tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post306142480463294486..comments2024-03-28T10:31:55.774-07:00Comments on The Passing Tramp: "Die" in Amber: Swing, Brother, Swing (1949), Ngaio MarshThe Passing Tramphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comBlogger26125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-21690592471151234542021-03-19T10:08:12.957-07:002021-03-19T10:08:12.957-07:00I agree with you on all counts. One wishes she cou...I agree with you on all counts. One wishes she could have dug deeper and not indulged in so many "dago" stereotypes.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-20689544908241142232021-03-19T10:06:59.696-07:002021-03-19T10:06:59.696-07:00Thanks so much, I do try! Sorry for such a late r...Thanks so much, I do try! Sorry for such a late response, hope you're still reading the blog.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-41625922959426595502021-02-24T18:31:06.185-08:002021-02-24T18:31:06.185-08:00I am a big fan of Marsh, being my second favourite...I am a big fan of Marsh, being my second favourite Queen of Mystery (after THE queen), But... being and argentine myself, I couldn't dismiss the fact that she portraits Rivera with a certain racism. Anyway, I don't think that is a motive to cancel her, on the contrary, is an opportunity too see that she belonged to a different and, I hope, passed time. Besides that, it contains and wonderful written and plotted story. Juan Manuel Blancohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11123640308104364818noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-90296596212642275522019-08-18T13:31:47.785-07:002019-08-18T13:31:47.785-07:00Dear Tramp, I much enjoyed this lengthy post, with...Dear Tramp, I much enjoyed this lengthy post, with all the delightful historical contextualization, contemporary crit, and amusing asides. Count me a fan!JGregV in L.A.https://www.blogger.com/profile/08334794062246735330noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-45161379588554522462019-03-15T17:02:57.216-07:002019-03-15T17:02:57.216-07:00I really enjoyed it. Yes--there are things that gr...I really enjoyed it. Yes--there are things that grate, but over all, enjoyable. Getting ready to put my review together--finally got up to my latest read. Then I've got to get busy on Murdered: One by One by Francis Beeding. I'm supposed to be doing a joint-thing with Brad at ahsweetmysteryblog and I've been keeping him waiting....Bev Hankinshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01127476456755776574noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-42247531783648076972019-03-12T21:58:33.795-07:002019-03-12T21:58:33.795-07:00If Desi had been dating Fee, I would have advised,...If Desi had been dating Fee, I would have advised, "Run, Desi, run for your life!" Not a family to get involved with. I'll be interested to see you take. TomCat didn't like it, Moira was iffy, but for different reasons. Richmonde liked it with qualifications and Nick gave it four stars. I enjoyed it on the whole, but as per usual with Ngaio there were things that grated too.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-86874872429878797182019-03-12T19:11:11.732-07:002019-03-12T19:11:11.732-07:00It's interesting to see blogger synchronicity ...It's interesting to see blogger synchronicity at work again. I just finished this (under the alternate title A Wreath for Rivera) and have it in line to be reviewed. I am running a bit behind per usual. Definitely appreciate your background on Lord Berners and love that you got Desi Arnez in there. <br /><br />I'm sure I must have read this back in the mists of time when I plowed through all the Marsh books my hometown library had on offer--but I didn't remember it at all. Which was a bonus because it meant I enjoyed the plot much more.Bev Hankinshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01127476456755776574noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-45475047891630850502019-03-12T16:58:10.641-07:002019-03-12T16:58:10.641-07:00Nick was in full agreement with you on Song. And I...Nick was in full agreement with you on Song. And I think a third person. It was a real battle royale. Such fun times.