Cette thèse porte sur l’étude comparée des œuvres de trois romanciers contemporains : Andreu Martín, Yasmina Khadra et Giorgio Todde. Si ces trois écrivains diffèrent par la nationalité, la langue et le style d’écriture, ils ont élu à un moment ou à un autre de leur carrière le roman policier et plus particulièrement le « noir » comme genre d’écriture. L’analyse de leur production policière de 1980 à 2010 tend à montrer les points de convergence et de divergence révélateurs d’une présupposée culture méditerranéenne. Entre Espagne, Algérie et Italie la Méditerranée s’impose comme espace géographique commun, mais également comme lieu de rencontre de différentes cultures. Les objectifs prioritaires ont été d’inscrire dans un cadre théorique les enjeux du roman policier face à la modernité et plus particulièrement les aspects significatifs à la vue des caractéristiques des trois auteurs comme la relation à l’Histoire, l’articulation entre individuel et collectif ou encore le rapport entre Histoire, mythe et vérité. Les particularités de chacun des trois romanciers et l’insertion de leur production dans le cadre géographique spécifique de leur pays d’origine constituent un axe de recherche majeur de la thèse. Pour ne pas restreindre le champ d’investigation il a été opéré une ouverture des perspectives : la Méditerranée comme espace géographique, historique et culturel en partage ; le concept d’insularité comme double condition, à la fois géographique et d’esprit ; ou encore le « noir méditerranéen » ont ainsi bénéficié d’un développement particulier. / This doctorial dissertation encompasses a comparative study of three contemporary authors: Andreu Martín, Yasmina Khadra and Giorgio Todde. Although the three writers differ in their nationality, language and writing style, they have all selected the detective novel and more particularly hardboiled fiction as their genre of choice. The body of this study focuses on the works created between 1980 and 2010. Through the analysis of these novels several revealing commonalities and differences have been discovered about a possible “Mediterranean culture”. Whether it be Spain, Algeria or Italy, the Mediterranean emerges then not only as a shared geographical space, but also as a meeting point between these diverse cultures. The principal objectives of this study are to place the specific tools and aspects of the detective novel within the theoretical domain of “modernity”, and an analysis of the significant articulations made by these three authors such as: their use of History, their representation of “the individual” versus “the collective”, and the relationship between History, myth, and truth in their novels. The particularities of all three novelists and the insertion of their literary production within the specific geographical environment of their country of origin constitute the focal point and principal axis of research of this dissertation. However, an open perspective has lead to the analysis of various concepts which particularly develop an understanding of that focal point. Among them the Mediterranean as a geographical, historical and cultural space shared by many; the concept of insularity as a double condition, as in a condition that is at the same time geographical and emotional; and the concept of a “Mediterranean hardboiled” fiction have revealed themselves as the most significant. / Questa tesi si basa sull’analisi comparata delle opere di tre scrittori contemporanei: Andreu Martín, Yasmina Khadra eGiorgio Todde. Sebbene questi tre romanzieri differiscano per nazionalità, lingua e stile di scrittura, si accomunanoper aver eletto ad un dato momento della loro carriera il romanzo poliziesco e più precisamente il “noir” come generedi scrittura. L’analisi della loro produzione poliziesca, dal 1980 al 2010, tende a dimostrare i punti di convergenza edivergenza rivelatori di una presupposta cultura mediterranea. Tra la Spagna, l’Algeria e l’Italia il Mediterraneos’impone come spazio geografico comune, così come luogo d’incontro di diverse culture. Gli obiettivi prioritari sonostati quelli di iscrivere in un quadro teorico i meccanismi del romanzo poliziesco, il suo rapportarsi alla modernità epiù precisamente gli elementi significativi che emergono dallo studio delle caratteristiche dei tre autori. Tra questi sievidenziano la relazione alla Storia, il rapporto tra l’individuale e il collettivo o ancora l’articolarsi tra Storia, mito everità. Le caratteristiche di ognuno dei tre autori e l’inserimento delle loro produzioni letterarie nello specifico quadrogeografico dei rispettivi paesi d’origine costituiscono un asse di ricerca della tesi. Per non limitare il campod’investigazione si è proceduto ad un ampliamento delle piste di ricerca: il Mediterraneo come spazio geografico,storico e culturale in comune; il concetto d’insularità come doppia condizione, geografica e d’animo e infine il “noirmediterraneo”.

Le polar américain contemporain se pose en continuité et en rupture avec l'âge d'or des années 1930-1950 en reprenant les codes et représentations mythiques du hard-boiled et du modèle anglais pour les confronter au monde contemporain. A la ville des années 1930, terrain privilégié du détective progressant méthodiquement vers la clé de l'énigme, s'oppose l'univers urbain contemporain - New York et plus particulièrement Brooklyn - au coeur duquel l'énigme initiale reste sans véritable dénouement. Les méthodes traditionnelles n'ont plus cours, laissant place à l'incertitude et au doute ; il n'est plus question de héros triomphant contre le Mal au coeur de l'univers urbain, mais des efforts d'un détective perdu dans sa propre fragmentation. Ainsi, la focalisation ne porte plus sur l'aboutissement de l'enquête mais sur la quête interne du détective qui, avant même d'élucider le mystère, est d'abord en quête de lui-même. Le polar d'avant-garde sous toutes ses formes, et en particulier la bande dessinée et le roman, détrône le statut mythique du détective pour en proposer de multiples figures, prétextes à la redéfinition des codes bien connus du genre et à l'exploration métaphysique du monde contemporain.

