Robert Barnard

• Born: November 23, 1936
• Birthplace: Burnham-on-Crouch, Essex, England
• Died: September 19, 2013
• Place of death: Leeds, United Kingdom

Types of Plot: Cozy; historical

Principal Series: Superintendent Perry Trethowan, 1981–87; Chief Inspector Charlie Peace, 1989–2012

Contribution

While he also worked as a literary critic and academic scholar, Robert Barnard is remembered as one of the leading practitioners of the pure detective story. As a mystery writer, he worked within the classic tradition and is often said to have inherited Agatha Christie’s mantle, for like her, he wrote of murder among everyday people and often used conventional plotting devices. His works, however, unlike Christie’s, are often humorous and filled with social satire. Barnard’s novels follow the customary plot progression from buildup, to crime, to investigation by police, to solution. However, Barnard experimented, sometimes using a first-person narrator or offering several narrators’ points of view. His settings are not the street corner, the gang, the brothel, or even the police station. Rather, he centered his novels at opera houses, local pubs, writers’ conventions, English villages, universities, parishes, and theaters, helping define the "cozy" mystery subgenre.

Barnard was well received in Great Britain, although he acknowledged that it was his American audience that enabled him to leave his professorship in Norway in 1983 to return to England and become a full-time writer. Barnard suggested that fellow writers of mystery fiction remember their purpose, noting, "I write only to entertain." He also advised writers to cherish the conventions of the mystery, and, in general, to seek not to spoil the recipe of this popular genre.

Biography

Robert Barnard was born on November 23, 1936, in Burnham-on-Crouch, Essex, England. His father was a farm laborer turned writer who wrote what Barnard called "very sub-Barbara Cartland" romance stories for weekly magazines. At Balliol College, Oxford, Barnard initially read history but soon changed to English. He received his bachelor’s degree with honors in 1959, worked in the Fabian Society bookstore, and then took a post as lecturer at the University of New England in New South Wales, Australia, in 1961.

During Barnard’s five years in Australia, he met and married Mary Louise Tabor, and read deeply in the Victorian period, specializing in Charles Dickens, the Brontës, and Elizabeth Gaskell. He began to write for academic journals, then attempted a comic novel, but the plot never developed. He next wrote a crime novel concerning Nazi looting, using standard detective-fiction structure. It was rejected by publishers, but a Collins editor encouraged him to send another manuscript. Collins then published his first mystery, Death of an Old Goat (1974). This first mystery, set in Australia, reflects his distaste for teaching there and especially for the snobbish British visiting professors with its numerous satirical portraits. In the novel, bumbling police Inspector Royale investigates the murder of visiting professor Bellville-Smith.

Barnard’s wife wished to move to Europe, so in 1966, he accepted a position at the University of Bergen, Norway. He lectured while he studied for his doctorate, graduating in 1971 after writing his dissertation on imagery and theme in the novels of Dickens. In 1976, he accepted a position at the University of Tromsø in Tromsø, Norway, the northernmost university in the world, three degrees north of the Arctic Circle. He came to love Norway, its beauty, its friendliness, and its peace. He set two of his mysteries there, Death in a Cold Climate (1980) and Death in Purple Prose (1987).

In 1983, Barnard resigned his teaching position in Norway and returned to England to settle in Leeds, having been abroad for twenty-two years. His sense of objectivity as a "returning exile" enabled him to see England through clear and freshly critical eyes. He enjoyed teaching and felt he had done a good job but now intended to take advantage of his growing market to support himself by his writing. Shortly after settling in Leeds, he noted that the very generous reviews in the United States helped to sell his works there and enabled him to live off his earnings.

In addition to his mystery novels and his short stories for mystery magazines, Barnard wrote the first book-length critical study of Agatha Christie, A Talent to Deceive: An Appreciation of Agatha Christie (1980), which contains a bibliography and short-story index compiled by Louise Barnard. He also wrote extensively on Charlotte Brontë and served as chair of the Brontë Society.

