‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ and ‘The Speckled Band’ are both murder mysteries. Why does one murderer, Mary Maloney, get away with it and the other, Dr Grimesby Roylott, get caught?

'Very sorry to knock you up, Watson, but it's the common lot this morning. Mrs Hudson has been knocked up, she retorted upon me and I on you'.

Richard Bradley

Comparative coursework Essay

This is extremely different language compared with what we would use today. It is very formal and quite difficult to understand.

The language in 'Lamb to the Slaughter' is more modern which shows that the story was written not too long ago. The characters in 'Lamb to the Slaughter' are middle class, their language is not formal but it is not common. You can tell this because on the third page (p139) Mary Maloney says

'It's still not too late. There's plenty of meat and stuff in the freezer, and you can have it right here and not even move out of the chair.'

She says 'stuff' which is not a commonplace word for the era in which this story was written. Apart from this word and a few other rare occasions she always speaks in 'Standard English'.

The social and historical context of each story was influenced by the era in which it was written. You can tell that 'The Speckled Band' was written in Victorian times because of the descriptions of what people are wearing. For instance, on the second page we learn that Helen Stoner is wearing a veil. On the third page (p152) Holmes observes that Helen Stoner is wearing gloves and that she came in a carriage. This is the type of clothing Victorian women wore. In 'The Speckled Band' the women involved are stereotypical of the day. They appear as weak individuals who cannot think for themselves. This is shown right at the end of the story where it reads

'It is not necessary that I should prolong a narrative which has already run to too great a length, by telling how we broke the sad news to the terrified girl, how we conveyed her by the morning train to the care of her good aunt at Harrow...'

This would be perfectly correct for the Victorian era. Victorian women were supposed to be completely obedient to men and were basically owned by their husband's. If 'Lamb to the Slaughter' had been released in Victorian times I have no doubt that there would have been a public outcry. We can tell that 'Lamb to the Slaughter' is fairly modern as on the first page (p137) when the room is described it says that there is a Thermos bucket. Also, on page three (p139) Mary Maloney talks about a freezer. As 'Lamb to the Slaughter' is a relatively modern story Mary Maloney is a self-dependent woman. She thinks and acts for herself. This is highlighted when she commits murder!

The murders are both executed by extremely different individuals. Dr Roylott in 'The Speckled Band' is a cruel and ruthless man and his crime is committed with great forethought and planning. Mary Maloney in 'Lamb to the Slaughter' kills on impulse. The author describes Dr Roylott on page fifteen (p164) as being

'Marked with every evil passion'. A description like this makes it easy for us to judge him and to condemn him in our minds. Also, we discover that Dr Roylott has already killed before and so therefore we can easily suspect him of repeating a crime, even though we have no proof. On the sixth page (p155) Helen Stoner says,

'Violence of temper approaching mania has been hereditary in the men of the family, and in my stepfather's case it had, I believe, been intensified by his long residence in the tropics.' This shows that Dr Roylott is capable of violence.

Richard Bradley

Comparative coursework Essay

This description of Dr Roylott is in complete contrast to Mary Maloney. She is a loving, devoted wife and a gentle person. She is not the type to commit murder, if there is a type. We empathise with her because we are placed on her side. She worshipped her husband who she thought was Mr. Perfect and he has shocked her by doing something very wrong. She creates a moral dilemma in our minds because publicly we cannot condone murder, but privately we understand why it happened.

The efficiency of the detectives is different in both stories. As we read from a third person view in 'Lamb to the Slaughter' we can watch the inefficiency of Jack Noonan and his teams misguided attempts at finding the murderer. These detectives jump to conclusions as shown on page 10 (p146) where Jack Noonan says,

'It's the old story, get the weapon and you've got the man' and he tells Mary Maloney that her husband was almost certainly hit with a large piece of metal.

Sherlock Holmes in 'The Speckled Band' is very methodical, checking every possible angle and does not give anything away until he has the evidence. He never makes any assumptions. He always seems 'in control' although as the story is told from a first person perspective we never know what Holmes is thinking. Holmes also works for the love of his art rather than money, unlike the detectives in 'Lamb to the Slaughter' who strike me as doing it because they have to.

