The fourth
reason detective mysteries are appealing as stories is related to the
foundational truth that human existence is meaningless apart from community. We
do not thrive nor are we fully content as solitary creatures, because as the
Creator said in the beginning, it is not good to be alone (Genesis 2:18).
Extended solitary confinement can drive a person mad, and even hermits usually
build their cells near one another.
And because
we are finite and fallen creatures, as soon as community is established a
system of some sort is necessary if justice is to be maintained. It may be a
simple system that grows up informally, but something systematic is required if
the community is not to descend into some sort of libertarian anarchy. This is
the wisdom in Jesus’ instructions to his followers about how to proceed if
someone sins against us (Matthew 18:15-20) and when churches fail to take his
words seriously the result is rarely admirable.
And because
we live in a broken world, corruption can penetrate our systems, within the
church or without, and when it does all of life is disrupted and perverted.
Sadly, corruption is a constant threat, from cities where the police accept
bribes to look the other way to the incestuous relationship between Washington
and Wall Street. Corruption undercuts the pursuit of justice, skewers the hope
of victims, and allows the powerful to gain at the expense of the powerless.
Detective
stories bring this complex interrelationship of community, system, justice, and
corruption into focus so that as we read life seems to be clarified. We love
detectives who are incorruptible, and see them as heroic. We wonder about the
detective who takes shortcuts for the greater good, and cheer if their breaking
the rules results in the criminal being apprehended. And we feel a weight when
the story is of corruption all through the system, so that justice is always
thwarted and the forces of law instead make a bargain with the forces of crime
to keep the evil within “acceptable” limits. This is why debates about a
nation’s judicial system become so heated—even if we are not dragged into the
justice system personally it matters to us that the system in our community is
not corrupted.
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And so
detective stories are appealing because they allow us to live in a fictional
world where these realities are explored, for blessing and for curse. We follow
the cases of incorruptible detectives and feel hopeful, or the cases of corrupt
detectives and wish they would be caught and exposed. Human community, systems
of law and order, and the diabolical threat of corruption are constantly with
us, and both justice and hope lie in the balance.
Lord Peter & Father Brown
If you have
not read Dorothy Sayers’s (1893-1957) Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries or G. K.
Chesterton’s (1874-1936) Father Brown mysteries, please do so. I think it is
correct to say that these two Christian authors not only wrote ripping good
stories, they revealed how glorious the detective genre could be.
Lord Peter
is a stereotypical British aristocrat, with a trusty butler, and time on his
hands because his money, which is considerable, was inherited. So he solves
mysteries, and because of his moral commitments and lack of need, is
incorruptible in his pursuit of justice. An interesting detail for Christians
is that though Lord Peter is not a believer, another character in the stories
is, and the interplay between the two is fascinating.
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Father
Brown is a Catholic priest, and is a good detective because he cares only for
truth and has spent so many hours hearing confession that he has no illusions
about human nature. He can see past and through deception and lies, and notices
ordinary details that more distracted people all miss. When he confronts the
criminal at the end of the story it is not with the standard, “You are under
arrest,” but with “I am ready to hear your confession.”
Both Sayers
and Chesterton clearly saw how detective stories fit into the deeper biblical
story of reality, and though neither series are religious in the sense of being
preachy, both take law, guilt, justice, mercy and forgiveness with the
seriousness they deserve. The fact that neither detective is corruptible makes
the stories all the more satisfying. I’d like both Lord Peter and Father Brown to
be at work in my community.
Father
Brown (51 short stories published in various editions).
Lord Peter
(11 novels plus 6 short story collections published in various editions).
The Protectors
The Danish
national police force includes the P.E.T (Politiets
Efterretningstjeneste) division, whose job is similar to that of the U.S.
Secret Service, providing protection to politicians, public figures, royalty,
and visiting diplomats. The series follows a group of new recruits to the
service, so we get a glimpse of the more mundane as well as the exciting parts
of the job. The individuals on the squad have personal lives and concerns, and
how these interact with their demanding and dangerous work is a subtext woven
into the plot.