In 1988, Barnard won the Anthony Award for best short story for "Breakfast Television," the Agatha Award for best short story for "More Final than Divorce," and the Macavity Award for best short story for "The Woman in the Wardrobe." He was nominated numerous times for the Edgar Award and won the Nero Wolfe Award for A Scandal in Belgravia (1991). In 2003, he received the Crime Writers’ Association’s Cartier Diamond Dagger Award for lifetime achievement in crime writing.

Barnard's final novel was a Charlie Pearce mystery, A Charitable Body, released in 2012. He died in 2013 at the age of seventy-six after a year of poor health and declining memory. By the time of his death he had published forty novels and remained considered one of the prime authors in the mystery genre.

Analysis

Robert Barnard, like Agatha Christie, located his mysteries, for the most part, in cozy, comfortable settings. They do not occur in alleys, in exotic dens, or crime-ridden slums but rather in respectable locations: gossipy English villages, clerical convocations, academic halls, conventions of specialists, arts festivals, and theaters. His first mystery is set in Australia and two later ones take place in Norway, reflecting the author’s travels. However, his main focus, even when living elsewhere, was England with its prep schools, Anglican parishes, by-elections, and its minor royalty. For Barnard’s readers, this is part of his appeal: tea cozies, lawn fêtes, rectors, and constables.

Barnard’s plots are conventionally crafted. They usually involve a closed circle of suspects, among whom various relationships and secrets are exposed, all following the commission of the murder. He admired Christie’s careful approach to plotting, citing her as a genius in the "double-bluff" method and its skillful use of red herrings. However, perhaps, like those of Charles Dickens whom he also admired, his plots are not his major strength. They are sometimes contrived and improbable, or they rely too heavily on withholding vital clues or on providing unforeseen twists at the end. Barnard told an interviewer that his stories were not totally preplanned. He would begin with a good idea of the murder, victim, motive, and murderer. Then, however, he often generated the story as he wrote, for he thought with his pen in hand—unlike Christie, who had every detail worked out in advance.

Plots in Barnard’s works are often, as in Dickens, secondary; however, both authors poured compensatory energy into the creation of characters, many of whom are originals and quite memorable. Barnard asserted he was "always pinching things" from Dickens, and they are both certainly masters at vividly depicting lower-class characters. For example, Jack Phelan in A City of Strangers (1990) is described as "wearing a vest that displayed brawny and tattooed arms gone nastily to flesh, and a prominent beer gut. His trousers were filthy, and he sat on a crate in a garden littered with the dismembered remains of cars." Barnard also provides an amusing variety of clerical types, a wicked caricature of an American scholar, models and body builders, an aging actress, and even an obscure member of the royal household.

The names of Barnard’s characters are inventive and also reminiscent of those of Dickens: Marius Fleetwood is a ladies’ man, though readers are told he began as a grocer improbably named Bert Winterbottom. Barnard noted he had to guard against becoming too Dickensian and resorting too easily to caricature, for his real strength was to write more realistically and display an acute eye for sharply drawn social and domestic detail, as in Mother’s Boys (1981). His characters are powerfully delineated and easily recognizable; for example, with Declan O’Hearn, in The Corpse at the Haworth Tandoori (1998), Barnard creates a new human being, so unusual and recognizable that readers would know him if he walked into a room. In Out of the Blackout (1984), he experiments with a new realism and an unusual piece of detection in which the central character, taken as a five-year-old child from London during the Blitz, is searching for his real identity.

Realism is evident in Barnard’s depiction of the sometimes self-referential world of writing and publishing. He explores authors of all kinds: writers of mysteries, romances, biographies, and memoirs. He deftly provides a sharply drawn social milieu of the subculture of male models; he gives memorable depictions of the realities of divorce and is especially good at depicting the dysfunctional family.

