Attacking MURDER as a FINE ART

Attacking MURDER as a FINE ART - Part 2 -

Attacking Murder as a Fine Art 2 - As Historical Fiction With Literary Pretensions?



The Wordsworth Family Graves in Grasmere. An alibi.



(5) Murder as a Fine Art is a novel in the style of the nineteenth century. And it is also an "historical novel," set in a specific historical time and place which is recreated for the reader. Could we not whack some of this history on the head? The tasty historical tidbits about architecture and construction, art, music and opera, medicine (chloroform, cholera, Florence Nightingale), politics (Lord Palmerston,1848, the Year of Revolutions, the Charge of the Light Brigade), economics (the British East India Company and the trade in tea and opium). Surely Morrell is not hinting at some connection between imperialism and wily politicians orchestrating empire in the service of evil capitalism? The scenes in Coldbath Fields Prison introduce historical details of prison design and Jeremy Bentham's ideas about prison reform. Emily's bloomers comment upon fashion and fashion victims. Do we really need to know about all the parks, squares, streets, neighbourhoods, from the Marble Arch to Piccadilly, the air balloon rides in Vauxhall Gardens? It's easy to get lost in this green maze. [p.191] It may be interesting to know that Madame Tussaud had set up her museum on Baker Street. With a Chamber of Horrors. Really? The public paid to see effigies of murderers and their victims? Why? Why did they? Why do they? How are the five dozen daily newspapers significant? Or railway time and the telegraph? Or the ever-prevalent poverty, the homelessness, troubled youth, the thousands of beggars? Well, yes, true. De Quincey had lived among them as a homeless youth himself. His knowledge of their culture helps him set traps for the murderer and makes it easy for Morrell to include several marginalized and invisible genders and underclasses as characters, as elements of plot, making them visible and relevant. All right. But maybe not all readers find history as interesting,



(6) Well, what about Murder as a Fine Art's literary pretensions. "De Quincey is a literary luminary battling a brilliant murderer." Could we not give this literary head a whack? De Quincey as a literary luminary has celebrity, and the misreading of his works by people with their own agenda puts him at risk of retaliation. Surely nobody would consider assassinating a writer? Trotsky was a politician. John Lennon was a musician. Salman Rushdie is still among us. Rohinton Mistry. Lawrence Hill. Seems a bit far-fetched, does it not? De Quincey is not an actor, or a president. Surely people are not targetted for their ideas, or for how well or how poorly they communicate them? Just because De Quincey was literary, a professional writer, is no guarantee of a literary novel.



What does it mean anyway? Literary? Including allusions to other stories, works of art, mythologies. Well, I guess he does this. There is a reference to the many-armed Kali, Hindu goddess of death. [p.166] There are references to his friends, Wordsworth and Coleridge. To wailing banshees. Literary implies using language in more than simply utilitarian ways. I enjoyed hearing of all the lost words from Victorian times: dollywop, linen lifter, dustman, mudlark, rookery, clacker, clostermonger. Of the origin of "screws," and of Piccadilly and other place names. Of the fatal link between hashish and assassin. Literary implies also a use of imagery and symbolism, not just for decorative purposes but to further plot, character, theme. Well, from the sixteen chapter titles we get: artist, death, monster, sublimity, garden of pleasure, shadows, interpreter, education, inquisition, woman of sorrows, effigy, sigh from the depths. Several are lifted directly, in other words, allude to De Quincey publications. Set together like this we see a confluence of spirituality/religion, psychology, and crime. Subjects which are supported by recurring motifs. Blood. Knocking on the doors of crime scenes. And the theatrical motif, the recurring use of deception and disguise, with its connection to identity. Who are you really? Who is as they seem? The murderer uses makeup. The streetwalkers rehearse to accost De Quincey in the park, like choruses from Greek drama. Thugs infiltrate the opium caravans. Murderers infiltrate . . . a wounded man bellows, roars [p. 255], like a dying bull. Diction and allusion. Aspiring to something beyond the page.



Part 2 of 3

© J.M. Bridgeman

Links are welcome but please do not re-print without permission.

jmbridgeman@telus.net

earthabridge@gmail.com

Attacking MURDER as a FINE ART

Attacking MURDER as a FINE ART - Part 3 - A Novel of Ideas

Attacking MURDER as a FINE ART - Part 3 - A Novel of  Ideas

Imagine it is dark, nighttime, in a close such as this one in Edinburgh where De Quincey lived and is buried. Imagine access to a nether world, to an underground culture of beggars and street people.

(7) And whack again. There's one last head. Murder as a Fine Art is a novel of ideas. For beneath all the blood and gore, beneath the horror, Morrell's London of 1854 is a labyrinth and the quest for "the artist of death" is a hunt for a minotaur, that misbegotten creature born of human failures, demanding a tribute of blood sacrifice. Evil with a beating heart. And the green maze within London's two thousand miles of dark streets constitute one big labyrinth. This is a story about the reality of evil in the world, and our attempts to contain it. About the relationship between evil and crime. Maybe even about the role of the artist in confronting the evils of the world, the evil within us born as we are in sin, the evil which we delude ourselves into believing that it does not exist.



