This comparative study focuses on the detective genre and is conducted through literary analysis with a feminist critical perspective of two of its most iconic protagonists, Sherlock Holmes and Miss Marple, created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in 1887 and Agatha Christie in 1930 respectively. The purpose is to attempt to establish the effect of the gender differences on these two protagonists. Both Holmes and Miss Marple are deemed as iconic in the detective genre, but the protagonists do not have similar experiences and are created by authors of different genders. Thus, the focus is to explore how gender differences are represented in the literary texts A Study in Scarlet (1887), “A Scandal in Bohemia” (1891), and The Murder at the Vicarage (1930) when it comes to their work as detectives. By using a feminist critical perspective and with the help of previous research, the differences in three central issues, that is, work methods, attitudes and method of disguise, are established. The most prominent result from the analysis is that Miss Marple has to work independently from the police force and trust another character, Leonard Clement, with what she knows hoping that Clement will use her observations to make the case move forward. By contrast, Holmes is approached by clients and even assists the police force in investigations, while Miss Marple is dismissed because of gender discrimination and ageism when she reaches out to the police force. Miss Marple is clearly a victim of gender discrimination and ageism, while Holmes is seen as eccentric but fully competent as a detective. Holmes is even described as having “extraordinary powers” while Miss Marple is described as an “old pussy” in a derogatory manner. Therefore, the results are that there is a significant difference in attitude where Holmes as a man encounters more positive attitudes and Miss Marple as a woman encounters more negative attitudes, all because of gender discrimination and ageism. These results are of great importance as it reveals what gender differences Holmes and Miss Marple encounter in their literary texts. It opens up the opportunity for more research in gender differences and gender discrimination in comparisons between protagonists. That Miss Marple is successful in the end, however, functions as a feminist statement.

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Revision of thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Sussex. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [263]-273) and index.

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This by-practice project is the first to provide an extensive investigation of the marginalisation of era appropriate science (EAS) and professional investigators by detective and historical detective fiction authors. The purpose of the thesis is to analyse specific detective fiction authors from the earliest formats of the nineteenth century through to the 1990s and contemporary, selected historical detective fiction authors. Its aim is to examine the creation, development and perpetuation of the marginalisation tradition. This generic trend can be read as the authors privileging their detective’s innate skillset, metonymic connectivity and deductive abilities, while underplaying and belittling EAS and professional investigators. Chapter One establishes the project’s critique of the generic trend by considering parental authors, E. T. A Hoffmann, Edgar Allan Poe, Émile Gaboriau and Wilkie Collins. Reading how these authors instigated and purposed the downplaying demonstrates its founding within detective fiction at the earliest point. By comparing how the authors sidelined and omitted specific EAS and professional investigators, alongside science available at the time, this thesis provides a framework for examining how it continued in detective fiction. In following chapters, the framework established in Chapter One and the theoretical views of Charles Rzepka, Lee Horsley, Stephen Knight and Martin Priestman, are used to discuss how minimising EAS and professional investigators developed into a tradition; and became a generic trend in the recognised detective fiction formula that was used by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Freeman Wills Crofts, H. C. Bailey, R. Austin Freeman, Agatha Christie, Ruth Rendell and P. D. James. I then examine how the device transferred to historical detective fiction, using the framework to consider Ellis Peters, Umberto Eco and other selected contemporary authors of historical detective fiction. Throughout, the critical aspect considers how the trivialisation developed and perpetuated through a generic trend. The research concludes that there is a trend embedded within detective and historical detective fiction. One that was created, developed and perpetuated by authors to augment their fictional detective’s innate skillset and to help produce narratives using it is a creative process. It further concludes that the trend can be reimagined to plausibly use EAS and professional investigators in detective and historical detective fiction. The aim of the creative aspect of the project is to employ the research and demonstrate how the tradition can be successfully reinterpreted. To do so, the historical detective fiction novel A Hidden Life uses traditional features of the detective fiction formula to support and strengthen plausible EAS and professional investigators within the narrative. The end result is a historical detective fiction novel. One that proves the thesis conclusion and is fundamentally crafted by the critical research.