Talking About Detective Fiction
A Q&A with P.D. JamesQuestion:What made you decide to write a book about detective fiction?P.D. James:I wrote my book,Talking About Detective Fiction, because the Bodleian Library, one of the great libraries of the world, asked me to write about detective fiction in aid of the Library. I said I would do so when I had finished writingThe Private Patient. Detective fiction has fascinated me both as a reader and a novelist for over 50 years, and I enjoyed revisiting the books of the Golden Age which have given me such pleasure, and describing how I myself set out on the task of writing a detective story which can be both an exciting mystery and a good novel.Question:How do you explain our seemingly unending appetite for mysteries? What is it about the mystery that so engages our minds and imagination?P.D. James:The human race has had an appetite for mysteries from the earliest writings and no doubt tales of mystery and murder were recounted by our remote ancestors round the camp fires by the tribal storyteller. Murder is the unique crime, the only one for which we can make no reparation, and has always been greeted with a mixture of repugnance, horror, fear, and fascination. We are particularly intrigued by the motives which cause a man or woman to step across the invisible line which separates a murderer from the rest of humanity. Human beings also love a puzzle and a strong story, and mysteries have both.Question:Do you think there is (or was) a Golden Age of detective fiction?P.D. James:The years between the two world wars are generally regarded as the Golden Age of detective fiction and certainly, in England in particular, there was a surge of excellent writing. The detective story became immensely popular and a number of very talented writers were engaged in the craft. I feel that there are so many good novelists writing mysteries today that we may well be entering a second Golden Age.Question:Do you feel that your own Adam Dalgliesh owes anything to any particular literary detectives who came before him?P.D. James:I don't feel that Adam Dalgliesh owes anything to a particular literary detective as the heroes of the mystery novels which I particularly enjoyed in the Golden Age were usually amateurs, and I was anxious to create a professional detective.Question:If you were to recommend 3 or 4 books that represent the best of detective fiction in all its forms, which books would they be?P.D. James:It is difficult to know what books to recommend as personal taste plays such a large part and modern readers may feel out of touch with the Golden Age mysteries which I so much enjoyed. Among them areThe Moonstoneby Wilkie Collins,Tiger in the Smokeby Margery Allingham,Murder Must Advertiseby Dorothy L. Sayers, andTragedy at Lawby Cyril Hare.  It would take a much longer list to represent the mystery in all its forms, and it would certainly include the American hard-boiled school.(Photo © Ulla Montan)