Comparing and Contrasting Detective Stories from Pre 1914 and Modern.

Authors Avatar

Comparing and Contrasting Detective Stories from Pre 1914 and Modern

The Blue Carbuncle written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in pre 1914 and Indemnity Only from the V I Warshawski series written by Sara Paretsky in 1987 are good examples of the evolution of detective stories. The character, setting, genre and language have changed completely over this large period of time. But each story was very interesting to the people of that time so obviously something would be different.

        The detective genre has been going for ages now since crime started and it has changed over time because of what a detective does and what crimes are committed. The Blue Carbuncle is one of the short stories for the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and as you already know is was written very long ago but Indemnity Only was only written a few years ago and is still well known. In the olden days detective stories would involve a person who would leave different clues to make a puzzle but nowadays we just find the clues and catch the criminal so there is less suspense involved in the plot.  

Join now!

        The characters in The Blue Carbuncle are very different to the characters in Indemnity Only because in pre 1914 most people involved in a detective story were aristocrats and were very posh. But nowadays people in a detective story tend to have more casual people. In the Blue Carbuncle the main character is Sherlock Holmes who is known for being quite posh. He is very secretive and serious about things while the main character in Indemnity Only is V I Warshawski is very open and can be sarcastic during a case. Holmes seems to be a very wise detective but ...

This is a preview of the whole essay