Rushforth Media

The Don(nish) Michael Innes and his main foil Inspector John Appleby

admin — Thu, 06 Dec 2012 12:15:12 +0000

In the Golden Age of crime fiction, particularly in Britain, murders were puzzles to be solved. Emotional displays of grief concerning the victim were either performed by mawkish girls, or else they were very suspicious indeed, and pointed towards guilt. While many detectives of the time could be said to solve crimes as they might a crossword puzzle, Inspector John Appleby would use the Rosetta Stone and then reference it against Socrates by way of Donne to get his answer. He was the most literary of detectives.

Michael Innes, author of the Appleby mysteries, was the pseudonym of the academic John Innes Mackintosh Stewart (1906 – 1994) who studied English Literature at Oriel College, Oxford and, subsequently, Freudian psychoanalysis in Vienna after graduation. He gained his first lectureship at Leeds University after writing an edition of Florio’s translation of Montaigne. Subsequent posts were at Adelaide, Belfast, then back to Oxford. In his academic career he wrote works on, among others, Joseph Conrad, Thomas Hardy, James Joyce and Rudyard Kipling. What makes Appleby so creditable as a savant sleuth, and Stewart so consummate as a writer, is this vast background of learning. It is the scholarly displays, however understated, that set Appleby apart.

By 1936, when he wrote his first mystery Death at the President’s Lodging, Dorothy L. Sayers and Agatha Christie had made their detectives part of the literary landscape, and the genre enjoyed new respectability, but it was the previous, more cerebral generation of writers that influenced Appleby’s character most. Although he has the unflappable insouciance of Lord Peter Wimsey, he also has the weighty learning of G.K. Chesterton’s Father Brown and Doyle’s Shelock Holmes, but happens to be a far more personable fellow than either. Moreover (let’s not forget Innes’ love of referencing) many of these writers are discussed and quoted. In his first book he even includes a don-cum-mystery writer character (later to reappear in other novels) who, himself, references the E.C. Bentley novel Trent’s Last Case, “this bible of his craft” which was particularly notable as being one of the first satires of the genre. This is the kind of playful intertextuality that postmodern literary critics wet themselves over these days.

For those readers less enamoured of clever literary allusions and mental point-scoring there is still much to enjoy in Innes’ work. It contains some of the finest prose of the period and is also very funny: “Dodd, heavy, slow, simply bred, and speaking with such dialectical purity that a philologist might have named the parish in which he was born.” There is an elegant purity to his style that makes it readable, yet rich and worthy. It is a talent many wish to possess but few are able to pull off. Also, the plots are satisfyingly convoluted and tricky. Their untangling rewards the observant reader. Innes, when first embarking on crime writing, found this complex thread-weaving much harder than he expected. The results are brocade-like in their intricacy.

Michael Innes’ work is a crucial link in the history of donnish crime fiction, which began with Holmes and has carried on to Colin Dexter’s Morse. Appleby, perhaps, has the claim to be the purest of these. The novels are certainly the most referential. Excitingly, for those who are new to Innes’ mysteries, there are almost fifty to enjoy. Before getting started, Appleby might first suggest the reader looks up an 1827 essay by Thomas De Quincey entitled On Murder Considered as one of the Fine Arts.

Simon Clegg, chairman at Rushforth Media

Audiobook producer Simon Clegg reckons audio’s not cheating.

admin — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:57:09 +0000

Before laser printers; before Microsoft Word; before paperbacks; before the biro; before newspapers; before Guttenberg; before Magna Carta; before the Rosetta Stone; before the first symbol was scored in the sand with a desiccated fibula; even before the iPad, human beings were able to communicate thoughts, ideas and stories. They used that now derided conceit: speech. It’s a clever, emotive, subtle and beautiful ability, and since the early 20th century we have been able to submit the voice to the modern western obsession of recording and archiving. So why do some people feel that audio books are somehow an inauthentic way to enjoy literature or other content? Why do they sense that they are not experiencing as they should be?

The oral tradition is a noble one. The classic poems like The Iliad, The Odyssey, and Beowulf were all works that were given breath in their spoken interpretation. Storytellers and bards would go from town to village and give performances to kings and beggars alike. This was the story as a social phenomenon.

What thoughts do we have of reading aloud in the 21st century? Much like generations before us we may relate it to being read to as children. Parents would sit on the bed and tell us stories of naughty rabbits or silly bears and we’d drift off into responsibility-free sleep.

This could be where the quasi stigma arises. When we consider being read to, the idea hints at either illiteracy, like the storytellers’ audience; or childishness. There is a belief then, that the solitary pursuit of reading a book is an indication that we are educated adults and not immature half-wits.

There is a name that appears regularly while researching negative reactions to audio books: the academic Harold Bloom. He says “Deep reading really demands the inner ear as well as the outer ear. You need the whole cognitive process, that part of you which is open to wisdom. You need the text in front of you.” His assumption that comprehension happens less efficiently through ear than through eye seems odd to me. Even odder, that access to “wisdom” is closed while listening. I see no evidence for this in my own experience. And are those who are unable to read also unable to be wise?

The standard often-used arguments in favour of audio books still ring true: you can get through a novel while you’re doing the washing up/ironing/driving. Brief bursts of activity through headphones are possible, where a period of settling is required before a print reading session can commence. But more compelling is the notion that we can experience story as recital, often by a professional who is better able than us to illuminate nuance in sentences, and subtlety in characters. With audio books we are at the latest high-tech point of a tradition that has lasted for millennia, and will continue still. And emerging new audio-meets-synced-e-book technology makes it even easier than ever for readers. So before you and your book club get too haughty, consider that audio’s not (necessarily) cheating. Reading is never cheating. So I’m off to re-charge the Kindle and the iPOD ahead of next week’s book club meeting.