A seven-headed monster. But is it truly misbegotten, or are its multi-facets deliberate? The way some people see a minotaur as a hybrid born of the marriage of the divine and the human? The idea of "hybrid" is true to the way Morrell, no matter what his subject, always inserts both action and ideas, or, in literary terms, text and subtext. After all, wasn't that what was most appealing about First Blood? There were reasons why Rambo did what he did. His monstrous deeds were in a sense a product of his nation's sins. Of his nation's political choices underlying its international "police" action. Action and reaction. Good cop, bad cop. You could take it even further. If the minotaur has been killed, is it the death of the divine, the death of mystery? In which case, the space has been created for the mystery writer, the novelists and screenwriters, to fulfill that need we have for fear and terror. For awe.



I "follow" David Morrell and have read others though not nearly all of his 40+ published works. It all started when I moved here to Hope, BC, where Morrell's First Blood was filmed. When the release of MaaFA coincided with my planned trip to England, I decided to make the novel my first ever purchased new release on my new tablet. Done. I read it beginning and ending in London, failing to notice, that first time through, the references to Grasmere and Edinburgh where I also visited.



Then the novel sent me to Gutenberg. I needed to know more about Thomas De Quincey, one of the main characters in the story. Confessions of an English Opium-Eater. On Murder Considered As One of the Fine Arts. The English Mail-Coach. On the Knocking at the Gate In Macbeth. Suspiriade Profundis (Sigh from the Depths). Addicted to laudanum, was De Quincey really advocating the use of the drug? Not the way I read It. But definitely an interesting account of addiction, of self-medicating, of mood-elevating, of increasing tolerance, of attempting to reduce usage, to maintain, and to function, to work, to support a family of nine, while still using. On Murder Considered As One of the Fine Arts seems first to be an exercise in humour, satire, irony, but moves into an analysis which points out that there are different kinds of murder, and that a mass murder of innocents executed after careful planning and preparation seemingly has something other than death as its goal. Why am I thinking of the Oklahoma City bombing? Its message is directed at the living, and the "creator" of the scene is most likely attempting to manipulate something. Opinion, or feelings of terror in those readers and viewers whose interest has been piqued by his actions. Is there a suggestion that such murders did not happen before mass media existed to "spread the fear"? Is not this the point of the details about the five dozen newspapers in London in 1811, and later, the mail-coach delivering London news to Manchester that same day, and, in 1854, the telegraph, spreading fear and terror instantaneously? Media prepare the canvases for the murderer artists, their greatest performances pieces.



The mail-coach essay begins as an exercise in style. De Quincey attempts to write about motion, speed, in an onomatopoetic way, taking the readers breath away, before he makes the leap from motion, speed, to sudden death, near death, and fear of death, to nightmares and how they link both to memory, remembered acts, and to remembered emotion. How the brain collates the fear and relief after a near-miss highway accident with the feelings aroused by the news of the victory at Waterloo. In the knocking at the gate in Macbeth, the murderers who have abandoned that which makes us human, "the divine nature of love and mercy," are reminded that the "reaction" has commenced, "the pulses of life are beginning to beat again." Stylistically, Shakespeare intuited, De Quincey says, that when we hear of murder, we automatically identify with the victim and think of self-preservation, but the dramatist requires that we think of the murderers. The knocking forces us to do that. We hear what they hear. At the same time, the knocking reminds the murderers that they are surrounded by convention and goodness. By representatives of authority holding back the threatening masses. In Suspiriade Profundis De Quincey explores how suffering develops the intellect and the spirit. "Now there is in the dark places of the human spirit--in grief, in fear, in vindictive wrath--a power of self-projection not unlike this [shadow play]." And, as in all good crime drama when order is restored, he believes "the energies of destruction must be equal to those of creation." That balance will return.



Many ideas explored in Murder as a Fine Art are ideas explored in De Quincey's published writing. Morrell has spoken [Afterword] of how a reference to De Quincey in a film about Charles Darwin's psychosomatic illnesses prompted the what-ifs which first gave him his plot. "[T]hat we're influenced by thoughts and emotions we don't know we have." On the surface, it is the murderer who seems not to comprehend the real motivations behind his action, who rationalizes, blames others, sets victims up. De Quincey confronts the delusions with a ghost from the past, and with hard physical evidence, puncturing the barrier between the carefully "separated chambers" of the criminal mind. He could see that the murderer embodied “a separate alien nature which contradicts his own.” [p.258] Emily also shares another De Quinceyism. "Father believes that nothing is ever forgotten." In other words, that we may bury things but they are never dead and gone. Some murderers (and dare we say, some opium-eaters, some policemen, some politicians) are responding to remembered or not remembered childhood experiences, family secrets, bullying or abuse. Some are reacting to repression and the need for outlets for too controlled emotions. De Quincey has intuited the idea of the subconscious, of the shadow, and also the idea that some dreams constitute an effort by the subconscious to communicate with the conscious self. Often with the use of symbols and images, of parallel feelings rather than exact duplication. Delusion, rationalization, obsession, compulsion, frenzy, outward and visible signs, lead him directly to explorations of the inward origins of criminal behaviour. Is it genetic, blood memory, misplaced identification, self-delusion that the "necessary casualties," [p.243] collateral damage, contributes to the greater good? Is it a copy-cat and if so, what is it that is being copied? Is it fratricide? Patricide? Or are lower forms of motivation involved, sexual deviance, personal revenge or retribution or some form of warped redemption? A simple enough point but one not always acknowledged by civilians. That there are different kinds of murder, and different kinds of murderers. Well, as De Quincey too often does, remembering that he was likely paid by the word, the list of ideas could go on and on. I guess the important point is, dear reader, are you interested in ideas or are you not?



