The Crime Fiction Handbook
Published on 30. August 2012
272 pages
978-1-118-32654-1 (ISBN)
Description
The Crime Fiction Handbook presents a comprehensiveintroduction to the origins, development, and cultural significanceof the crime fiction genre, focusing mainly on American British,and Scandinavian texts.
* Provides an accessible and well-written introduction to thegenre of crime fiction
* Moves with ease between a general overview of the genre anduseful theoretical approaches
* Includes a close analysis of the key texts in the crime fictiontradition
* Identifies what makes crime fiction of such cultural importanceand illuminates the social and political anxieties at itsheart.
* Shows the similarities and differences between British,American, and Scandinavian crime fiction traditions
Reviews / Votes
"Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-divisionundergraduates through faculty." (Choice, 1September 2013) "Messent's readings are always perceptive and his bookoffers an excellent introduction to a diverse genre." (The Guardian, 8 March 2013) "Those interested in the more arcane byways of crimefiction will find this concise but intelligent volume invaluable,with its academic (but accessible) analyses of some of the keytexts in the genre. What is perhaps the most valuable aspect of thebook is the fact that Peter Messent has managed to unearth newinsights into this much written-about subject -- no easy taskin the 21st century, when a considerable amount of analysis of thefield (including, in a modest way, by this writer) is soendemic." (Crime Time, 27 February2013) "...at a stroke this volume joins the library of key texts in thefield." (Crime Time, February 2013) "... a good introduction to a prolific genre." (Times LiterarySupplement, March 2013)More details
Other editions
Additional editions
Peter Messent
The Crime Fiction Handbook
Book
10/2012
Wiley
€90.21
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Person
Peter Messent is Emeritus Professor of Modern AmericanLiterature at the University of Nottingham. A specialist on MarkTwain, Ernest Hemingway, and crime fiction, he has publishednumerous books and articles on a variety of nineteenth- andtwentieth-century American writers. His most recent publication isthe prize-winning book Mark Twain and Male Friendship(2009).
Content
Acknowledgments vii
Introductory Note ix
Part 1 Introduction 1
Part 2 The Politics, Main Forms, and Key Concerns of CrimeFiction 9
The Politics of Crime Fiction 11
The Types of Crime Fiction 27
Classical Detective Fiction 27
Hard-Boiled Detective Fiction 34
The Police Novel 41
Transgressor Narratives 50
Vision, Supervision, and the City 60
Crime and the Body 75
Gender Matters 85
Representations of Race 96
Part 3 Some KeyWorks in Crime Fiction 107
Edgar Allan Poe: "The Murders in the Rue Morgue"(1841) 109
Arthur Conan Doyle: The Sign of Four (1890) 116
Agatha Christie: The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) 127
Dashiell Hammett: The Maltese Falcon (1930) 136
Raymond Chandler: The Big Sleep (1939) 143
James M. Cain: Double Indemnity (1936) 151
Patricia Highsmith: The Talented Mr. Ripley (1955) 159
Chester Himes: Cotton Comes to Harlem (1965) 167
Maj SjEURowall and Per WahlEURoEURo: The LaughingPoliceman (1968) 176
James Ellroy: The Black Dahlia (1987) 187
Thomas Harris: The Silence of the Lambs (1988) 198
Patricia Cornwell: Unnatural Exposure (1997) 208
Ian Rankin: The Naming of the Dead (2006) 218
Stieg Larsson: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2005) 227
End Note 241
References 243
Index 253