Barnard experimented under the pseudonym Bernard Barnstable with four realistic historical novels. To Die Like a Gentleman (1993) is set in Victorian England, with the period style well achieved through letters and diary accounts, allowing for multiple viewpoints. Two other historical novels feature Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart as a narrator-detective and allow Barnard to display his knowledge of music and to make satirical comments on eighteenth century English society. A Mansion and Its Murder (1998) concerns a late nineteenth century banker and captures the fin de siècle culture in England.

Barnard was capable of creating memorable short works as well. Most of the sixteen short stories collected in Death of a Salesperson (1989) are ironic crime narratives in the style of the Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955–1962) television show. His topics in this collection, as in his longer detective fiction, include satires on the art world, academia’s foibles, and the stately home tradition. Like Roald Dahl’s stories, those of Barnard are based on a winning combination of humor and shock.

In commenting on his series characters, Barnard noted that he tried not to overuse them, for they tend to dictate the tone of the book, and he preferred to vary the tone. Also, he insisted that the crime novel is not deep nor psychological in focus, but formulaic, populist, and designed to entertain. To interest his audience, he updated the well-worn English scene with academics who leave their wives for graduate students, with the nastier sides of divorce, and with some ambiguous twists on sexual orientation. Overall, in his plotting, Barnard is never obsessed by evil; rather, he is much more interested in meanness and in human failings, especially in the lack of self-knowledge.

Although Barnard’s plots are pleasingly realized and his characters are memorable, his style is often his most powerful feature. Unlike Christie, he wrote with humor, both gentle and light and also biting and satirical. He had an ear for dialogue—always observing and listening and recording, determined that his dialogue be as lively as possible. In general, his ability to write in ways that shock, entertain, delight, and surprise gives testimony to the variety and power of his style.

Death in a Cold Climate

Death in a Cold Climate is set in Tromsø, Norway, where Bernard taught for several years. It conveys a strong sense of how somber and depressing a Scandinavian winter can be and provides an understanding of a foreign culture that is essential to the plot. The murder victim is an outsider, a young Englishman. Symbolically, the story opens at the darkest time of the year, and the competent Norwegian police inspector Fagermo takes until the spring return of the sun to solve the murder. Barnard provides humorous remarks on Norwegian foods and Scandinavian pretense as well as a moving picture of the Korvold family.

Sheer Torture

Sheer Torture (1981) introduces Barnard’s Detective Perry Trethowan, his first recurring detective figure, and one who narrates his own story. For fourteen years, Perry has been happily disowned by his loony, aristocratic family and is married to Jan, who is working on a degree in Arabic. Perry’s superior orders him to investigate the bizarre death of his father, who, wearing spangled tights, has been murdered in a medieval torture machine called a strappado. Perry is more embarrassed than grieved by the event but manages to solve the kinky murder. Some critics call this novel a cross between the novels of the British writers Roald Dahl and Ngaio Marsh.

Political Suicide

In Political Suicide (1986), Barnard displays his withering views of the British electoral process and gives himself wide scope to satirize the political machinations of the Tories, the Social Democrats, and the Labour Party. There are also fringe parties galore: the John Lennon Lives Party, the Bring Back Hanging Party, and the Richard III Was Innocent Party. Some critics have compared his election passages to those of Dickens in Pickwick Papers (1836–1837). A Tory member of Parliament has been found drowned in the Thames. The three candidates vying to fill his vacant position in Bootham, Yorkshire, provide Barnard with many opportunities for scathing satire, for they are all among the suspects interviewed by Superintendent Sutcliffe, who takes until the final pages to reveal the motive, means, and opportunity of the murderer.

Death in Purple Prose

Death in Purple Prose, a Perry Trethowan series novel that depicts literary groups, finds the detective again involved with his loony, aristocratic family. Perry accompanies his sister Cristobel to a convention of the World Association of Romantic Novelists (WARN), held in Bergen, Norway. Here Bernard draws lightly on his own father’s profession as a romance writer as well as on his years spent in Norway. He satirizes the romance-novel industry, and when a famous writer is murdered, secrets are revealed. Malevolent rivals for the title of conference queen range from the sensibly attired Mary Sweeny with her hard, glinting eye to the coy and sugary Amanda Fairchild.

