0 reactions
JJ P.D. ames is more than a genre novelist...
I am a big fan of genre novels, and occasionally they do rise to the level of literature; just finished the wonderful P.D. ames mystery *A Certain Justice* (1997) and was struck by her skill as a writer and stylist (in addition to her obvious mastery of plot and suspense), as a couple of examples will attest:
Describing Miss Carpenter, one of the huge cast of characters in this massive, beautifully constructed novel:
*Here was one of Miss Barbara Pym’s excellent women, a dying breed no doubt, even in country parishes, but once as much a part of the Church of England as sung evensong, an occasional irritant to the vicar’s wife, but an indispensable prop to the parish; Sunday school superintendent, arranger of flowers, polisher of brass, scourge of choirboys, and comforter of favoured curates.*
And the series protagonist, Detective Chief Inspector Adam Dalgliesh, describes the view of London from his office window:
*He moved over to the window and looked down over London. This was his city and he had loved since he had first been brought as a birthday treat to spend a day’s sightseeing with his father. London had laid its spell on him then, and though his love-affair with the city, as with all loves, had had its moments of disillusion, disappointment and threatened infidelity, the spell had remained. Through all the slow accretions of time and change there remained at its core, solid as the London clay, the weight of history and tradition which gave authority even to its meaner streets. The panorama beneath him never failed to enchant. He saw it always as an artefact, sometimes a coloured lithograph in the delicate shades of a spring morning, sometimes a pen-and-ink drawing, every spire, every tower, every tree lovingly delineated, sometimes an oil, strong and vigorous. Tonight it was a psychedelic water-colour, splashes of scarlet and grey layering the blue-black of the night sky, the streets running with molten red and green as the traffic lights changed, the building with their squares of white windows pasted like coloured cut-outs against the backcloths of the night.*
Dame James was indeed a master of her craft. I think she should be considered a literary artist. Agree or disagree?
#entertainment
I am a big fan of genre novels, and occasionally they do rise to the level of literature; just finished the wonderful P.D. ames mystery *A Certain Justice* (1997) and was struck by her skill as a writer and stylist (in addition to her obvious mastery of plot and suspense), as a couple of examples will attest:
Describing Miss Carpenter, one of the huge cast of characters in this massive, beautifully constructed novel:
*Here was one of Miss Barbara Pym’s excellent women, a dying breed no doubt, even in country parishes, but once as much a part of the Church of England as sung evensong, an occasional irritant to the vicar’s wife, but an indispensable prop to the parish; Sunday school superintendent, arranger of flowers, polisher of brass, scourge of choirboys, and comforter of favoured curates.*
And the series protagonist, Detective Chief Inspector Adam Dalgliesh, describes the view of London from his office window:
*He moved over to the window and looked down over London. This was his city and he had loved since he had first been brought as a birthday treat to spend a day’s sightseeing with his father. London had laid its spell on him then, and though his love-affair with the city, as with all loves, had had its moments of disillusion, disappointment and threatened infidelity, the spell had remained. Through all the slow accretions of time and change there remained at its core, solid as the London clay, the weight of history and tradition which gave authority even to its meaner streets. The panorama beneath him never failed to enchant. He saw it always as an artefact, sometimes a coloured lithograph in the delicate shades of a spring morning, sometimes a pen-and-ink drawing, every spire, every tower, every tree lovingly delineated, sometimes an oil, strong and vigorous. Tonight it was a psychedelic water-colour, splashes of scarlet and grey layering the blue-black of the night sky, the streets running with molten red and green as the traffic lights changed, the building with their squares of white windows pasted like coloured cut-outs against the backcloths of the night.*
Dame James was indeed a master of her craft. I think she should be considered a literary artist. Agree or disagree?
#entertainment
| 25,000 mlx | |
| 30 | |
| 0 |