Simon Clegg on the twentieth century’s most prolific author

admin — Sat, 24 Nov 2012 17:51:45 +0000

Rushforth chairman Simon Clegg has dealt with some high profile names in media – both dead and alive. Here he writes about the twentieth century’s most prolific author, and one whom perhaps you’ve not heard about of late.

The Gideon of Scotland Yard novels stand high among John Creasey’s voluminous output, where they first appeared under the pseudonym of J.J. Marric, one of more than twenty pen-names used by Creasey. (Creasey found bookshops only had so much space under the letter ‘C’, and much of which was taken up by Agatha Christie. So he had to be creative with his pen names.) The books in the Gideon sequence are pioneering examples of the so-called ‘police procedural’ and predate by a year the appearance of Ed McBain’s 87th Precinct series in the US. Since Creasey did nothing by halves or in small measure there are some 25 books in this series alone, showing the progress of the central character from Inspector to Commander based at Metropolitan Police headquarters, Scotland Yard. Creasey also penned another and even more extensive sequence set in London and featuring Inspector West, a detective lumbered – and not ironically – with the nickname of ‘Handsome’. Ah, those were the days when policemen ticked all the boxes, and probably would dive in the river after you!

More importantly, Creasey was one of the first crime writers to understand the (ongoing) public fascination with day-to-day police work, and the dramatically-interesting way in which it could be played off against a copper’s home-life. In some respects the policeman’s lot is not so different from anyone else’s. More time is spent in the office than out nicking villains. There is a bureaucratic hierarchy to negotiate, there are forms to fill, axes to grind and hatchets to bury, all set against a background of domestic strains and anxieties. But it is the crime, large-scale or petty, which inevitably gives the books their grip. At the time, and we’re talking principally of the 1950s and 60s here, the Gideon novels seemed like the last word in realism. Furthermore, Creasey was perhaps the first major proponent of such novels dealing with more than more central crime incident, a result it is said of ‘copper friends and neighbours suggesting the earlier Inspector West novels ought to be a little more realistic.

George Gideon, or G-G to his friends and criminals, is a big man in all respects. In the John Ford film version of the very first book of the series, Gideon’s Day (Gideon’s Week was ranked in rather good company as one of the top 100 crime/mystery books ever), the then Inspector was played by Jack Hawkins. The actor’s crinkled hair, gruff manner and physical bulk fitted Creasey’s described persona perfectly. In the stories, Gideon’s arrival at New Scotland Yard sends a buzz through the building, a buzz that is half-fear, half-expectation. Like quite a few old-time and real-life coppers – Slipper, Fabian – he seems to be readily recognised not only by Fleet Street but by the London public at large. And it’s no coincidence that he shares a name with a judge from the Old Testament, for this latter-day Gideon is fierce, principled and unyielding.

Tough but thoughtful, he is merciless towards any hint of corruption in the forces although, like any good superior officer, he takes time to ask after the families of his juniors – at which their eyes light up. Despite juggling several cases at once, the Commander is capable of bringing legendary powers of concentration to bear on a particular crime. He loves London which he knows intimately, from his days on the beat, through the soles of boots. The entire city is his patch or manor, and nothing escapes his attention. At their best, the books give the impression of the ceaseless onrush of police work and, in an era before graphic forensic detail, the detail and the jargon feel plausible.

Creasey may have been a bit soft or uncritical about that resolute man George Gideon – just as Ed McBain could be sentimental about some of his police heroes in the 87th series – since he emerges as someone essentially without faults, and so less interesting than he might have been. You get the feeling that even an off-duty hour in G-G’s company might be thin on the laughter front. But there was a resolute edge to his creator too. In Gideon’s River, an abducted girl is killed by her kidnapper minutes before the police arrive. In a US procedural the cops would most likely have got there in time. In Gideon’s March, a couple who’ve just begun an unlikely but touching affair are blown up in an assassination attempt on the French President during his London visit.

So how do the Gideon or the West novels stack up against the current police procedurals? There are similarities. The spats with superiors, particularly in the case of Inspector Roger West, are reminiscent of countless threats shouted or whispered in the corridors of today’s fictional stations. The switching from case to case, which Creasey may well have originated, is now a well-worn device but one which in the hands of a skilful contemporary writer, such as Mark Billingham, can be very satisfying.

But the differences between then and now are as great, maybe greater. It’s a rare modern plod who has a home-life as contented as Gideon’s (six children at the last count). Current detectives are likely to be victims of one or more of the three big Ds: drink, divorce, depression. They may even flirt with drugs, which inevitably fill a much bigger space in crime fiction now. Crime writing in general now is a lot more explicit and gory. Creasey, working in a period when the cinema resorted to a fade-out at the first hint of dropped clothing and fist fights were conducted more or less by Queensbury rules, hinted at sex and violence, or at best sketched them in lightly. His coppers are rarely heard to swear as they move through a black-and-white London still affected by bomb damage, a world of razor-boys, forgers and dodgy car salesmen. Women don’t get much of a look-in except as wives and girl-friends. All the same the policemen are in general honourable, even righteous. As they had to be. And after a fashion, even in the most hard-nosed modern procedural, they still are.