colin Dexter and Ian Rankin.

Colin Dexter this week on BBC Radio 4 Extra.

This week on BBC Radio 4 Extra, Colin Dexter reads his story "The Double Crossing," in which unexpected death poses problems for a vacationing couple and Detective Inspector Lewis. Episodes usually can be heard for up to a week after broadcast.

Ian Rankin, John Thaw on BBC Radio 4 Extra.

Clues'
Scottish crime fiction issue

This week on BBC Radio 4 Extra, Rebus uncovers more than simple theft in Ian Rankin's short story collection Beggars Banquet. Mystery fans also may be interested in Sheila Hancock's recollections of her late husband, Morse's John Thaw. Episodes generally can be heard online for up to a week after broadcast.

New painting of Colin Dexter.

The Oxford Mail discusses the first portrait painting of Morse creator Colin Dexter. It was produced by actress Celia Montague, who appeared in the "Twilight of the Gods" episode of Inspector Morse.

Bloomsbury April 23rd book auction results.

Some highlights from Bloomsbury's April 23rd literature auction:

• First English edition of James Fenimore Cooper's The Spy (1822; novel about a spy for George Washington during the Revolutionary War; Cooper's second novel): valued at £400–600, sold for £1300 (approximately $1900)
  

• First edition of M.R. James's Ghost Stories of an Antiquary (1904), £550 (approximately $809)
  

• First serialized edition of Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express (1935), valued at £60-80, sold for £360 (approximately $530)
  

• Signed copy of the autobiographical She Goes to War (1942) by Edith Pargeter (aka Ellis Peters), £280 (approximately $412)
  

• Signed first edition of John le Carre's Call for the Dead (1961), £3000 (approximately $4414)
  

• Signed first edition of James Crumley's The Wrong Case (1975), £160 (approximately $235)
  

• First edition of Colin Dexter's The Silent World of Nicholas Quinn (1977), £420 (approximately $618)
  

• First edition of Lindsey Davis's The Silver Pigs (1989), £170 (approximately $250)
  

Sadly, the copies of Leslie Charteris's The Saint vs. Scotland Yard and The Saint and Mr. Teal that I mentioned in this post went unsold (as did copies of Chandler's Farewell My Lovely and The Long Goodbye).