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ANTHONY ABBOT AND J JEFFERSON FARJEON: BACK AT THE
BARBICAN!
1930s Crime Fiction at the
Barbican Library, London.
by Jerry Dowlen
I was delighted when I saw
that the Barbican Library in London had chosen 1930s crime fiction as a summer
2011 special theme.
If like me, you're an eager seeker of pre-war crime fiction books, you'll
celebrate every opportunity to read one that you haven't seen before. Having
already swooped with great relish upon a new intake of Edgar Wallace books that
I saw in the Barbican Library in early 2011, I was positively drooling in July
to find that their staff had been equipped with miners' lamps, surely, to
burrow deep into the archives and emerge triumphant with a barrowful of vintage
1930s hardback books bearing the fond original insignia of the Collins Crime
Club.
I gazed excitedly at the colourful array of melodramatic front cover
illustrations and surging incitements (‘A High Spot Thriller’ … Death – Swift
and Unforeseen’ … ‘Murder – Diabolical! Amazing! Baffling!’). I can’t be sure
that I didn’t exclaim out loud: "Oh golly!"
"Oh golly!" is the sort of expression that one of J Jefferson
Farjeon's crime-adventuring heroes would instinctively come out with, when the
unexpected happens. Farjeon populates his fast-moving stories with earnest
young male heroes whose public school upbringing has steeled them always to
keep their chins up and to dismiss any physical hardship or impending doom as a
footling trifle. Adrift in the open sea in a leaking boat during a raging storm
at night, a Farjeon hero will typically ask: "I suppose this is the
way to Piccadilly Circus?"
That’s one of the many joys
of reading pre-war crime fiction. The storylines and settings and characters
can be a bit stodgy at times, but you can usually rely upon finding some
delightful sixpenny-pieces of colloquial fun:
"Think
nothing of it, old top.”
“Why
the deuce should I know that seedy-looking blighter?”
"With
reference to my letter of the 1st ultimo …”
I am thrilled to report that the Barbican Library has perpetuated and extended
the 1930s crime fiction display into the autumn and the winter. They have
labelled it: ‘The Golden Age of Crime Fiction’. Accordingly, if you make a
visit today, and you locate the special shelf on the back wall, you’ll find not
just a picnic but a veritable feast of ‘Robbery and Blackmail and Murder!’
Anthony Abbot
‘The Murder of Geraldine
Foster’ (1930)
‘The Murder of a Startled
Lady’ (1935)
If I ever decide to compile a
personal list of Authors Who In My Opinion Should Not Be Forgotten,
alphabetically Anthony Abbot will surely have to come first!
It is a shame that no one
reads Abbot any more. I will vouch that he was a superbly talented writer and
plot-setter. He could spin an imaginative and teasing mystery tale that
unfolded in a deceptively effortless style, quickly drawing the reader into the
action.
 For me it is an extra bonus
that Abbot set his stories in New York, a city that I know well. It is a
trademark of his murder mysteries that he provides vivid and detailed
descriptions of indoor and outdoor locations in which murder action takes place
or police investigation is pursued. From my own roaming around real-life New
York it is that much easier and more satisfying for me that I can picture some
of Abbot’s locations and I can soak in the atmospheric, sometimes haunting
quality of his writing: the dragging of the Manhattan river-bed, for example,
to find a buried corpse (spookily, a woman spirit-medium has informed the
police exactly where to look). I can delight too in finding period references
such as “We were passing the gaunt and immense edifice of the unfinished
Cathedral of St John the Divine.” (That said, a reference to an apartment block
whose janitor is Lithuanian, could belong to 2011 not 1931!).
The stories are narrated by
the neat and effective device of the real-life author planting himself into the
action. The police team in New York, led by the grizzled veteran Thatcher Colt,
includes an employee named Abbot, who carries out minor secretarial duties.
Colt addresses him as “Tony”. Self-described at one stage as Colt’s “aide de
camp”, Abbot is too insignificant perhaps to be a Watson to Holmes or a Captain
Hastings to Poirot, but he pictures for us a Colt who is at times effusive when
scenting the trail; at other times taciturn, clinical and even melancholy. Colt
above all is fiercely loyal to his profession. He scorns the notion that the
gentleman amateur detective can trump the police process:
“All
the way to Headquarters he was silent and contemplative, in the back seat of
the car. Centre Street was deserted when we reached the grim old Department
building, with its marble trim and its ornamental iron. As we walked through
the vaulted stone corridors, our footsteps echoed on the resounding flagstones.
