Maddened by Mystery: Or, the Defective Detective
...le at this time and symbolised the honour and law and order of the American, French and (like in this text) British bourgeois. By taking the established conventions of the detective adventure/ thriller (seen within Agatha Christie novels and those of P.D. James); the crime, the suspects, the red herrings, the deduction, clues and finally solution, Leacock mocks the formulaic means by which most detective novels, stories and films were being created. The effect of this satirical view of detectives and their actions is similar to that of Stoppard's play 'The Real Inspector Hound'. "The great detective... wore a long green gown and half a dozen secret badges... He could completely disguise himself at a second's notice... A pile of cryptograms lay on the desk. The Great detective hastily tore them open one after the other, solved them, and threw them down the cryptogram-shute at his side." This quote is painfully satirical of the dress of the detective and his skills, including the incredible art of deduction. The last sentence is illustrative of the overemphasis some authors place on the intelligence, genius even, of the detective. Such is his genius that he has a crytopgram-shute, an incredibly ridiculous notion. The techniques are therefore, attune to those of Stoppard's techniques in 'Hound'. The use of witty wordplay, exaggeration and black comedy add to the tongue-in-cheek approach of Leacock: "Sir,... A mystery has been committed!" "Ha!.. Is it such as to completely baffle the police of this entire continent?" "They are so completely baffled with it that they are lying collapsed in heaps; many of them have committed suicide." This dialogue continues for several paragraphs with different examples which highlight the inefficiency of not only the British police but also the archbishop, the prime minister and the House of Commons. These elements are common throughout detective tales which attempt to prove to responders that they must only rely on the detective, the 'Great Detective' as it were. "These clues must be followed up.... A young man... Evidently young since described as a 'pup', with a long, wet snout (ha! Addicted obviously to drinking), a streak of white hair across his back (a first sign of the results of his abandoned life) - yes, yes... With this clue I shall find...