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-62872675018153551912019-03-12T09:05:19.042-07:002019-03-12T09:05:19.042-07:00You're not miffed about my comment, are you? T...You're not miffed about my comment, are you? The only thing I really remembered about the book is that I figured everything out the moment the murder was committed and thinking how much better it would have been as a novella with the solution directly following the murder. I would never dream of calling anyone a moron who got it wrong or has a different opinion on a detective story. After all, I have fallen time and time again for the Birlstone Gambit and persistently disagree with JJ. And our taste in detective fiction align very closely. <br /><br />Neither was I outraged over you daring to praise <i>Death's Old Sweet Song</i>. Just disagreed with you. So did Nick! ;) <br /><br />For me, the puzzle, or plot, is fundamental and, since I'm not a genre historian/scholar (just a reader), it's what I mainly focus on. Sorry if you thought I was doing your article an injustice by just commenting on the plot. TomCathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03415176301265218101noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-31638543508517098892019-03-12T07:02:35.541-07:002019-03-12T07:02:35.541-07:00She's certainly Miss Originality.She's certainly Miss Originality.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-65068810689457416322019-03-12T07:01:25.741-07:002019-03-12T07:01:25.741-07:00Sure, I was just thinking that the Communist stuff...Sure, I was just thinking that the Communist stuff would have been perfectly at home in the 30s, probably more so than when we were in the Cold War. I think Ngaio often could be on the condescending side to "colonials." <br /><br />I'm interested in social conditions between the wars and when I got to thinking about this book again and the models for Pastern I thought it might have been Berners. He's fairly well known to social historians of the aristocracy. And he wrote classical music! OF a sort. I was thinking of you and Meyerbeer and Les Huguenots above, incidentally, when I went off on my French tangent.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-72671248847577093362019-03-12T06:54:40.578-07:002019-03-12T06:54:40.578-07:00Structured is fine by me. I have no problem with ...Structured is fine by me. I have no problem with a formally structured detective novel, in the way she does it. The first ones with their constant staged murder reenactments felt a little forced to me, you can tell Ngaio is trying to get everything on stage, as it were, that's how she visualized murders. But she got into her flow by the late 30s. <br /><br />I think she never wrote a "serious" novel because she didn't want to put herself too much into her writing. Mystery writers so often hide themselves, or limit what they reveal. I'm not sure she was willing to make the emotional commitment. She gets close in Lampreys, Opening Night, a few others. But that's okay, she produced some excellent mysteries.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-46645522737629796612019-03-12T00:56:55.036-07:002019-03-12T00:56:55.036-07:00Best stylist of the crime queens... what about Gla...Best stylist of the crime queens... what about Gladys Mitchell?Nick Fullerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05668031989499870182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-5705805983124060672019-03-12T00:55:53.660-07:002019-03-12T00:55:53.660-07:00Surfeit of Lampreys was my first Marsh; it's m...Surfeit of Lampreys was my first Marsh; it's more *plodding* than Christie, but I liked it enough to read all but Photo-Finish that year. Marsh was my detective fiction discovery after Doyle, Christie, Chesterton, and Sayers.<br /><br />I wouldn't call her a formula writer (unlike Stout, who's depressingly so). There's a *structure* (situation, complication, murder, detection, exposition) in really all her books except Spinsters in Jeopardy, but she varies characters, setting, and theme.<br /><br />She's also, as you say, underrated as a plotter; she never has the stunt solutions of Christie or Carr (they all did it! the narrator did it! the victim did it! the detective did it!), but they're at least solid and workmanlike, and at her best ingenious. Death at the Bar is probably her best from a pure detection standpoint, with its Street-type poisoning at a pub. She really hit her stride in the late '30s, with Overture to Death, which lasted until the '50s (Singing in the Shrouds, maybe?), and a late peak in Clutch of Constables. <br /><br />Like Nicholas Blake, she combines the pleasures of the detective story with an interesting novel.<br /><br />She's an elegant writer; she's witty; her dialogue is usually excellent (bar the slang); and her characters vivid (even if we can tell which ones she likes, and which she doesn't). She is, as Mike Grost said, civilised.