Published Quarterly by Lifeloom.com	"Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive." Sir Walter Scott	Winter 2005 Volume II issue 3
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             Why is it that crime fiction set in a past time has increased in popularity? Perhaps it is that readers are now so well educated that they demand more of a mental challenge than just a comparison of forensic detail. The plethora of police procedurals and professional investigation programmes has increased the general awareness of scientific methods and what can be achieved. Once the general public were aware that wearing gloves prevented tell-tale fingerprints; now we also know that traces from the gloves can be a giveaway too! I have read much true crime and crime fiction over the years but I've now come to prefer the historical crime investigation because of its lack of forensic science.

             In recent works, set in contemporary times, forensic scientists have come into their own as a valuable resource in investigation. If anything, the skill of the modern crime writer is to balance the art of telling a good yarn as well as keeping up to date with the latest advances in forensics. It is a real talent to blend a gripping story with accurate scientific knowledge. I'm sure there are plenty of writers of contemporary crime who would admit to "swotting up" on forensic science each day, even if to keep up with their readership.

             But as we go back in time - a privilege given to us in the fiction field - we have less science to rely on. As well as the appeal of past glories and settings in a romantic, far removed world, we can read of "cases" that need more than fingerprints and DNA tests to solve. We need motives, personalities, drives. We need investigators who, rather than waiting for a week for lab reports, rely on feeling and intuition. Ellis Peters' Brother Cadfael, a medieval herbalist and monk, was a homespun forensic scientist. His knowledge of herbs and natural medicine, combined with his experiences as a soldier, allowed him insights into the crime and - if not actually presenting the solution - then clues to the criminal. However, the motivations of the criminal can only be discovered by interaction with the personalities involved.

            It's this interaction that forces the historical characters to be more fully developed and three-dimensional. They become more than stereotypes from a movie or "personality-challenged" representations. Even in the golden age of crime-writing, the interwar years, the characterisations were much stronger. Some may say that they are cliché; but Agatha Christie was writing from a contemporary perspective and the "types" she represented were (to her) real. Criminal forensic science was playing a much larger part and, as a one-time pharmacist, Christie knew the importance of science in crime detection. She happily admitted that there was no such thing as "untraceable poisons" and concerned herself more with the mechanics of how the murder was done, rather than what with. I wonder what she'd have done given the modern capability to engineer organic and inorganic poisons and even designer viruses!

             No one could talk about the development of scientific crime-solving in fiction without mentioning Sherlock Holmes. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a medical man himself and proposed a greater involvement of science in investigation, in a way tapping in to the Zeitgeist of Victorian England and its fascination with science and technology. Holmes happily conducted experiments, wrote monographs and papers to professional publications and generally encouraged the readership to accept the wonders of science as an exacting and effective tool to defeat criminals. However, Conan Doyle was - like Agatha Christie - writing from a contemporary perspective. It can only be wondered that he was spearheading the detective sciences ... using fiction!

             Present day authors writing in historical settings have the valuable advantage of hindsight. However, good authors use the knowledge of science in a very subtle manner. The characters might observe a reaction but not necessarily understand what they are seeing. An excellent example of this is in the novels of Susanna Gregory. These feature a doctor in Cambridge University immediately after the Black Death of 1348. Doctor Matthew Bartholomew has been trained at Oxford and then in France under an Arabic tutor which gives the doctor quite advanced ideas such as the importance of hygiene and a disregard of astrology - at the time a required subject to qualify! The novels also use Doctor Bartholomew's talents as a pathologist and medical coroner - a kind of Quincy M.D. in tunic and hose. Regardless of Susanna Gregory's modern understanding of forensics, she doesn't let her creation have amazing prescient powers. Her novels strike the delicate balance of character interaction and forensics.

           All in all, the concentration of modern detective fiction on the sciences and technology has - to me - paled into comparison with a genre that emphasizes motive and means rather than the nuts and bolts. Where contemporary fiction discovers forensic clues then uses these to trace the criminal (the what leading to the how thence to the who), historical crime fiction searches for reasons to lead them to the perpetrator (the why leading to the how leading to the who).

Copyright 2005 by Alan J. Bishop

Published Quarterly by Lifeloom.com	"Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive." Sir Walter Scott	Winter 2005 Volume II issue 3
W M M New Issue		W M M Archives