THE CORNERSTONES OF CRIME (Part 2)

by Barry T. and Angela Zeman

Before continuing the Haycraft-Queen discussion, we would be remiss by not taking a few moments to mark the untimely passing of Ira Levin, a great writer, multiple Edgar winner and MWA Grandmaster. He was also an unpretentious guy with a constantly fresh sense of humor. A master of ingenious plotting, his novels were tension filled, driven by ‘premise and situation’, and possessed a sharp sense of place and time. He wrote only seven books, but each was carefully done. His first, A Kiss before Dying, (1953) won an Edgar. Four others were wonderfully translated to the screen-the iconic Rosemary’s Baby, The Boys From Brazil, The Stepford Wives (twice), and Sliver.

Ira’s creative skills ran to more than novels. A well know playwright, his most famous of many production, “Deathtrap, another Edgar winner, was a stunning example of Broadway at its best. He could also deftly handle comedy. His adaptation of Mac Hyman’s novel “No Time For Sergeants” starring Andy Griffin in his career making role, ran for almost 800 performances.

Some have said that the movies made from his books “added a luster to his reputation that was not wholly merited by the original works”. This is certainly debatable, but was is not, is his writing skill, ability to construct a great plot, create sinister tension, and make fantastic psychologically multilayered situations real and plausible.

Good Bye Ira. It was a privilege knowing you.

Now to head back to a brief survey of our main subject. The “Haycraft-Queen Cornerstone List”, as it is known after the additions by Ellery Queen, keenly illustrates the evolution of the mystery-detective fiction genre. While a few of the early books of the 18th and 19th centuries may not offer what critics today consider great writing, many are eminently readable, while others are literary classics retaining all their power and richness. All possess historical and developmental importance. From the 1890’s through the mid 1920’s, the quality of writing uniformly improved, although some styles are now dated. Form, structure, and craftsmanship greatly improved in the ’20 s and ’30s. A number from this era are real stars, representing the best of the Golden Age of detective fiction.

A significant number of the books on the H-Q List are available either in print, or from a search on one of the book websites such as abe.com. The reprint hard covers or paperbacks can be often had for under $5, but can sometimes get into a few hundred for difficult to find reprint titles in nice condition with pictorial dust jackets. If you are a collector and want first editions, prices to acquire the classics or rare volumes in good condition are often in the hundreds; those in very good condition with dust jackets reflect the desire of today’s collectors to own them, with prices often over a thousand dollars and a number of those in truly fine condition with like dust jacket fetching well over twenty thousand dollars. More than a handful of truly rare ones in fine condition, with dust jacket present will go for multiples of that; A Study in Scarlet in “Beeton’s Christmas Annual” (its first appearance — no dust jacket of course), and The Maltese Falcon, The Glass Key (UK edition, the true first), and The Mysterious Affair at Styles are just a few in the later category. Thanks goodness paperbacks or reprints are available.

Genre masterpieces and seminal works on the H-Q List from the era which became the “Golden Age” include the usual suspects, which were recognized as such in 1941 when Haycraft initiated his “bookshelf”, or in the early 1950s when Queen added his updates. These modern classics include: The Maltese Falcon and The Glass Key by Hammett (the short story collection The Adventures of Sam Spade was also included); The Mysterious Affair at Styles, by Agatha Christie; Whose Body, by Dorothy Sayers; Fer-de-Lance and The League of Frightened Men, by Rex Stout; The Postman Always Rings Twice, by Cain; The Big Sleep, by Chandler; and W.R. Burnett’s Little Caesar, the first gangster novel, to name only a handful. If you were unfortunate enough to be a first edition collector (technically known as a bibliophile, but more commonly and more accurately referred to as a ‘book nut’) prices for these books often far exceed those for more difficult to find books that appeared in the 18th and 20th centuries, except for three icons; Poe’s Tales , all of Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes volumes, and Dracula.

Acknowledged by nearly all as the father of the detective story, Edgar Allan Poe published Tales in 1845. Tales lead off Haycraft’s original “Cornerstone” selections, but Ellery Queen added three earlier works: the 1748 appearance of Zadig, by Voltaire, described as the “great-great grandfather of the detective story”; the English book Things as They Are, or The Adventures of Caleb Williams (1794), by William Godwin, “the great-grandfather of the detective story;” and Memories de Vidocq (1828-29) by Francois Vidocq, a four volumes series of fictionalized personal experiences by a former criminal who became the founder of the French Surete, and later one of the world’s first private detectives. Queen named Vidocq the genre’s “Grandfather.”

