Detective Fiction & Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Essay -- Literature

According to the English crime writer P.D. James (1920-) for a book to be described as detective fiction there must be a central mystery and one that by the end of the book is solved satisfactorily and logically, not by good luck or intuition, but by intelligent deduction from clues honestly if deceptively presented. (James. 2009 16). This is traditionally conducted via a detective a simulacrum deployed within the narrative structure whose occupation is to investigate crimes (Oxford. 2006 202). Therefore detective fiction represents an enigma, a puzzle to be solved by dint of an intriguing serial publication of events and clues presented by the writer to its audience that are taken on a journey through a process of reasoning, elimination and conclusion to solve a mystery. The narrative formula allows the audience to engage on an exploration of self-discovery as the mysterys solution supplies a temporary sense of self through which the reader is offered an apparatus for negotia ting the boundaries that define identity. (McCracken. 1998 50).Detective fiction can be defined and situated into various different categories one is taxonomicplacing it in similarity to other types of popular literatureWesterns, science fiction, spy tales and so on. John G. Caweltis (Adventure) has grouped these types into larger categories called archetypes which are convenient for making an initial specialization between two major kinds of detective fiction, Mystery and Adventure. (Rzepka. 2005 9). This raises the question of how detective fiction appeals to past and present audiences and its position as bulge out of a mass market publication in contemporary society. In order to answer this question it is important to briefly summarise the rise o... ...http//www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Detective_Fiction_(Bookshelf). Accessed twentieth April 2012Routledge Encyclopedia of Narrative Theory. (2007) Detective Fiction, Herman, D. Jahn, M. & Ryan, M. On-line Available from ht tp//books.google.co.uk/books?id=wWNnBndF9uEC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&dq=generic+conventions+of+detective+fiction&source=bl&ots=nN3XjelCQo&sig=w_epfgfc-_S9UUZhgH65xBIxMbY&hl=en&sa=X&ei=p7KfT-H_GafE4gTW_-y2Aw&ved=0CFAQ6AEwBgv=onepage&q=generic%20conventions%20of%20detective%20fiction&f=false. Accessed nineteenth April 2012Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Literary Estate. (2000) The Official Website of the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Literary Estate. On-line Available from http//www.sherlockholmesonline.org/. Accessed 20th April 2012The Sherlock Holmes Company, (2010). On-line Available from http//www.sherlockholmes.com/. Accessed 21st April 2012