1.

Record Nr.

UNISA996202481803316

Titolo

The Cambridge companion to American crime fiction / / edited by Catherine Ross Nickerson [[electronic resource]]

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cambridge : , : Cambridge University Press, , 2010

ISBN

1-139-80097-3

0-511-76284-4

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (xii, 190 pages) : digital, PDF file(s)

Collana

Cambridge companions to literature

Disciplina

813/.087209

Soggetti

Detective and mystery stories, American - History and criticism

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Title from publisher's bibliographic system (viewed on 09 Nov 2015).

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Introduction : the satisfactions of murder / Catherine Ross Nickerson -- Early American crime writing / Sara Crosby -- Poe and the origins of detective fiction / Stephen Rachman -- Women writers before 1960 / Catherine Ross Nickerson -- The hard-boiled novel / Sean McCann -- The American roman noir / Andrew Pepper -- Teenage detectives and teenage delinquents / Ilana Nash -- American spy fiction / David Seed -- The police procedural in literature and on television / Eddy von Mueller -- Mafia stories and the American gangster / Fred L. Gardaphe -- True crime / Laura Browder -- Race and American crime fiction / Maureen T. Reddy -- Feminist crime fiction / Margaret Kinsman -- Crime in postmodernist fiction / Susan Elizabeth Sweeney.

Sommario/riassunto

From the execution sermons of the Colonial era to television programs like The Wire and The Sopranos, crime writing has played an important role in American culture. Its ability to register fear, desire and anxiety has made it a popular genre with a wide audience. These new essays, written for students as well as readers of crime fiction, demonstrate the very best in contemporary scholarship and challenge long-established notions of the development of the detective novel. Each chapter covers a sub-genre, from 'true crime' to hard-boiled novels, illustrating the ways in which 'popular' and 'high' literary genres influence and shape each other. With a chronology and guide to further reading, the Companion is a helpful guide for students of American literature and readers of crime fiction.