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In one
sense The Protectors is not a
detective series, yet fulfilling the tasks assigned to them usually involves
needing to anticipate dangers and unravel threats to the persons they must keep
safe. Their work carries them to the edge between criminal violence and social
justice, and hidden clues and mysterious criminals always lurk. And they are
tasked with preventing terrorist attacks, tracking dangerous persons, and
finding stalkers.
One of the
delights of The Protectors is the
insight it allows into Danish life and society. Filmed in Copenhagen, each
episode provides lovely vistas of Danish countryside or the scenic streets,
architecture, interiors, and neighborhoods of Copenhagen. Following the members
of the squad also allows insight into Danish culture, mores, and daily life.
I enjoyed
this series, appreciated the character development as the episodes progressed
through each season, and came to understand how even working as a bodyguard can
demand choices that are rife with ethical concerns, and sometimes moral confusion.
The Protectors are often misunderstood, criticized when things go badly by
powerful figures in politics and the media, and ignored when everything goes
well. Yet the squad remains committed to its work, and does its best even when
needing to protect unsavory characters. In a fallen world, police like the
P.E.T. will always be necessary, and one can only hope that they act with the
integrity the officers in The Protectors
sought to nurture and display.
The Protectors (2 seasons, 10 episodes
each, 1 hour each episode, Danish with subtitles, available on DVD or
streaming)
Spiral
The Protectors is set in Denmark and
follows a squad of limited officers who desire to live with integrity, while Spiral takes us to France where nearly
everyone depicted in the series seems willing, if not eager, to be corrupted to
get ahead. Spiral is delightful for
the opportunity it provides to see into French life, society and culture and
the lovely setting of Paris. The corruption comes not because they are French,
but because they are fallen, and to mark the contrast, one figure in the series
seeks justice even at personal cost.
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The French
system of justice is quite different from what I am used to, with magistrates
empowered to investigate crimes and determine whether the persons involved
should be brought to trial. The series follows one such magistrate and the police
working under his direction depicting how he must weave his way through a
labyrinth of political vested interests and legal corruption. Two young attorneys,
trying to get their careers launched in a crowded and competitive field,
discover the temptation to bend the law is not merely present but is usually
far more lucrative than just doing the job of a lawyer.
The
depiction of corruption is never glorified, and though characters may claim
things are relative, the stories reveal that is not the case. Choices have
consequences, justice perverted is never victimless, and the individual who
chooses corruption may gain wealth and even prestige but loses their soul.
Each series
of episodes tends to follow one major crime, as it is investigated and brought
to justice, with subplots of other smaller cases woven into the plots. Over
time we watch as temptation, disappointment, and choices make a difference,
setting up ripples that work their way out to poison the system upon which the
community depends. This is a rather dark and gritty series, one that shows not
just the horror of crime, but the tragedy that is corruption.
Spiral (5 seasons, 8-12 episodes each, 1
hour each episode, on DVD and some streaming, French with subtitles)
Peaky Blinders
A
production of BBC Two, Peaky Blinders tells the story of a family gang that
ruled the streets of Birmingham, England in 1919. World War I has just ended,
conditions for working men in Birmingham are grim, Communist agitators are
seeking to organize resistance, industrial pollution is unrestricted, and
despair and alcoholism are rampant. The Peaky Blinders, a family of gangsters
are named for their caps, into the peaks of which they have sewed straight razors,
so in a street fight they can be slashed across an opponent’s eyes. The
neighborhoods that the gang rules are bereft of law, the police either bought
off or too afraid to get involved. Then the brutal but effective Chief
Inspector Chester Campbell (played by Sam Neill), is brought in from Belfast by
Winston Churchill to clean up the mess, and he soon comes up against the head
of the Peaky Blinders, the clever and ambitious gangster Tommy Shelby (played
by Cillian Murphy).
