Subject: (urth) Re: Digest urth.v022.n015

From: Alice Turner <al at interport.net>
Date: Tue, 05 Jan 1999 20:35:11 +0000

Stephen et al,

>Michael Straight wrote :
>
>>This sounds like it was inspired by a novel from the mid 1800's by Wilkie
>> Collins called _The Moonstone_, which T.S. Eliot called "the first and
>> greatest of English detective novels" (it introduced the idea of giving
>> the reader all the clues necessary to solve the mystery and of having a
>> "detective" to put it all together).  It features chapters written by
>> each of the witnesses to the crime.  I don't know if they contradict each
>> other, as, alas, I haven't read it yet. 
>
>
>A quick recommendation of _The Moonstone_. I love Wilke Collins' fiction
>and perhaps this is the best of his novels, with a wonderful complex plot
>and great characters (the detective Sgt. Cuff is great) and a marvelous
>sense of place this is of interest to Wolfe fans. As far as I can recall
>the Chapters written by various characters do not contradict each other
>they move the plot on seamlessly and are only written by divers hands
>because some of the narrators are not on hand to describe all of the
>events.

I too think -The Moonstone- holds up wonderfully well, especially
considering what a pioneer it was, 1868, decades before the great adventure
fiction of the end of the century. And I'll recommend -Incident of the
Fingerpost- too, with one caveat: it is awfully long, and ones attention
(mine, anyway) does tend to wander at times, so that it becomes a bit of a
slog. But clever and atmospheric and amusing.

-alga

*More Wolfe info & archive of this list at http://www.urth.net/urth/