Monday 7 April 2014

What makes the difference?



Anyone who writes and submits their work to publishers or agents will know what a struggle it is to get published. The industry is looking for work which is fresh and in some way unique, something that will catch the attention of the readers out there and make the publisher lots of money. Yes, it’s a business and money is a significant motivator in this game.


At the same time as they want something new, publishers also want something that is familiar. They want something original yet somehow the same. What a challenge!


I got to thinking about some of my favourite crime writers and what they offered that was unique and special. Sherlock Holmes, of course, jumps out immediately. What a hard act to follow!


What follows is a brief round-up of writers from the 1920s onwards:


Agatha Christie – a sprightly spinster (Miss Marple) who lurks in the background, observes what is happening and analyses scenarios until she reaches the correct conclusion; an oddball and prissy Belgian (Hercule Poirot) whom villains underestimate while he sniffs out the truth through – again – observation and analysis.


Elizabeth George – a dynamic juxtaposition of an upper class aristocrat (Thomas Lynley), who is never quite comfortable in his skin, with a working class non-conformist (Barbara Havers), who notoriously thumbs her nose at authority and does it her way, while constantly feeling left out of normal life. Lynley at least is capable of normal human relationships; Havers is not.


Henning Mankell – a depressive, self-absorbed detective (Kurt Wallender) who is abysmally bad at human relations but has persistence and intelligence for solving crimes. Also a subtle capacity to unravel the flaws of Swedish society from a left-wing perspective. Largely friendless, he doesn’t get on with his ex-wife, his father or his daughter.


Raymond Chandler – an intelligent yet socially isolated and independent PI (Phillip Marlowe) whose moral fibre and honesty guide him faultlessly through the temptations and evils of Los Angeles. He unwinds by playing chess against himself.


Colin Dexter – a lonely, sensitive and reserved aesthete (Endeavour Morse) with inadequate communication and social skills but ample compassion and insight into human frailties. He relaxes by playing opera.


PD James – a bookish, poetic, empathetic but reserved detective (Adam Dalgliesh) who loses his family and only slowly finds himself able to love again. Like Morse, Dalgliesh always seems to understand why someone would commit murder, without condoning their actions.  An odd pairing of an old-fashioned English gentleman with a life spent investigating grizzly murders.


Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö – an efficient methodical pillar of Swedish society (Martin Beck) who is increasingly used by the authors as a tool for critiquing and eventually savaging the Swedish social democratic model from a Marxist perspective. A man who is rescued from portraying a stereotypical Swedish depressive and recluse with a failed marriage by the meticulous detail with which his cases are conducted and the insights he brings to the human situation.


Ian Rankin – a maverick (John Rebus) who functions best when he is overstepping the boundaries set for him by authority and who will calmly flout accepted procedures in pursuit of an outcome. A social isolate who takes to the bottle and is smoking himself to death while alienated from his daughter and most of his colleagues. A man who brings himself under suspicion from the police complaints and conduct branch – and seems to relish it.


While all of these detectives are unique and readily identifiable, don’t they share something in common? In their own ways, they are not ‘normal’ human beings – they stand outside regular human society. And they are usually observers rather than participants in normal life – almost none of them have regular family lives. Few of them seem to have friends. Many of them have alcohol problems. They are extreme examples of what we see around us.


Yet they are also united by another factor – an unshakeable commitment to ensuring that justice is done, although not always in ways which would be seen as conventional.


Given the enormous success of the above authors, it seems that the reading public is strongly attracted to characters who, while alienated from normality in some way, have a vital job to perform in maintaining the social order. And perhaps that’s why publishers love 'em.


(The odd one out in the above analysis is Ruth Rendell, whose chief protagonist, Detective Inspector Reg Wexford, seems normal by comparison. He has a stable and successful marriage and two daughters. In her other work, however, Rendell specialises in developing eccentric and alienated characters who often live on the margins of society. Rendell’s genius lies in her analysis of the edges and how people cope with their own dysfunctionalities amid the challenges of a problematic social order. I must admit that it’s an ordinariness similar to Wexford’s that makes Tom Barnaby so refreshing in Midsommer Murders.)