Still Thatcher Colt remained silent, but the very atmosphere of the old
building, a place of badges, raincoats, billies, caps and handcuffs, seemed to
charge him with new life. No Commissioner ever loved the Department with a more
ardent or fanatical interest.”
Critics say that by the time
‘Startled Lady’ was published, in 1935, Abbot’s detective stories had developed
a macabre quality, with plots involving the supernatural. If you read ‘Startled
Lady’ it is certainly a vivid and challenging experience. I will warrant that
the denouement, when Colt unmasks the killer inside the operating theatre of a
hospital, is one of the cleverest and most audacious murder mystery solutions
that I have ever read.
J Jefferson Farjeon
'Trunk Call' (1932)
‘The Z Murders’ (1932)
'Sinister Inn' (1934)
 These three books indicate to me that a trademark Farjeon murder mystery story
will take place in a severely compressed period of time. Drama will sometimes
be enacted in compressed interior spaces such as a room, a shed, a car or a railway
carriage. There will be the feel of a John Buchan adventure story: the young
male hero will be quickly plunged into a series of “why is this happening to
me?” disturbing incidents that will cause him to react impulsively. His
protective instincts will be aroused when he finds that an attractive young
lady is evidently in some danger – although the young lady in question will
behave enigmatically towards him, and will be unapologetic in her apparent
stubborn desire to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds.
Characters with potentially
sinister motives press themselves persistently and inconveniently upon the
hero. These characters, who may turn out to be police officers acting
incognito, or may prove to be malevolent ne’er-do-gooders, are prone to knock
on front doors or ring doorbells or gain entry with stolen keys or climb
through open windows, to make threatening intrusions when they are least
wanted.
Elements of the plot and the
action in ‘Trunk Call’ and ‘Z Murders’ are almost interchangeable: for example,
train rides from London to the west of England (Torquay and Bristol). ‘Sinister
Inn’ begins likewise with a rail journey from London (to Dartmouth) but in this
story there are two male heroes – Bill and Robert - instead of only one, and the
action soon shifts away from England to Brittany in France.
 A witty touch from Farjeon in
‘Sinister Inn’ is to give the profession of a novelist to the 25-year old young
lady who finds herself caught up in the action. Her publisher has been nagging
her to inject more realism and less sentimental sloppiness into her stories.
After a panic-stricken first night in a creepy old country inn in France, she
reflects privately that her next book will duly be a corker – “if Providence
spares me to have any more readers.” Later, making an ungainly descent from the
window of her hotel room, in which she no longer feels safe, she notes: “I
lowered myself gingerly to terra firma. From terra infirma to terra
firma. Am I getting my sense of humour back? When or if I ever write this
story I shall leave that joke in.”
In an age of social custom
when a lady, however perilous her immediate circumstances, had always first and
foremost to protect her honour, there are mixed messages in Farjeon’s
narrative. On occasions, to evade capture or continue the chase, a Farjeon male
hero will find himself spending long periods of time in close physical
proximity with his female travelling companion. Inside the ‘Sinister Inn’ hotel
it is determined that the young heroine could never dream of admitting either
Bill or Robert – or both – to her room, for fear of “compromising herself” as
the phrase was in those days. She notes to herself on one occasion that this
would be unthinkable, “as I am wearing next to nothing.” In ‘Trunk Call’ however,
despite her temporary state of being déshabillé the young damsel in
distress does not banish her gallant male protector from her presence. But we
can take it as implict, can’t we, that in the 1930s a chap would never behave
improperly to a lady or take advantage of her, for heaven’s sake!
Have you read Agatha
Christie’s mystery masterpiece ‘The ABC Murders’ (1936)? I count it as one of
the best crime fiction stories of all time – especially for the cunningly
simple solution that is revealed at the end, to explain the mystery that has
been confounding the reader throughout.
What, then, to make of
Farjeon’s ‘Z Murders’? Opposite end of the alphabet; but is it intrinsically
the same plot as ‘The ABC Murders’? Both stories involve an ABC railway
timetable – I can tell you that. Intriguingly too, there is a point in the
investigation of ‘The Z Murders’ when a baffled Detective-Inspector James
declares: “I wish I were a Sherlock Holmes or a Poiret (sic).” Well … Hercule
Poirot discovered whether Mr Alexander Bonaparte Cust was the ABC Murderer.
Will the weary Detective-Inspector James emulate Poirot by solving the riddle
of ‘The Z Murders’?
The Barbican Library in
London is open six days a week (although beware of the dastardly 2pm early
closing on Fridays). Take a trip back in time to the 1930s and the Golden Age
of Crime Fiction! Hurry – it’s on now!
Jerry Dowlen
January 2012
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The Jerry Dowlen Feature Article for February