The Mistress of Alderley

In The Mistress of Alderley (2002), a Detective Sergeant Charlie Peace mystery, the murdered man is an aging lothario, Marius Fleetwood, who, although he still lives with his wife, claims multiple past and current mistresses. His current official mistress, the retired actress Caroline Fawley, thinks he is hers, exclusively. However, when Fleetwood is murdered, Peace finds, among other things, that the dead man had also been trysting with Caroline’s daughter, an oversexed opera star. Satire is aimed at the local clergy, at techno-kids, and at a fussy dower-house gentleman and his rough sister. The whole nasty mess is cleared up when the murderer is discovered at the very end to be the daughter’s jealous lover. English slang abounds ("swish," "breakfast fry-up," "Guy Fawkes") as well as allusions to famous people in the news such as Hillary Clinton and Guy Ritchie.

Principal Series Characters:

• Superintendent Percival "Perry" Trethowan , a Scotland Yard detective, ostracized by his aristocratic family of zany eccentrics. Originally assigned to the vice squad, he first appears on an assignment to investigate the spectacular death of his own father. All the Trethowan mysteries are written in the first person; readers are informed that he is a large man, but rather than being self-revealing, Perry is the consummate observer.
• Chief Inspector Charlie Peace first appears in a Trethowan mystery, Bodies (1986), as a black gym employee. He returns as a series character, a newly hired police officer in Death and the Chaste Apprentice (1989). Subsequently transferred to Yorkshire, he quietly fields and ignores racial slurs. Ever laconic and sardonic, he efficiently solves mysteries with humor, sometimes teaming with the older, widowed detective Mike Oddie.

Bibliography

Barnard, Robert. "Growing Up to Crime." In Colloquium on Crime, edited by Robin W. Winks. New York: Scribner, 1986. Bernard discusses his creative process, focusing on improvisation and on the use of caricature, humor, and, suspense; also discusses mystery novels as a genre.

Barnard, Robert. A Talent to Deceive: An Appreciation of Agatha Christie. Rev. ed. New York: Mysterious Press, 1987. Barnard’s work on the author whom he most admired sheds light on his understanding of the classical detective novel and how he interpreted it in his own works.

Barnard, Robert. "Why oh Why? Motivation in the Crime Novel." Writer 108, no. 8 (August, 1995): 3. Barnard talks about writing mysteries, particularly cozies, and creating plausible motives for crimes.

Breen, Jon L. "Robert Barnard." In Mystery and Suspense Writers: The Literature of Crime, Detection, and Espionage, edited by Robin W. Winks. New York: Scribner, 1998. Provides biographical details, an analysis of Barnard’s critical writings, and a look at the historical novels and short stories.

Ford, Susan Allen. "Stately Homes of England: Robert Barnard’s Country House Mysteries." Clues 23, no. 4 (Summer, 2005): 3-14. Ford analyzes Barnard’s use of the traditional detective novel form used in the Golden Age of mysteries. Compares his work to that of Agatha Christie and Ngaio Marsh.

Herbert, Rosemary. "Robert Barnard." In The Fatal Art of Entertainment: Interviews with Mystery Writers. New York: Hall, 1994. Updates a 1985 interview, covering Barnard’s use of personal experience in his fiction, his favorite writers, and his attitudes toward literary allusion and the populist entertainment aspects of the mystery genre.

Ripley, Mike. "Robert Barnard Obituary." The Guardian, 25 Sept. 2013, www.theguardian.com/books/2013/sep/25/robert-barnard. Accessed 8 Sept. 2017.

Vitello, Paul. "Robert Barnard, Award-Winning Writer of British Crime 'Cozies,' Dies at 76." The New York Times, 29 Sept. 2013, www.nytimes.com/2013/09/29/books/robert-barnard-award-winning-writer-of-british-crime-cozies-dies-at-76.html. Accessed 8 Sept. 2017.