The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey

The Daughter of Time (1951) is one of the most famous detective novels of the twentieth century and it remains the volume for which Josephine Tey is best known. In 1990, the Crime Writers’ Association voted it the number one top crime novel of all time, and it was in the news again recently when the body of its subject, Richard III, was recovered from beneath a car park in Leicester. I know I wasn’t the first nor the last person to have their understanding of that man completely reconfigured by reading this novel.

I first read The Daughter of Time as a sixth-former. It wasn’t my first Tey but it was the first one that made an impression. The central conceit is bizarre enough to be iconic. Inspector Alan Grant, confined to a hospital bed, is looking for something to pass the time. He ends up applying his keen policeman’s mind to a problem surrounding the historical figure of Richard III. Suspecting that Richard might not be the monster we all know him as, Grant uncovers a web of lies and propaganda, configuring Richard as a victim of political machinations and
even absolving him of responsibility for the infamous case of the princes in the tower.

A couple of weeks ago, I was delighted to hear that a serialised and apparently unabridged reading of the whole novel was being aired on BBC Radio 4 Extra. If you’re based in the UK, you can still listen to all episodes here. This review is based on listening to the reading, rather than an a close rereading of the text – although I have, of course, read it a few times.

One thing, beyond the obvious, that makes the story so special is Grant himself. He’s a great and understated detective; a poetry loving policemen before they were ten-a-penny, he also lives with a constant mental crisis, splitting his mind into distinct personalities and haunted by the fact that he will never be a manly man. Nearly all of Grant’s cases spring from his own fascination with the victim. He develops an unhealthy and uncanny obsession with the deceased – usually a beautiful man – and the case of Richard III is no different. Grant gets lost staring into the eyes of etchings and finds himself unable to reconcile such a hypnotic face with the horrible stories attached to it. That’s his starting point.

Treating the historical mystery as a contemporary psychological criminal investigation, Grant sees everything from a fresh angle, allowing his creator to gently satirise the naiveté of traditional historians, who unwittingly tow the line of archaic propaganda. There are frequent allusions to ‘the Sainted Moore’, referencing the authoritative but factually flawed writings of Thomas Moore. As one of Grant’s helpers, the excellent Marta Hallard states, with cutting diplomacy: ‘Perhaps when you’re grubbing about with tattered records, you don’t have time to learn about people. I don’t mean the people in records, but real-life people — flesh and blood’.

Of course, Grant can’t do everything by himself from a hospital bed. Not only would that be impractical in the pre-internet age, it would also be incredibly boring for the reader. One of his helpers is the actor Marta Hallard, whom Tey’s readers will already know, and another is an American student who develops a love of research purely by accident whilst helping him out. This student, Brent Carradine, provides our policeman with his fill of original documents found in the British Museum. He (Brent) is planning to write a book about Richard. When he asks if Grant would prefer to do the honours – since this is his case – Grant responds that he would never write a book. ‘It’s my considered opinion that too many books are written as it is’, he adds. And, glancing up for a moment from a detective novel that really pushes the boundaries of what a detective novel can do, the reader agrees.

There is an element of artifice in this novel, and I’m not just talking about the rather wonderful parodies of historical fiction in and out of which the author dips (Tey herself was, of course, also an historical novelist and playwright, under a second pseudonym, Gordon Daviot). No, the whole thing, the five century-long puzzle, must be tied up and resolved by the time Alan Grant gets out of hospital. And, of course, it is. When he emerges from hospital, having found out the truth, Grant makes perhaps my favourite comment in all of Tey’s work: ‘How small and queer the world looks viewed the right way up.’

Grant’s/Tey’s version of the Richard III is not quite the story we have now, but it is closer to it than the traditional Shakespearean line. It is frankly remarkable that a genre novel has been so influential. It’s not my favourite crime novel – it’s not even my favourite Tey – but the fact that it exists, and in such an entertaining and accessible form, is brilliant.

Mini reviews #8

The Moonstone (1868) by Wilkie Collins. T.S. Eliot called The Moonstone ‘the first, the longest and the best of modern English detective novels.’ Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers made similar remarks. And — while each of those points is demonstrably not true — the remark holds, idiomatically. The Moonstone is a fascinating novel that blends sensationalism and realism. Most major crime fiction has its origins in this book (I’m looking at you, A Study in Scarlet), and the whole thing is compulsively readable. I’ve never met anyone who dislikes The Moonstone, and I think that every crime fiction fan should read it.