Personally, I could dispense with nineteenth century novels, or action suspense thrillers, or blood and horror. With the Gothic, even if its "melodramatic devices are symbolic manifestations of the character's own unconscious fears or spiritual confusion." [Beckson & Ganz] But I do like detectives and detective stories, psychology, criminology, history, literary writing, and I really like novels that make me think. Whatever you like, with the possible exception of romance (of which there is not more than a hint and a wink), there's something to get your jaws into here, in David Morrell's Murder as a Fine Art.



Part 3 of 3

© J.M. Bridgeman

Links are welcome but please do not re-print without permission.

jmbridgeman@telus.net

earthabridge@gmail.com

Work In Progress - St. Kevin's Kitchen, Glendalough

This Work In Progress - St. Kevin's Kitchen, Glendalough - was published by http://www.travelthruhistory.com in October.

Glendalough Round Tower and moss-munched gravestones.

St. Kevin's Kitchen

St. Kevin's Cross

The double-arched gateway with vendors beyond. Gorse in bloom.

Ruins from  the parking lot, Wicklow Mountains beyond.

Literary Lyme

I made it. I made it back to the beautiful little seaside village of Lyme Regis which has inspired so many writers. Jane Austen. John Fowles. Tracy Chevalier. Joan Thomas. Ian MacEwan. (See my original musings, 5/1/11.)

The Literary Lyme Jane Austen Walking Tour was a highlight of my June tour of the UK. Natalie Manifold escorted us through the narrow tilting streets, to the mailbox, the guest houses, up steps and down, along the beachfront promenade, and on to the Cobb. With her visual aids stitching the past to the present, she set the Austen visits into the context of the Napoleonic era. She outlined the conflicting opinions about where Louisa actually jumped (Persuasion) and what really she was trying to do. Is "pull" an expression which Jane Austen would recognize?

I also enjoyed Natalie's Mary Anning walk coordinated through the Lyme Regis Museum. The town is different when explored through the eyes of its residents, the Anning family. Two hundred years ago, fishermen, commercial sailing fleets, smugglers, quarrymen, carpenters made a living independent of holidayers or tourists. The ancient family church is most impressive, with its Mary Anning stained glass window. As is the Anning family headstone outside, with the tumble of ammonites laid at its foot in homage to Mary whose fossil "finds" so attracted the scientists of the era.

I regret that my schedule did not permit me to attend the French Lieutenant's Woman tour with the walk along the undercliff. This evocative shot of Natalie "gazing" will have to suffice.

And the image of the Cobb which on this sunny day appears to beckon, to promise shelter, safe harbour, where land, sea, and sky connect.

Spring 2013

For those friends who are not on Facebook.


Here's the Flower of the Week--Magnolia in bloom on Raab Street, Hope, on April 2, 2013, inspiring my new Words to Live by, in Life as in Art: to focus on the positives, on what is here--the graceful white lines; the contrast of black, white, and grey; the blush of colour in bud and flower bowl; the branch as a slash between past and future; the texture of the velvet budcaps (calyxes); the way the flower shivers at the wind's caress. (You can tell I am reading Hardy again.)

New Reviews

New Reviews

Happy to announce that four new reviews are posted at the Prairie Fire Review of Books page on the University of Manitoba Open Journal site: 

http://ojs.lib.umanitoba.ca/prairiefire

Click on Current Issue and then on the PDF beside each review.

Sad to report that these are likely to be the last reviews. Something about funding? Funding no longer available?

Let us continue to read, and continue to think of reading as a subversive activity.

Ivan E. Coyote

Sinclair Ross

Mitch Spray

V6A

2012 Winter Greetings

2012

In 2012 we have been blessed with the white stuff before the Winter Solstice (which is not always the case here in Hope, BC, Canada.) Everything looks so "embellished" and the quality of the light changes. The wood stove is working overtime and the goodies everywhere are so tempting.

It has been another good year of abundance, visitors, travels, and friends meeting over coffee and Scrabble.

If we do not see you, you are in our hearts. All the best to you and yours. Have a Happy New Year.

jmb