ARMAGEDDON POP

If I was writing a detective story, I would give it the title "The murderer was the chauffeur", because as you can guess, you wouldn't even need to read it to be clear who killed it, thus the title would "kill" the whole intrigue. But seriously, I decided to deal with the interesting phenomenon of crime fiction. The absolute master of this genre is Agatha Christie, the creator of such characters as Miss Marple or Hercule Poirot, while Arthur Conan Doyle, the author of Sherlock Holmes, is undoubtedly a master of crime fiction.

Today, crime fiction is also doing well, thanks to authors such as Henning Mankell, Jo Nesbo or my favorite author of detective stories about Dr. David Hunter, i.e. Simon Beckett. Crime fiction is one of the most important literary genres and invariably attracts numerous readers. Is there anything more fascinating than the dark side of human nature? Isn't the crime interesting and intriguing? Wouldn't we like to know the motives for which murderers commit their crimes? It is also worth mentioning Stephen King's novels, which are in a sense detective stories, although they may well be classified as horror, which does not mean that they lack criminal plots.

It is enough to mention "The Shining" or "The Green Mile" if anyone had any doubts that King does not represent a modern detective story. Even philosophers were fascinated by detective stories, such as Ludwig Wittgenstein. Hannah Arendt, on the other hand, devoted much of her work to the phenomenon of evil, which is also important for the crime fiction genre.

Of course, when we are in crime fiction territory, we cannot miss the absolute classic of the genre, which is "Crime and Punishment" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Also Shakespeare's dramas such as "Hamlet" or "Macbeth" are a kind of crime works. "The Name of the Rose" by Umberto Eco, "The Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon or even "The Steppenwolf" by Hermann Hesse are specific examples of detective stories.

Some of the above-mentioned works may not be crime stories in the strict sense, but they have criminal themes. If you like watching crime stories, I recommend watching the English crime series "Midsummer Murders". For those with strong nerves, I would recommend films such as "Seven", "The Bone Collector" and, of course, "Dexter" from the series, which, despite too brutal scenes of murder, can be admired due to the inner monologue of the anti-hero, who is a serial killer. It is also worth taking an interest in the story of another mass murderer, the hero of The Silence of the Lambs - Dr. Hannibal Lecter.

If you want to know what the nature of evil is, you have good examples above. As Nietzsche wrote, “He who fights demons should be careful not to become one himself. When you look into the abyss, it also looks at you." One may wonder where such a fascination with crime comes from in man, as well as the question "where does evil come from?" Why instead of thinking about the question "how to live?" people are interested in how to take other people's lives?

We know that not everyone is prone to violence, but who is not interested in the crimes committed? Why do the media keep promoting new crimes? Finally, I would like to mention one of the bloodiest works, which is not a detective story as such, but has many criminal threads, namely "The Songs of Maldoror" by Lautreamont. It is a work that glorifies evil and constitutes its apology, and its protagonist wants to destroy the divine order in the world.

Trying to answer the question about the human fascination with crime, we come to the issue of awareness of the committed crime. For example, when Raskolnikov crosses the line of murder, he discovers that he has a conscience that does not allow him to live with the committed crime and he is looking for redemption. Similarly with Macbeth, who, gaining power on the path of crime, also suffers internally, and one crime he commits pushes him towards the next.

We can also mention Gombrowicz's drama "Yvona, Princess of Burgundy", in which the intrigue also leads to a crime intended to gain power. As we know, the main motives of crime are power, money or power and money. So if you want to spend a nice winter evening with a book, it's worth reaching for a detective story. It's really worth spending some time reading detective stories, whether classic like Agatha Christie or contemporary like "Chemistry of Death" by Simon Beckett. And if you want to know who the murderer was, of course it was the chauffeur, because as you know, no one would suspect him of murder.

Marek Wojnicki