English 159-2 - Spring, 2013

Topics in the Novel

Topic: The Contemporary Detective Novel

Class Information

Instructor: Hicks, W. Jack
CRN: 62586
Time: TR 3:10-4:30
Location: 229 Wellman

Description

Call them private eyes, sleuths, shamuses, dicks, snoops, peeps or worse, detectives are popular and omnipresent in contemporary fiction and film, high and lowbrow. We’ll meet classic styling tough guy Philip Marlowe (Raymond Chandler); and then, LAPD detective and Viet Nam vet Harry Bosch, working the darkness of the City of Angels; Watts handyman Easy Rawlins, the ultimate O.G. turned good guy; forensic scientist Kay Scarpetta (think television such as “CSI” and “Bones”), who frees corpse secrets via cybertechnology, computer analysis and DNA scans; Precious Ramotswe, exposer of rascals and healer of broken hearts in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana; and pierced/tattooed Lisbeth Salander, a vengeful bisexual superhacker who scrapes bare incestuous conspiracy in the Scandinavian winter. Their tales make fascinating reading and speak of worlds in jarring transition, changing the roles of detectives, criminals (and their awful deeds), victims and ourselves--who ignore, watch, impede or abet crime and punishment.

REQUIREMENTS: TBA

Texts:
Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep
Walter Mosley, Devil in a Blue Dress
Michael Connelly, The Black Echo
Alexander McCall Smith, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency
Patricia Cornwell, The Body Farm
Stieg Larsson, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Selected passages from film adaptations of novels above