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In this
series we go one step further and watch what life is like when corruption has
perverted the system, so that the street gang and the police are more alike
than not. Both take life when it suits them (though for different reasons),
make compromises to get ahead, and try to find a way to further their own ends
even if integrity is lost in the process.
In some
neighborhoods today residents fear a squad of police arriving on their street
even more than they do the gangs that rule the street when the police are
absent. Peaky Blinders gives some
hint of what that must be like, and it is not as it should be. Chief Inspector
Campbell is on the side of law and order, yet is willing to brutalize, torture,
invade homes, and make the sight of a constable a reason for the law abiding
citizen to fear.
The
trajectory from Lord Peter and Father Brown to The Protectors to Spiral
to Peaky Blinders follows stories of
increasing corruption. None of these productions glorify crime and corruption
but force us to face the reality of the tragedy of living in a darkly fallen
world. They reveal how badly we yearn for a system within our communities that
seeks justice with integrity, which in turn reveals why we mean it when we
pray, “Thy kingdom come, they will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
The Peaky Blinders (2 seasons, 6
episodes each, 1 hour each episode available exclusively on Netflix and DVD)
An article in Evolution
and Human Behavior with the title, “Sexual exploitability: observable cues
and their link to sexual attraction,” apparently (I have not read it) argues
that since males have less invested in the process of reproduction, men
naturally are more interested in casual sex and prowl around looking for a
woman that they can get into bed. The researchers studied their hypothesis and
found that, believe it or not, men looked for certain traits in women that
identified them as prime candidates to being tricked into a one-night stand.
Erin Gloria Ryan, however, writing online (www.jezebel.com) in response to this academic
study is having none of it. For one thing, she believes the authors of the
study are letting men off too easily. Just because men evolved that way doesn’t
make it admirable. Ryan’s primary objection, however, is that the authors of
the study assume only men want one-night stands. Women do too, she says, and so
in “How to Look Dumb and Slutty Enough for a One Night Stand” Ryan has “broken
down the list of 88 traits that researchers found influenced men in their quest
for sex to bring you a definitive guide to tricking dudes into thinking that
they’re tricking you into having sex with them.” Ryan’s list of four Do’s and
Don’ts may surprise you, then again, maybe it won’t:
“DO: look
immature, act drunk and reckless, hang out with sluts, glance over your
shoulder, appear sleepy, touch your boob.
“DO NOT:
appear intelligent, be old, act shy or anxious, suck on a straw, stand near men.
“DO: wear
an engagement or wedding band, attend a wedding, wear tight clothing, be a
punk, have tattoos, be short, be fat.
“DO NOT: be
skinny, have a flushed face, be tall, dance, be a prostitute, have piercings.”
It’s easy to make light of such things. Ryan certainly uses
some animated prose when she takes aim at the journal article, which she calls,
“idiotic.” And there is a place for that, since the best response to folly is
not solemnity but laughter. That’s very difficult to accomplish, however,
without being dismissive of the people involved, a form of ridicule forbidden
to Christians. If we do not have the intellectual acuity of G. K. Chesterton we
should never try.
I am grateful for Erin Ryan’s piece, because it makes me
reflect on three issues I easily overlook.
First, what are the implications of all this for the topic
of modesty? I’m not talking about prudishness here, but a modesty that
expresses something of one’s character even as it deepens their attractiveness
as a person. The Christian response to Ryan’s four Dos and Don’ts, then does
not involve embracing the opposite but producing something entirely different.
Second, I’m grateful Ryan reminds us of a reality we often
forget as Christians but should not, namely, that we live in a sexually charged
world. If you are surprised when I say Christians forget this, let me provide
proof. I often speak on film, and often on those occasions a Christian will ask
why there has to be so much sex in the movies. “There are plenty of good films
without sex,” I always reply, “but the reason sex appears so often is precisely
the same reason it appears in the Bible so often—it is central to life.” How is
it that Christians can claim to take the Scriptures seriously and miss the way
sexuality, for blessing and for curse, is a vital theme that weaves it’s way
through the pages and stories of God’s word? A faith that includes The Song of Solomon has every reason to
celebrate sexuality. A fallen world may get sexuality wrong but they certainly
won’t ignore it.
