I have to say that Julian Symons's Bloody Murder … ("heartily recommended" in these columns by Kingsley Amis when it appeared in hardback; and, in spite of what I have to say, essential reading for all crime fans) is a pernicious and dangerous piece of work. In essence this book—sub-titled 'From the Detective Story to the Crime Novel: a history'—is a sustained and bitter, if unacknowledged, attack on the classical detective story, and on Dorothy Sayers in particular.
The fundamental fact is that Symons prefers the brooding, psychological, sociological modernism of Simenon and his followers to the puzzle story of the Golden Age of detective fiction; and to enforce this preference he tells all manner of fibs about the detective puzzles of the 'twenties and 'thirties—viz., that their structure forbade characterisation, that their heroes and people were of purest cardboard, that the puzzle element itself forbade human interest. Hastily acknowledging Sayers's quality as a crime critic. Symons ignores the detailed passages in Gaudy Night in which Lord Peter and Harriet discuss just this problem, and triumphantly resolve it. Again, the high and beautiful comedy of the Ngaio Marsh novels is to all intents and purposes ignored, in favour of a friendly study of the appallingly cardboardish Agatha Christie.
This is a free excerpt of 207 words. There are 472 words (approx.
2 pages at 300 words per page) in the full critical essay.
Read the rest of this Criticism with our Symons, Julian (Gustave) 1912–: Critical Essay by The Spectator Access Pass.
