Surfing, Submerging, Subverting: The Poe-litics of a Popular Genre
Is short crime fiction merely a popular genre designed for entertainment or a more serious genre, worthy of serious study: a genre merely to surf or one worthy of intellectual submersion? While readers can decide for themselves, the choices its practitioners make also help to answer this question. W...
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| Veröffentlicht in: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/jsse, |
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| 1. Verfasser: | |
| Format: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Sprache: | Anglais |
| Veröffentlicht: |
Journal of the Short Story in English
2024
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| Online Zugang: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Zusammenfassung: | Is short crime fiction merely a popular genre designed for entertainment or a more serious genre, worthy of serious study: a genre merely to surf or one worthy of intellectual submersion? While readers can decide for themselves, the choices its practitioners make also help to answer this question. Why do they so often subvert the rules of the genre, sometimes to the point of parody? Edgar Allan Poe, as a founder of short crime fiction, was interested in how the brain works. To interpret phenomena is the brain’s basic learning pattern. Crime fiction is about our search for meaning, but subject to parody since writers and readers recognise it as a mere brain exercise. The crime matters less than the exercise involved in solving it. The short form is especially apt: it tests our capacity to resolve an issue, but can quickly reveal the folly of assuming all mysteries can be solved. This is evident from Poe through Twain and Wilde to contemporary writing. Psychologist Helen Phillips and neuroscientist Anil Seth provide insight into the science behind the genre’s appeal. In political terms, parody paradoxically marks the genre as serious rather than merely popular. Totalitarianism, for instance, dislikes crime fiction, short or long, because it promotes questioning and can involve humour. The maverick tendencies of the free-thinker are the Poe-litics of this intriguing genre. |
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