Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Masters of the Humdrum Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961

Masters of the Humdrum Mystery: Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, Alfred Walter Stewart and the British Detective Novel, 1920-1961

Evans, Curtis

Paperback

Literary Criticism

ISBN10: 0786470240
ISBN13: 9780786470242
Publisher: McFarland & Company
Published: Jun 15 2012
Pages: 309
Weight: 1.20
Height: 0.90 Width: 6.90 Depth: 9.90
Language: English

In 1972, in an attempt to elevate the stature of the crime novel, influential crime writer and critic Julian Symons cast numerous Golden Age detective fiction writers into literary perdition as Humdrums, condemning their focus on puzzle plots over stylish writing and explorations of character, setting and theme. This volume explores the works of three prominent British Humdrums--Cecil John Charles Street, Freeman Wills Crofts, and Alfred Walter Stewart--revealing their work to be more complex, as puzzles and as social documents, than Symons allowed. By championing the intrinsic merit of these mystery writers, the study demonstrates that reintegrating the Humdrums into mystery genre studies provides a fuller understanding of the Golden Age of detective fiction and its aftermath.

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