Thesis (M.A.)--Indiana University, 2010. / Title from screen (viewed on July 19, 2010). Department of English, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI). Advisor(s): Robert Rebein, Jonathan Eller, William Touponce. Includes vitae. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 84-86).

Lesbian Detective Fiction: the outsider within is a creative writing thesis in two parts: a draft lesbian detective novel, titled Fatal Development (75%) and an exegesis containing a critical appraisal of the sub-genre of lesbian detective fiction, and of my own writing process (25%). Creative work: Fatal Development -- It wasn’t the first time I’d seen a dead body, but it didn’t seem to get any easier. -- When Dirk and Stacey discover a body in the courtyard of their Brisbane woolstore apartment, it is close friend and neighbour, Kersten Heller, they turn to for support. The police assume Stuart’s death was an accident, but when it emerges that he was about to take legal action against the woolstore’s developers, Bovine, Kersten decides there must be more to it. Her own apartment has flooded twice in a month and the builders are still in and out repairing defects. She discovers Stuart was not alone on the roof when he fell to his death and the evidence he had collected for his case against Bovine has gone missing. Armed with this knowledge, and fed up with the developer’s ongoing resistance to addressing the building’s structural issues, Kersten organises a class action against Bovine. Kersten draws on her past training as a spy to investigate Stuart’s death, hiding her activities, and details of her past, from her partner, Toni. Her actions bring her under increasing threat as her apartment is defaced, searched and bugged, and she is involved in a car chase across New Farm. Forced to fall back on old skills, old habits and memories return to the surface. When Toni discovers that Kersten has broken her promise to leave the investigation to the police, she walks out. The neighbouring – and heritage-listed – Riverside Coal development site burns to the ground, and Kersten and Dirk uncover evidence of a network of corruption involving developers and local government officials. After she is kidnapped in broad daylight, narrowly escaping from the boot of a moving car, Kersten is confident she is right, but with Toni not returning her calls, and many of the other residents selling up, including Dirk and Stacey, Kersten begins to question her judgment. In a desperate attempt to turn things around, Kersten calls on an old Agency contact to help prove Bovine was involved in Stuart’s death, her kidnapping, and ongoing corruption. To get the evidence she needs, Kersten plays a dangerous game: letting Bovine know she has uncovered their illegal operations in order to draw them into revealing themselves on tape. Hiding alone in a hotel room, Kersten is finally forced to confront her past: When Mirin didn’t come home that night, I was ready to go out and find her myself, disappear, and start a new life together somewhere far away. Instead they pulled me in before I could finish making arrangements, questioned me for hours, turned everything around. It was golden child to problem child in the space of a day. This time, she’s determined, things will turn out differently. Exegesis: The exegesis traces the development of lesbian detective fiction, including its dual origins in detective and lesbian fiction, to compare the current state of the sub-genre with the early texts and to establish the dominant themes and tropes. I focus particularly on Australian examples of the sub-genre, examining in detail Claire McNab’s Denise Cleever series and Jan McKemmish’s A Gap in the Records, in order to position my own lesbian detective novel between these two works. In drafting Fatal Development, I have attempted to include some of the political content and complexity of McKemmish’s work, but with a plot-driven narrative. I examine the dominant tropes and conventions of the sub-genre, such as: lesbian politics; the nature of the crime; method of investigation; sex and romance; and setting. In the final section, I explain the ways in which I have worked within and against the subgenre’s conventions in drafting a contemporary lesbian detective novel: drawing on tradition and subverting reader expectations. Throughout the thesis, I explore in detail the tradition of the fictional lesbian detective as an outsider on the margins of society, disrupting notions of power and gender. While the lesbian detective’s outsider status grants her moral agency and the capacity to achieve justice and generate change, she is never fully accepted. The lesbian detective remains an outsider within. For the lesbian detective, working within a system that ultimately discriminates against her involves conflict and compromise, and a sense of double-play in being part of two worlds but belonging to neither. I explore how this double-consciousness can be applied to the lesbian writer in choosing whether to write for a mainstream or lesbian audience.

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / By start of the 1920s, the United States had seen nearly forty years of vast accumulations of wealth by a small group of people, substantial financial speculation and a mass change in the economic base from agricultural to industrial. All of this ended in 1929 in a crushing depression that spread not only across the country, but also around the world. Hard-Boiled detective fiction first reached the reading public early in the decade initially as adventure stories, but quickly became a way for authors to express the stresses these changes were causing on people and society. The detective is the center of the story with the task of reestablishing a certain degree of order or redemption. An important character hallmark of this genre is that he is seldom able to do this, or that the cost is so high a terrible burden remains. His decisions and judgments in this attempt are formed by his relationship with the people or community around him. The goal of this thesis is to look at the issues raised in the context of how the detective relates to a person or community in the story. For analysis, six books were chosen arranged from least level of personal relationship by the detective to the most intimate. The books are Red Harvest, by Dashiell Hammett, The Big Sleep, by Raymond Chandler, The Galton Case, by Ross MacDonald, Cotton Comes to Harlem, by Chester Himes, Devil in a Blue Dress, by Walter Mosley, and I, the Jury, by Mickey Spillane. In the study of these books, a wide range of topics are presented including political ideologies, corruption, racial discrimination and family strife. Each book provided a wealth of views on these and other subjects that are as relevant today as when they were written.