Contemporary Literary Criticism | Paretsky, Sara - Glenwood Irons (essay date 1995)

Glenwood Irons (essay date 1995)

SOURCE: “Gender and Genre: The Woman Detective and the Diffusion of Generic Voices,” in Feminism in Women's Detective Fiction, University of Toronto Press, 1995, pp. viii-xxii.

[In the following excerpt, Irons discusses the importance of community to Paretsky's detective protagonist V. I. Warshawski, and how Paretsky's portrayal of her has changed the detective genre.]

… Detectives in fiction have always seemed to be a response to what most generations feel is the uncontrollable murder and mayhem that surrounds them. Some have achieved international reputations: names like Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, and Sam Spade are still better known than those of the authors who created them. The woman detective has also enjoyed worldwide appeal; yet, with the exception of Agatha Christie's Miss Marple or Carolyn Keene's Nancy Drew, the names of female detectives have only recently gained wide...

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