The Golden Age of Detective Fiction was an era of detective fiction in the 1920s and 30s . Some of the best mystery novels were written during this period. It’s the combination of the atmosphere created in the novels, the complex puzzle that is solved mostly by sheer wit without the help of modern forensic science, and the suprize at the end of the book when the murerer is revealed that make them so apealing. While authors such as E.A. Poe and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle gave birth to the modern detective story, the Golden Age authors honed and polished it, giving it the shape and tone that we love best.
The British authors were by far the masters of the genre: Agatha Christie (1890 - 1976), Dorothy L. Sayers (1893 - 1957), Josephine Tey (1896 - 1952), Margery Allingham (1904 - 1966), Ngaio Marsh (1895 - 1982), Anthony Berkeley (aka Francis Iles) (1893 - 1971), R. Austin Freeman (1862-1943), Freeman Wills Crofts (1879-1957) Philip MacDonald (1900–1980), Michael Innes (1906–1993), and many more; some of them, such as John Dickson Carr, S. S. Van Dine and Ellery Queen, were American but had a similar touch, their plots frequently set in the heart of the English countryside or in London.
During this period the most complex and ingenious puzzles in detective fiction books were invented, the most suprizing solutions revealed, the most memorable detectives were created. Books like "The murder of Rodger Acroyd", "The Three Coffins Mystery", "The Greek coffin Tragedy" ,are absolute classics and just leave the reader in awe at the end of the book when the solution is revealed.
Most of the novels of that era were whodunnits.A whodunit or whodunnit (for "Who done it?"l) is a complex, plot-driven variety of the detective story in which the puzzle is paramount. The reader is provided with all the clues from which the identity of the perpetrator of the crime may be deduced before the solution is revealed in the final pages of the book. Agatha Christie was one of the best at deceiving the reader and than revealing the most ingenious solutionsin the last chapter of the book.
During the Golden Age the rules of fair play were introduced and the audience was invited to participate, to puzzle out the solution along with the detective.Here are some of the key concepts of the Golden age mystery novel:
The reader must have equal opportunity with the detective for solving the mystery. All clues must be plainly stated and described.
No willful tricks or deceptions may be placed on the reader other than those played legitimately by the criminal on the detective himself.
The detective himself, or one of the official investigators, should never turn out to be the culprit. This is bald trickery, on a par with offering some one a bright penny for a five-dollar gold piece. It's false pretenses.
The culprit must be determined by logical deductions — not by accident or coincidence or unmotivated confession. To solve a criminal problem in this latter fashion is like sending the reader on a deliberate wild-goose chase, and then telling him, after he has failed, that you had the object of his search up your sleeve all the time. Such an author is no better than a practical joker.
The problem of the crime must he solved by strictly naturalistic means. Such methods for learning the truth as slate-writing, ouija-boards, mind-reading, spiritualistic se'ances, crystal-gazing, and the like, are taboo.
The culprit must turn out to be a person who has played a more or less prominent part in the story — that is, a person with whom the reader is familiar and in whom he takes an interest.
The method of murder, and the means of detecting it, must be be rational and scientific. That is to say, pseudo-science and purely imaginative and speculative devices are not to be tolerated in the roman policier. Once an author soars into the realm of fantasy, in the Jules Verne manner, he is outside the bounds of detective fiction, cavorting in the uncharted reaches of adventure.
A servant must not be chosen by the author as the culprit. This is begging a noble question. It is a too easy solution. The culprit must be a decidedly worth-while person — one that wouldn't ordinarily come under suspicion.
The stupid friend of the detective, the Watson, must not conceal from the reader any thoughts which pass through his mind; his intelligence must be slightly, but very slightly, below that of the average reader.
There must be one or the most two main detectives.To bring the minds of three or four, or sometimes a gang of detectives to bear on a problem, is not only to disperse the interest and break the direct thread of logic, but to take an unfair advantage of the reader.
One major subjenre of the whodunit mystery is The locked room mystery in which a murder or other crime is committed under impossible circumstances: no one could have entered or left the scene of the crime, and the death involved could not have been a suicide. Such stories normally follow other conventions of classic detective fiction, in that the reader is presented with the puzzle and all of the clues, and so encouraged to solve it before the solution is revealed in a dramatic denouement. John Dickson Carr was the Master of this class of detective story, but of course there are a lot of other examples.
Some Books that represent best the Golden Age of detection:
Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) - Considered one of the best Golden Age novels although it stirred a lot of contriversaly with its solutions to the crime.
Anthony Berkeley's The Poisoned Chocolates Case (1929), which features six different solutions to the murder.
S. S. Van Dine's The Benson Murder Case (1928)
Ellery Queen'sThe Greek Coffin Mystery (1932), regarded by some as the best of his early novels in the Golden Age style
Elery Queen The Chinese Orange Mystery
Dorothy Sayers Strong Poison
Rex Stout's The League of Frightened Men (1935), which is the second Nero Wolfe novel
John Dickson Carr's The Hollow Man (1935, U.S. title The Three Coffins) -- usually considered the quintessential locked-room mystery, replete with a tongue-in-cheek philosophical disquisition on the subject by the detective, Dr. Gideon Fell
Christie, Agatha The ABC Murders.
Murder On Wheels by Stuart Palmer
Ronald Knox's The Footsteps at the Lock (1928)
Edmund Crispin's The Moving Toyshop (1946), a Golden Age mystery which also parodies certain conventions of the genre
Rex Stout's Some Buried Caesar
Michael Innes's Lament for a Maker