Howard Haycraft’s next two selections, not separated by any additions by Queen, were Dickens’s Bleak House and The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Other picks by both Haycraft and Queen are classics of literature and as well, historically important in the development of the mystery/detective fiction genre. Few can argue with the stature of the nineteenth century giants: Hugo’s Les Miserables; Dostoevsky’s Crime and Punishment; Wilkie Collins’ classics The Woman in White and The Moonstone; Twain’s Pudd’nhead Wilson (where fingerprints were first used); Stevenson’s chilling masterpiece Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the first crime/horror/thriller; and Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

Passing into the Twentieth Century, the following classics were chosen: Joseph Conrad’s The Secret Agent; O’Henry’s short story collection The Gentle Grafter; and two decades later, Theodore Dreiser’s An American Tragedy and Liam O’Flaherty’s The Informer.

Making the list were important “crossover” or “mainstream’ books. Damon Runyon’s Guys and Dolls, and the psychological thriller, Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier. Brighton Rock by Graham Greene was as highly acclaimed when it first appeared as it is today.

Of course, the modern literature hard-boiled crime classics of Hammett, Chandler, Cain and Burnett appeared around this time in the chronology. Some of Queen’s additions to the list from this time period, mid 1920’s through the 1940’s, are detective/mystery books by Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners, and other authors generally recognized as purely mainstream writers. These include C.S. Forester’s Payment Deferred; W. Somerset Maugham’s short story espionage collection. Ashenden; T.S. Stribling’s Clues of the Caribees; Glen Trevor’s (James Hilton) Murder At School; John P. Marquand’s first Mr. Moto book, No Hero; Nicholas Blake’s The Beast Must Die; James Gould Cozzen’s The Just and the Unjust; William Faulkner’s Intruder in the Dust; and Robert Coates’ Wisteria Cottage.

A number of the great books from this era were added by Queen. All were certainly penned by great writers, but one can’t help but wonder whether Queen included them not only to aid in defining the genre, but to also popularize and legitimize the field at a time when many narrow-minded critics and commentators disparaged detective stories as pap for the masses.

Whatever the rational, Queen excelled at the task. Many stories by well-known literary figures also appeared in EQMM throughout the years, as well as many 18th and 19th century stories rediscovered by him. Queen did much to educate the public to understand the value and importance of detective/mystery/suspense fiction and its contribution to what is now rightly considered some of the best in world literature.

Other entries in the Cornerstones of equal import to the genre include multiple selections from the works of acknowledged masters including Erle Stanley Gardner’s first two Perry mason novels, The Case of the Velvet Claws and The Case of the Sulky Girl; Freeman Wills Crofts’ The Cask and Inspector French’s Greatest Case; Dorothy Sayers’ Documents in the Case, written with Robert Eustace; R. Austin Freeman’s The Eye of Osiris and The Singing Bone; G.K. Chesterton’s The Man Who was Thursday and the first Father Brown short stories collected in The Innocence of Father Brown; Ellery Queen has their first “Ellery Queen” book The Roman Hat Mystery, and the later Calamity Town, as well as the Drury Lane mysteries The Tragedy of X and The Tragedy of Y, and two of their famous short story anthologies, Challenge to the Reader and 101 Years Entertainment are part of the
“lustrum”. S.S. Van Dine, had The Benson Murder Case and The Canary Murder Case, John Dickson Carr (Carter Dickson) The Crooked Hinge, The Arabian Night Murder, The Plague Court Murders, and The Judas Window; and Cornell Woolrich’s (William Irish) noir classics The Bride Wore Black and Phantom Lady.

Next time we will look at some of the H-Q books important to the development of the genre. Today, some are certainly obscure, and therefore reading copies are not easily available. Others are simply not as readable as the literary masterpieces we have discussed so far. In addition, we will survey the important works that followed the Golden Age-after the start of WWII. There will be many familiar titles, but also a number of underappreciated books you will definitely want to read.