‘It’s a narsty biziness’ : conservatism and subversion in 1930s detective fiction and thrillers

White, G

Abstract

This chapter focuses on popular fiction and particularly the crime genre, encompassing both the detective story and the thriller. Critical surveys looking back across the decades finds these subgenres difficult to distinguish over time but writers of the 1930s are very much aware of which subgenre they are writing in and its relative status. In 1942 Nicholas Blake asserted that ‘It is an established fact that the detective novel proper is read almost exclusively by the upper and professional classes. The so-called “lower middle” and “working classes” tend to read “bloods”, thrillers.’ And, he points out, ‘the modern thriller is generally much below the detective story in sophistication and style’ (xxii) Given the perceived hierarchy of readership and regard, defining the difference between these subgenres became important to some authors.

• Online Publication Date: Dec 13, 2020
• Publication Date: Jan 14, 2021
• Deposit Date: Nov 21, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 13, 2021
• Pages: 239-272
• Series Title: The Decades Series
• Book Title: The 1930s: A Decade of Modern British Fiction
• ISBN: 9781350079144-(Hardback);-9781350079168-(ebook);-9781350079175-(ebook)
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.5040/9781350079175.ch-008
• Publisher URL: https://doi.org/10.5040/9781350079175.ch-008
• Related Public URLs: https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/the-1930s-a-decade-of-modern-british-fiction-9781350079144/; https://doi.org/10.5040/9781350079175