In which Charis and Sharon discuss the second half of UNNATURAL DEATH. We reveal the whoddunnit right away and chat about how difficult it is to talk around the culprit when it comes to this book. This episode revisits our conversations on spinsters, lesbianism, and the detective’s moral responsibility in light of later revelations in the book. We also boggle at the over-abundance of murders in this novel and have a lengthy discussion on how to deal with casual racism in the literature we love.
*Content note: UNNATURAL DEATH contains several instances of a racial slur. We do not use the word ourselves in our discussion, but we do talk about its appearance and context in this episode.
Download the episode 6 transcript.
Shownotes:
- “He for God only, she for God in him”; Miss Climpson’s priest is referencing the unequal relationship between Adam and Eve in Milton’s PARADISE LOST (Book 4, line 297).
- Charis’s robot vacuum Bunter is adorable and most helpful!
- As she mentioned in the episode, Sharon owes a great deal to Carolyn Betensky’s “Casual Racism in Victoria Literature” from the Winter 2019 issue of VICTORIAN LITERATURE AND CULTURE for informing her thinking regarding the casual racism in this and other books in the Wimsey series. Charis and Sharon also recommend Ijeoma Oluo’s SO YOU WANT TO TALK ABOUT RACE for a more in-depth unpacking of some of the ideas, like respectability politics, that we bring up in our discussion about racial representation in fiction.
- Charis mentions the very excellent Ian Carmichael audiobook versions of the Wimsey mysteries.
- While Sharon couldn’t find the quote from Neil Gaiman about leaving out key details of a heist from AMERICAN GODS to foil readerly attempts, she did find this news item about a successful copycat crime in real life!
- Our next episode will be a holiday special about “The Locked Room,” a Lord Peter story published for the first time this year in BODIES FROM THE LIBRARY 2: FORGOTTEN STORIES OF MYSTERY AND SUSPENSE BY THE QUEENS OF CRIME AND OTHER MASTERS OF GOLDEN AGE DETECTION (edited by Tony Medawar)