No More Murders! (1967) by Maria Lang. Enjoyable escapism from ‘Sweden’s answer to Agatha Christie’ — and, for once, the accolade seems well-earned. Reading this book in translation made me feel the closest I’ve ever felt to reading a new Christie book. It’s not quite the same, and Lang has her own voice, but the complicated plot, the sense of fun, and the poetic beauty of the setting all work brilliantly. I derived considerably more pleasure from No More Murders! than from the TV adaptation, which I also enjoyed.

Country House Murders (1989) edited by Godfrey Thomas. This is one of the best of those massive Michael O’Mara anthologies from the 1980s and 1990s. It features an impressive roll of authors: Christie, Rendell, Marsh, James, Allingham, Innes, Sayers, Wodehouse(!), Chesterton, Blake, Collins, Brand, Orczy, MacDonald, Doyle, Hare, Freeman, Barr, Wills Crofts, Carr, Ethel Lina White, and James Miles — only the last of which was new to me, and all stories are on the classic country house theme.  Besides featuring the titles you’d expect (James’ ‘A Very Desirable Residence’; Doyle’s ‘The Adventure of Abbey Grange’), it includes some unexpected delights, such as ‘The Man on the Roof’ by Christianna Brand, and ‘The Worcester Enigma’ by James Miles, in which Sherlock Holmes inspires Elgar’s Enigma Variations. So, now we know!

An Expert in Murder (2008) by Nicola Upson. Upson’s first book to feature Josephine Tey as a detective is set in the West End in the 1930s. It’s a nice nostalgic whodunit, with a really interesting plot. I did find, however, that the narrative didn’t really suit Tey — either as a writer or a character. Upson’s Tey bears no resemblance to Elizabeth Mackintosh herself, but is a kind of everywoman-Scottish-crime-writer, and the story architecture bears little resemblance to her own. I’d have enjoyed this more if the sleuth had been an original character… but, then, in all honesty, I probably wouldn’t have heard of it, let alone read it. So props to Upson.

Magpie Murders (2016) by Anthony Horowitz. The only thing worse than ripping off Dame Agatha is ripping off Dame Agatha without understanding what she was doing.

Mini reviews #6

The Man in the Queue (1929) by Gordon Daviot (Joesephine Tey). Tey’s first detective novel, featuring Inspector Alan Grant, and her most conventional. A rather feeble man queues patiently at the theatre and suddenly drops down dead, a stiletto lodged in his back. Grant, who is both a policeman and a gentleman amateur, calls on his colourful network of allies to track down the guilty party. Great fun, and the series only gets better.

Crime in Lepers’ Hollow (1952) by George Bellairs. Inspector Littlejohn is on hoiliday, at something of a loose end – but not for long. Soon he is mixed up in a murder and embroiled in a family saga. I found the book okay; it’s relatively dark and relatively readable, and has all the eccentricities we might expect from Bellairs. But it’s not one of his best, perhaps because of the very slow start.

Detectionary (1977), edited by Otto Penzler, Chris Steinbrunner, and Marvin Lachman. This is a really useful resource, listing and describing major characters, writers, titles, and adaptations. Sadly, it is not exhaustive, and I don’t believe it’s been updated, but it’s still thoroughly useful. And it’s interesting – it’s strange to see which characters were considered major and which were not, forty years ago.

The Back Passage (2006) by James Lear. A gay erotic tribute to the country house mystery. Set in the 1920s and replete with secret passages (ho ho ho), class stereotypes, and petites morts. While it sounds like a fun idea, the author isn’t quite able to merge the crime plot with erotic elements, so the two strands of the novel jar with one another. This is a shame, because in his ‘straight’ gay novels, written as Rupert Smith, he manages to synchronise sex and plot very well.

The Spectrum of English Murder (2015) by Curtis Evans. This book explores the crime fiction of Henry Wade (Lancelot Aubrey-Fletcher) and G.D.H. and Margaret Cole, who occupied firm positions on the right and the left of British politics respectively. Evans has an insightful and diligent approach, making his subjects come alive, and illuminating their under-valued crime fiction.