A Shilling For Candles kicks off with the discovery of a body on the beach, but was successful young starlet Christine Clay murdered or suicidal, or was her death a terrible accident? As always, the real interest for me in a period mystery story is the historical detail: 'cranks' (hippies and vegetarians), 'fanatics' (anyone overtly religious) and unfortunately, a light vein of anti-Semitism. I'm struggling with whether to call it anti-Semitism, since the Jewish character I'm thinking of is very sympathetic, but attention is continually drawn to his 'race' and his alleged racial characteristics, in a way that shines a horrible light on the general mood in 1936.
I particularly enjoyed the character of Erica Burgoyne, self-possessed, serious, seventeen year old would-be-detective, daughter of the Chief Constable, practical and not at all girly. I'd read a whole series about her, please.
And apparently there is a whole mystery series by Nicola Upson which features Josephine Tey herself as the detective! Of course they have them at the Ath -- I might need to check them out, too.
I suppose it is a good thing that now we (some of us) actually notice that kind of 'soft' anti-Semitism, or racism, or sexism, or whatever. We (my siblings and partners) were talking the other day about films we used to love, and that we just can't watch now because of this. I used to LOVE cowboys-and-Indians westerns (landscape, fighting, chiselled blokes on horses riding around madly) but the portrayal of the 'Indians' as savages, and their slaughter... It's impossible.
ReplyDeleteYes, once the veil has been ripped from the eyes, it's impossible to put it back. And of course that's a good thing. But it does complicate some of our former simple pleasures. I guess that's a price worth paying for becoming 'woke'!
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