<br /><br />Nick Fullerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05668031989499870182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-5099965243280056222019-03-12T00:37:42.455-07:002019-03-12T00:37:42.455-07:00I've met plenty of truculent Australians, Comm...I've met plenty of truculent Australians, Communist or otherwise. They're not confined to the '30s. As a Kiwi, of course, there's some trans-Tasman rivalry. I don't think there are any sympathetic Australians in Marsh (maybe Light Thickens?), and at least one murderer.<br /><br />It's certainly based on Marsh's memories of pre-war London, rather than the modern day; but this is true even of her late books. Grave Mistake, for instance, smacks of the '50s. The biographers' moral judgement seems to have got the better of their aesthetic judgement.<br /><br />Lord Berners certainly sounds a character, like someone out of Waugh or even Saki. How did you come across him?Nick Fullerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05668031989499870182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-19384148853372077822019-03-11T23:02:12.859-07:002019-03-11T23:02:12.859-07:00Oh, yes, Xavier, thanks for the point on "Neg...Oh, yes, Xavier, thanks for the point on "Negroes" and jazz, I suppose Ngaio was trying to keep up with the cool kids on that one!The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-26107743525795116932019-03-11T14:48:35.756-07:002019-03-11T14:48:35.756-07:00She's like PD James for me in that she's a...She's like PD James for me in that she's a writer who frustrates me but I kept reading her. I think Surfeit of Lampreys is a great mystery, but I know a lot of people hate it, either for the characters or the puzzle or both, lol. On the other hand a lot of people, like me, think it's genius. But I hated it the first time I read it too! I have learned to like even the Marshy inquisitions. They have drama in themselves, a battle between Alleyn and the subjects of his interrogations. She had a formula, but then so did Rex Stout.<br /><br />It may have incurred friend TomCat's ire, as when I dared to praise Jonathan Stagge's Death's Old Sweet Song (oh, the outrage!), but I will defend Ngaio Marsh as a plotter. Sure some of her books are duds, but I think some of them work just fine and she actually put quite a bit of effort into the plotting. Her first few books tried to be Christiesque and succeed in being much inferior to Christie. She's not interested in motive but in the how, you find the murderer but finding who could have done it physically. I think she put in some fine performances on that level, and so did Barzun. But I like means/method of murder mysteries. <br /><br />I think Allingham was the best stylist of the Crime Queens, but she could overwrite too. Marsh was probably the best all-rounder, writing stylishly while not overwhelming the mystery structure like Allingham sometimes did, especially later in her career. The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-11212758861959291302019-03-11T14:35:41.998-07:002019-03-11T14:35:41.998-07:00Ngaio was kind of a mean girl, I think, at least i...Ngaio was kind of a mean girl, I think, at least in her books. I guess it was an outlet, that's what they say about writing. The vicarious thrill of putting people down, aka snark. Ngaio was not only Queen of Crime put Empress of Snark. I still enjoy reading her, even when she gets me irked.<br /><br />This book, I wish she had really researched jazz players, like Crispin said, but she was trying to do a new milieu. Would have been good had she updated her London, I believe she had in the next one, which I recall liking quite a bit.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-45028949662664551722019-03-11T14:30:50.460-07:002019-03-11T14:30:50.460-07:00And that should read "characters are dated,&q...And that should read "characters are dated," though what I really mean are the author's attitudes are dated. <br /><br />Sure, Marsh talks about the Left Book Club and Greek famine relief, but the former could have been from the Thirties too, as could the "truculent" Australian Communist. Even Lord Pastern feels more real to me than Carlos, who would have been a crude stereotype back in the Thirties. Even the characters in the novel comment that he is too much of Latin stereotype to be real. Except he is, in the world of the novel, though Ngaio is trying to have it both ways.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-88335451933463053852019-03-11T14:23:07.077-07:002019-03-11T14:23:07.077-07:00It's such a long post, there will be more than...It's such a long post, there will be more than one typo! But that was a particularly bad one, lol.The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-37653000157241607512019-03-11T13:56:05.374-07:002019-03-11T13:56:05.374-07:00I need to get to work, so will comment later on th...I need to get to work, so will comment later on the post.