The victim's character is different in both stories. In 'The Speckled Band' Helen Stoner is the planned victim of Dr Roylott. She is a stereotypical Victorian woman, always obedient to men and basically owned by her stepfather. She does not have a job or her own income, which was commonplace at that time. Patrick Maloney, on the other hand, is a man with a job, his own income, a house and a loving and devoted wife, soon to be the mother of his child. Helen Stoner is a woman who turns to men for help in a time of need, as she knew something was going to happen to her. Patrick Maloney is a man who did not know what was going to happen when he told his wife about the thing that he had done wrong.

The public and private morality at the time each book was written is frequently brought to the surface in each story. In 'Lamb to the Slaughter' Patrick Maloney confronts us with his hypocrisy. After telling his wife he has done wrong he becomes anxious that his exploits should not become public knowledge as it might affect his job. This is on page four (p140). We are challenged by the juxtaposition of feeling sorry for Mary Maloney, but is murder the answer to our problems?

In 'The Speckled Band' public and private morality is also an important issue. On page six (p155) we learn that Helen Stoner paid off a local blacksmith to keep quite about Dr Roylott throwing him into a stream. Also, we know from other books that Holmes was a drug addict and this must have caused unrest when 'The Speckled Band' was written.

The public and private morality issue of 'The Speckled Band' and the Sherlock Holmes stories is still around today. On the 10th of September 2000 in the Independent national newspaper there was an article by a man called Rodger Garrick - Steele who has researched 'The Hound of the Baskervilles' since 1989 alleging that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle plagiarised the story. He says that Conan Doyle's fried, Bertram Fletcher Robinson wrote the story. He also alleges that Conan Doyle had an affair with Robinson's wife, Gladys and then in league with her, poisoned him. The allegations are to be investigated

Richard Bradley

Comparative coursework Essay

by Scotland Yard. If these turn out to be true, Conan Doyle's reputation will be ruined forever.

The author's purpose and audience for each story was very different. Roald Dahl, who wrote 'Lamb to the Slaughter', is famous for his short stories which sometimes have a bizarre ending. Many people around the globe love his stories. Some years ago his short stories were made into TV plays in a series called 'Tales of the Unexpected'. In 'Lamb to the Slaughter' Mary Maloney gets away with murder. Roald Dahl's readers would have expected a 'twist in the tale' as it would be too predictable for Mary Maloney to be caught.

Stories are written to make lots of money. Publishers expect their authors to have a style that corresponds to the genre they are writing in. As 'Lamb to the Slaughter' is a modern story we, as modern people, are not shocked by what happens. We understand why Mary Maloney committed murder and we do not want her to be caught.

'The Speckled Band' was written at the time when Britain was probably the most powerful country in the world. We were world leaders in industry and our Army and Navy could not be matched by any other nation. As we were the greatest country in the world it would be unthinkable for us to produce the greatest fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes, and for him to fail to solve every case. If this had happened the reading population would not have purchased Conan Doyle's books. Women at this time had low status and were largely powerless. It would therefore be disgraceful for a female character such as Mary Maloney to get away with murder and 'Lamb to the Slaughter would have been unlikely to succeed as a popular work of fiction.

After discussing the topics that I listed at the start of this essay, I now need to answer the question

'Why did Mary Maloney get away with murder?'

I believe that it was not because she was a cleverer murderer than Dr. Roylott. He was certainly better at planning his murder as she did not plan her murder at all, it was impulsive. His method was tried and tested because he had killed Julia Stoner, two years before.

I personally think that Mary Maloney got away with murder because of the era when her story was written. As 'The Speckled Band' was written at a time when Great Britain was all conquering, Sherlock Holmes had to succeed and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was under pressure to make it happen. If he had written the Sherlock Holmes stories today it would not have mattered so much if Holmes had failed for once, much as Mary Maloney getting away with murder did not cause outcry when that was written. The detectives in 'Lamb to the Slaughter' fumbled around, missed the vital clues and were too blinkered to suspect anyone like Mary Maloney. I think Roald Dahl intended this as he knew his books would sell if they were different.

All in all I enjoyed reading both of these short stories and after writing this essay it is hard to imagine that they are both fictional!