Crime Fiction A Classical Blueprint

I've been doing a bit of research on the Oregon of Crime Fiction, 'The Classical Blueprints' - or as some may call it, the old fashioned Detective story. 1930, period, where the main characters were Villain, a Dame in destress and a Hard nose Detective, who no matter how many times he got knocked Down, would always get right back up to save the day.

I read hear, that P.D James, once described the Classical Detective Story as follows. "There is, she says, always a mysterious death at its heart. There is always a closed circle of suspects and each of the suspects has to have motive and opportunity.

The central character has to be the detective who eventually must solve the mystery by logical deduction from facts fairly put before the reader.

T.S Eliot described "The Moonstone, by Wilkie Collins", as 'the first, longest and best classical detective story. Yet this story had no murder in it, so is an example of an exception to most other books written in that genre and that time.

Looking at the ingredients that went in to writing a good classical detective story of that period, 'The Classical Blueprint", I got to wondering about the Oregon of other genre?

For Crime fiction, "from what I've read", it go's something like this.

The Classical Blueprint: 'The Detective story', - Edger Allan Poe's, Chevalier Auguste Dupin, Wilkie Collins - The Moonstone, as already mentioned.

The Watson: And not as most may think, Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, but originated from the short stories about Le Chevalier Dupin, by Allan Poe. "I didn't know that".

The Locked Room: A sub genre of the Watson. Well we all like a riddle? The Locked room, go's back to ancient riddles, "What is the room you leave without entering? What is the room you enter without leaving? - Dickson Carr's, "The Hollow Man", Is sighted as a good authority on this type of Crime genre.

Modern Variations: The Inverted Story, where the identity of the murderer is no longer kept secret till the closing pages. The example given is a short story, "The singing Bone, 1912 by R. Austin Freeman.

The backgrounder: with less emphasis on the murder, but set in some interesting area. Dorothy L Sayers, The Five Red Herrings. 1931.

The How dun it? Weill we all are familiar with this one.

The Why dun it? Similar to the above but with more emphasis on Why? I think both are exemplified by Agather Christie.

And then there is The Detective Novel. Yet another variation of this many headed monster we cal Crime Fiction. I'm sure there are as many more?

But what about other Genre? What is there Classical Blueprint? What about Poetry, Horror, etc?

Sorry for any spell errors, I can't be botherd checking it again.