[.ca] Murder for Pleasure: The Life and Times of the Detective ... (ISBN 0881840718)

Dated, But Still Informative Book on Detective Novels:
First published in 1941, then enlarged in 1951, Howard Haycraft's 'Murder for Pleasure' is one of the earliest books that took the detective novel seriouly, examining the major and minor works of the genre. It must be said that the book looks often terribly dated in several places, and readers living in the 21st century can read excellent 'Bloody Murder' by Julian Symons or 'The Perfect Murder' by David Lehman, but still 'Murder for Pleasure' gives precious information about the genre and occasional insights. From the time of Poe, Howard Haycraft traces the history of detective novel mainly in England, America, and France (the last not much). As Haycraft covers only up until 1941, the names of the authors Haycraft mentions look often a little too selective, or too classic now. In this book Agatha Christie is already given a due recognition, but Eric Ambler and Nicholas Blake are still newcomers, and you barely hear the works of one William Irish. Instead, you can find the titles of the books, or the names of the mystery writers that are forgotten today. For example, Haycraft praises one detective series featuring Uncle Abner and its creator Melville Davisson Post (1871-1930), giving more than three pages to Post's works. For today's readers, Haycraft's judgement that no one is a true connoisseuer of detective novel without reading all the Uncle Abner stories sounds very hasty. But the differences of taste and writing style becomes exactly the fun of reading this book, because 'Murder for Pleasure' records many minor, now forgotten writers of the genre. The 'quiz' section and others are interesting, but slightly look irrelevant (Who is Prof. S.F.X.Van Dusen?), the book is clearly written by the hand of a man who really loves detective novels, and his enthusiastic sentences reveal that fact. Haycraft's voice is not that of scholar, but of a devoted fan of detective novels. As if to show his origin, he generously gives tips for aspiring writers, like advice about how to negotiate the publishers (no acadamics would write like that). And like any avid fans, he worries too much about the definition of 'detective novels' -- for Haycraft, it seems, such storytelling method as used in popular TV series 'Columbo' or criminal's viewpoint is strictly experimental. The book itself offers no fresh perspectives, but as bibliographical source of detective genre 'Murder for Pleasure' contains still precious information that is hard to find elsewhere.