Hello
Thanks for popping in.
I've been to another talk, all about whodunnits! Did you know the word whodunnit was coined in 1936 in the Variety Magazine when a writer was running out of space for his article!
Whodunnirs crop up in allsorts of forms from books to theatre and film to games and puzzles.
In the Lyceum Theatre in London in 1888, US Actor Richard Mansfield starred in a shocking, very darkly lit, quiet, eerie adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's book Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, thought to be the first whodunnit in the theatre. Interestingly, they began their play with Mr Hyde first. Women fainted during the performance and, even when going home, the audience was thoroughly spooked by the play eyeing people suspiciously. The set used uplighters and downlighters for the first time, alongside grotesque make-up. Nothing had been seen like it before.
The biggest whodunnit of all time was Jack the Ripper also in 1888 which was thought to be influenced by the Jekyll and Hyde play so the show was cancelled. There were 5 or 6 suspects for the Ripper murders, at one of the murders a beautiful shawl was lying there, covered in blood. One of the policemen thought he would take it home for his wife, who was a dressmaker. However, unsurprisingly, she didn't want to use it and it was parcelled up, put away and eventually passed down from one person to another until, recently, it appeared for sale at an auction. The buyer went to each of the descendants of the suspects for a sample of their DNA, checked the DNA database, set up in 1993, and Aaron Kosminski, a barber, was identified as the Ripper but errors were made in the analysis so it wouldn't have stood up in court.
Of the whodunnit games, the best known is Cluedo. Anthony E. Pratt invented Murder, a game he used to take into the air raid shelters during WW2 which proved popular down there so he approached toy company Waddingtons who took up the idea. They changed the name to Cluedo and filed for patent in 1944, officially launching the game in 1949. Pratt received £5,000 in 1952 for the overseas rights to selling the game abroad thereby missing out financially when it was really popular. The lead piping in the game used to be made of lead and many people became ill.
There are many, many crime writers. Books started to become exciting when Enid Blyton (1897-1968), who also wrote under the name Mary Pollack, started writing children's books. She was a Pianist and Teacher, her first book was written in 1922 - Child Whispers but by 1942, her books were full of adventure like Five on Treasure Island. In 2008 she was voted best loved author, beating Jane Austen, Shakespeare and J.K. Rowling.
Other early notable adventure books were Nancy Drew 1930 in the US, The Hardy Boys, Biggles in 1932 and Dick Barton on the radio during 1946-51.
The Three Apples, written in Arabic, is the earliest known crime story told by Sheherezade in the Arabian nights.
The earliest crime novel was written by Steen Bilcher, a Dane. Mark Twain later found himself in court when he used his novel and just changed the names.
Edgar Allen Poe was the first to write detective books as we know them today which gave clues to work out whodunnit, like his book written in 1841 The Murder in the Rue Morgue.
Arthur Conan Doyle led a fantastic life. He was born in 1859 in Edinburgh to an alcoholic father. Luckily, at the age of 9, wealthy relations took him away to be educated privately. He studied medicine, became a ship's surgeon travelling to the Arctic Circle, then a ship's doctor travelling to Africa, which he didn't enjoy as much. After he qualified he went to Dorset with a partner from medical school but broke up and headed to Portsmouth where he wrote Sherlock Holmes. He went to the Boer war, believed in the occult and fairies and the King loved his books so much he knighted him to keep him writing. A Study in Scarlet was his first book in 1886. He originally wanted to call his famous characters Sheridan Hope and Ormond Staker.
Meanwhile, historically, prisoners were being fingerprinted in 1896 and the records were put in a database by 1901.
Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers were writing in the 1940s.
Anthony Horowitz, born 1955, decided early that he would become a crime writer. At 13 his Mum bought him a skull to inspire him. In 2011 he wrote a new Sherlock Holmes novel to follow on from those written by Conan Doyle. He writes the Alex rider novels as well as for many TV shows. He's written 21 episodes of the TV series Foyle - despite a few complaints of anachronisms like the name Samantha wasn't invented until 1952 and there are too many railings, which would have been melted down during the War, it is very well liked. His wife produced it. He's also written 11 episodes of Poirot and 6 episodes of Midsomer Murders although Caroline Graham wrote the original books and planned them all out before starting to write,
Ann Cleeves wrote Vera and plots it as she goes along. She also writes Shetland.
Private and intense Rodney David Wingfield hated writing books, he much preferred writing radio plays. Jack Frost first appeared as a radio play in 1977 but he had to continue his advenures in book form. He was so private that he even put a photo of Kenneth Williams on the dust cover instead of his own photo. Whilst he liked David Jason as an actor, he wasn't his idea of what Frost looked like.
Peter James writes about crime in Brighton. He goes on the night shift with the police so his stories are authentic. His mother Cornelia was glovemaker to the Queen and now his sister carries this on. He owns the rights to Biggles.
The most talked about crime story on TV was Broadchurch written by Chris Chibnall who has written the new Dr Who series due out shortly.
Notes from the talk
What a lot of whodunnits!
Cheerio