All this has also made me reflect anew on an amazing aspect
of the Christian view of sexuality, namely that it is simultaneously an
intensely physical and a deeply spiritual
act. Has that understanding eroded in our world, and if so, why? I realize that
in the heat of the moment the physical can seem to be all there is and all that
matters, but there is more to life than the moment. Could it be that people
yearn for a spiritual dimension but fear sex is physical alone? Or have they
made peace with lowered expectations? That’s something worth asking about when
we are discussing movies or the Bible, since in both places the topic comes up
quite naturally and often.
Source: Erin
Gloria Ryan online (http://io9.com/5912975/how-to-look-dumb-and-slutty-enough-for-a-one-night-stand?tag=sexuality).
My appreciation to my good friend, John Eddy who called my attention to Ryan’s
piece.
Last night I took a book of brief newspaper pieces by G. K. Chesterton to bed to enjoy before falling asleep.
I will lift up my eyes to the hills, from whence cometh my help; but I will not lift up my carcass to the hills, unless it is absolutely necessary.
* * * * *
For those who study the great art of lying in bed there is one emphatic caution to be added. Even for those who can do their work in bed (like journalists), still more for those whose work cannot be done in bed (as, for example, the professional harpooner of whales), it is obvious that the indulgence must be very occasional. But that is not the caution I mean. The caution is this: if you do lie in bed, be sure you do it without any reason or justification at all. I do not speak, of course, of the seriously sick. But if a healthy man lies in bed, let him do it without a rag of excuse; then he will get up a healthy man. If he does it for some secondary hygienic reason, if he has some scientific explanation, he may get up a hypochondriac.
* * * * *
I was walking about a German town, and I knew no German. I knew, however, two or three of those great and solemn words which hold our European civilization together—one of which is “cigar.” As it was a hot and dreamy day, I sat down at a table in a sort of beer-garden, and ordered a cigar and a pot of lager. I drank the lager, and paid for it. I smoked the cigar, forgot to pay for it, and walked away, gazing rapturously at the royal outline of the Taunus mountains. After about ten minutes, I suddenly remembered that I had not paid for the cigar. I went back to the place of refreshment, and put down the money. But the proprietor also had forgotten the cigar, and he merely said guttural things in a tone of query, asking me, I suppose, what I wanted. I said “cigar,” and he gave me a cigar. I endeavored while putting down the money to wave away the cigar with gestures of refusal. He thought that my rejection was of the nature of a condemnation of that particular cigar, and brought me another. I whirled my arms like a windmill, seeking to convey by the sweeping universality of my gesture that my rejection was a rejection of cigars in general, not of that particular article. He mistook this for the ordinary impatience of common men, and rushed forward, his hands filled with miscellaneous cigars, pressing them upon me. In desperation I tried other kinds of pantomime, but the more cigars I refused the more and more rare and precious cigars were brought out of the deeps and recesses of the establishment. I tried in vain to think of a way of conveying to him the fact that I had already had the cigar. I imitated the action of a citizen smoking, knocking off and throwing away a cigar. The watchful proprietor only thought I was rehearsing (as in an ecstasy of anticipation) the joys of the cigar he was going to give me. At last I retired baffled: he would not take the money and leave the cigars alone. So that this restaurant keeper (in whose face a love of money shone like the sun at noonday) flatly and firmly refused to receive the twopence that I certainly owed him; and I took that twopence of his away with me and rioted on it for months. I hope that on the last day the angels will break the truth very gently to that unhappy man.
Source: Tremendous Trifles by G. K. Chesterton (Dover Publications: Mineola, NY; 1909, 2007) p. 7, 53.