ICYMI: Lisa Hopkins on Shakespeare Allusion in Crime Fiction (Palgrave, 2016)

ICYMI: Lisa Hopkins, Sheffield Hallam University, has published Shakespeare Allusion in Crime Fiction (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016). Here from the publisher's website is a description of the book's contents.

This book explores why crime fiction so often alludes to Shakespeare. It ranges widely over a variety of authors including classic golden age crime writers such as the four ‘queens of crime’ (Allingham, Christie, Marsh, Sayers), Nicholas Blake and Edmund Crispin, as well as more recent authors such as Reginald Hill, Kate Atkinson and Val McDermid. It also looks at the fondness for Shakespearean allusion in a number of television crime series, most notably Midsomer Murders, Inspector Morse and Lewis, and considers the special sub-genre of detective stories in which a lost Shakespeare play is found. It shows how Shakespeare facilitates discussions about what constitutes justice, what authorises the detective to track down the villain, who owns the countryside, national and social identities, and the question of how we measure cultural value.

Colin Dexter (1930-2017) Passes Away

Colin Dexter, creator of the Inspector Morse novels, has died, aged 86. Here is more from The Guardian.

Mr. Dexter wrote thirteen Morse novels, the first appearing in 1975 (Last Bus To Woodstock) and the last, in which Inspector Morse dies, appearing in 1999 (The Remorseful Day). Inspector Morse and his friends and colleagues came to the screen beginning in 1988 (ITV) with the late John Thaw as Endeavour Morse (we don't learn his first name until extremely late in the series). Two spin-off series followed: Lewis, starring Kevin Whately, who had played Sergeant Lewis in the original series (2006-2015), and Endeavour, starring Shaun Evans as a young Sergeant Morse (2012--).

Order of Inspector Morse books.

A short bibliography on Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse

Simon Barker, Period Detective Drama and the limits of contemporary Nostalgia: "Inspector Morse" and the strange case of a lost England

Helen Davis, Inspector Morse and the Business of Crime 

Lyn Thomas, In Love With Inspector More: Feminist Subculture and Quality Television

Stijn Reijnders, Watching the Detectives: Inside the Guilty Landscapes of Inspector Morse, Baantjer and Wallander

Alan Jacobs on the Murder Mystery and the Search for Justice

Alan Jacobs on the Inspector Morse television series, its spinoffs, and "Murder in Paradise," from The American Conservative. Via @allenmendenhall.

Revisiting Inspector Morse

Last Friday's issue of The Independent has a wonderful article about the charms of Inspector Morse, that unique character created by Colin Dexter and brought to life by the late actor John Thaw. In addition to DVDs available from BFS Entertainment, you can enjoy the Inspector in print in any of Dexter's wonderful novels, many of which are also available in audio editions. Here's a link to the PBS webpage for Morse, and here's a link to a webpage for a walking tour of Inspector Morse's city.

Here are a few discussions of the character in literature and film.

Barker, Simon, “Period” Detective Drama and the Limits of Contemporary Nostalgia: Inspector Morse and the Strange Case of a Lost England, 6(2) Critical Survey 234-42 (1994).

Brodie, J. S., The Cult of Inspector Morse: A Contemporary Phenomenon, 38 Journal of Kyoritsu Women’s Junior College 79-87 (February 1995).

Decottignies, Jean, La vie poétique de l'inspecteur Morse: Un polar mélancolique (Grenoble, France: ELLUG; 2004).

Thomas, Lyn, In Love With Inspector Morse: Feminist Subculture and Quality Television, 51 Feminist Review 1-25 (Autumn 1995).

Sparks, Richard, Inspector Morse: “The Last Enemy”, in British Television Drama in the 1980s 86-102 (George W. Brandt ed., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993).

[Cross-posted to The Seamless Web].