<br /><br />One typo that leapt out: But then Bush lied through the war and its aftermath in England, even playing an active role in itNick Fullerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05668031989499870182noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-19538075651872754742019-03-11T09:47:07.156-07:002019-03-11T09:47:07.156-07:00Marsh's opinion that jazz should only be playe...Marsh's opinion that jazz should only be played by "Negroes" was actually a widely shared one at the time, especially among jazz critics - Cool and West Coast jazz were initially dismissed on the grounds that it was not the real thing, because the players weren't black. Interestingly, most of those purists happened to be white themselves.<br /><br />I haven't read this one book, but as you know I'm rather fond of Marsh for all her flaws as a mystery writer. I even consider her the best writer of all four Crime Queens on purely literary terms though she is certainly the weakest when it comes to puzzles. I do often wonder why she kept writing mysteries for all those years even though her heart and talent were obviously elsewhere - and why she stuck to a subgenre where her failings were most apparent. She'd probably have felt more at ease, and enjoyed herself a lot more, had she gone the Allingham way of dropping the puzzle element altogether but for some reason (money?) she apparently never conceived of writing anything else than classic detective stories. As it is, her output in my view is one of the cornerstones of classic mystery fiction but it is a flawed one. Xavierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05702919450638993709noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-60583750650353294992019-03-11T08:57:30.331-07:002019-03-11T08:57:30.331-07:00Thanks for the shoutout! I re-read my own review, ...Thanks for the shoutout! I re-read my own review, and think I was rather hard on it, because I do now remember it with some enjoyment: I think I quite liked the world she created. I liked the way she tried to look at a culture clash between two worlds, and to at least try to introduce some different types of characters. But you are so right about one thing - she was catty! There is so often something mean-minded about her comments - they're her own characters, in a way she is entitled, but she seems to have created them for the purpose of absolutely laying into them...Clothes In Bookshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14680610242823846662noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-33681312433787501322019-03-11T08:01:40.890-07:002019-03-11T08:01:40.890-07:00I'll quote Nick in full, so you won't have...I'll quote Nick in full, so you won't have to follow the link (unless you want to see the spoiler):<br /><br />"The first time I read this, I found it a drag; I’d just discovered John Dickson Carr, and wanted to finish it so I could read The Red Widow Murders. <br /><br />I reread it in 2002/03. One of Marsh’s good ones: stylish and sophisticated milieu (night-club scene), amusing characters (particularly the Pasterns), sharp dialogue — and a good ‘impossible’ crime, not too distantly related to Enter a Murderer. The murderer is not too difficult to spot, but the solution rings new changes on an old dodge: several Chestertonian flourishes. Dope smuggling and yellow journalism hover in the background, and there is a good time-table."<br /><br />He's right about the Chestertonian touches. I find the book satisfying on mechanics, even though the characters are dates. And I mean dated by 1949. I think had this book been published a decade earlier I would have been forgiving of that aspect. Maybe I should just pretend. The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-137677673775151256.post-33200357794198822782019-03-11T07:34:20.971-07:002019-03-11T07:34:20.971-07:00I don't know, I recall when I read this the fi...I don't know, I recall when I read this the first time it wasn't blatantly obvious to me. On rereading I do see the killer ID, in part because knowing Ngaio, there are a lot of people you have to eliminate automatically. But I think the how aspect is interestingly worked out. Sorry it doesn't rise to your standards. Obviously a lot of people have liked it over the years, some presumably for the mystery and presumably they weren't *all* morons, so we'll just have to have a difference of opinion.<br /><br />Thank you for commenting on the only part of the 3500 word post which I presume interested you. For me, writing about mysteries based *entirely* on the puzzles has become rather a bore intellectually. But to each his own. The Passing Tramphttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09830680639601570152noreply@blogger.com