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The latest Perry Mason novel I read (Erle Stanley Gardner. The Case of the Buried Clock. New York: Ballantine Books, 1943) has more overt references to World War II than the previous one (The Case of the Careless Kitten).

There was a war metaphor:

“The door was pushed open. Two men came barging over toward the group, moving with grim purpose like warships plowing through sea toward a convoy.” [p. 46]

One of the characters was back from the war, recuperating from injuries:

“Vincent Blane had asked him if it would make him nervous staying alone in a cabin where a murder had been committed. . . . Harley smiled every time he thought of that; he who had been trained to carry on while comrades were shot down all around him; he who had become so familiar with death that it had ceased to inspire him even with healthy respect, let alone fear …” [p. 59]

There was a reference to rationing:

[Perry Mason:] “Perhaps in your position, Doctor, you haven’t as yet appreciated the seriousness of tire rationing, and therefore dismissed it from your mind.” [p. 92]

“War time” was referenced, where clocks were pushed forward an hour ahead to save electricity.

I assume all of the characters in the story were white. Race wasn’t an issue as it was in the previous book. However, one of the characters makes a comment that reminds you that race was an issue:

[Lola Strague]: “And I do wish, Burt, you’d either snap out of it or go home! After all, I’m free, white and twenty-one.” [p. 139]

I don’t recall ever hearing a line like this and had no idea it was a catch-phrase:

There was another expression I’d never heard:

 [Harley:] “… if he was going to jail he’d as soon be hung for a sheep as a lamb, and he was going to make it worth his while.” [p. 15]

An explanation of the expression is found here.

As always, there are interesting (which does necessarily mean good) metaphors/similes:

“Hamilton Burger moved with the slow dignity of a steam roller …” [p. 210]

“Mason lit a cigarette [it would be interesting to count how many times that gets written in one of these books]. ‘Trying a lawsuit is like changing a flat tire. Sometimes the jack works perfectly, the rim comes off, the new tire goes on, and you’re on your way so smoothly that you hardly know you’ve had a flat. Sometimes everything goes wrong. The jack won’t work, and when you finally get the car up, it rolls off the jack, the old tire sticks, the new rim won’t go on. . . . And this is a case just like that, where everything has gone wrong to date.’” [p. 148]

Astrology makes an appearance in the story. A short chapter in the book consists of a newspaper article, including this paragraph:

“The Bugle has commissioned one of the leading astrologers to cast the horoscope of Jack Hardistry [the murder victim]. Jack Hardistry was born on July 3^rd, which according to astrologists, makes him a ‘Cancer,’ and astrologists point out that persons born under the sign of Cancer are divided into two classes—the active and the passive. They are thin-skinned, hypersensitive, and suffer deeply from wrongs, real or fancied. They are at times irrational in their emotions, and subject to ill health.” [p. 144-145]

I’ve never understood astrology and don’t understand how a reporter would include it in a news article, though I do have very smart friends who think it explains all sorts of things. Mason’s private detective, Paul Drake, had some things to say about astrology:

“She’s [Mrs. Payson] interested in astrology, but she’s interested in a lot of other things. Astrology, it seems, doesn’t have so much to do with astronomy, and like lots of women who talk about the signs of the zodiac, she doesn’t know a damn thing about the stars themselves.” [pp. 216–217]

Astronomy is the place where Mason gets stuck for a good portion of the book and Paul’s comment helps him solve the case.

These Perry Mason novels continue to be interesting because of the times in which they are set. (I think the same thing is true of the television series.)

*  *  *

This book got me thinking about the authorial voice.

Early on I noticed that Gardner had certain sentence structures that he used again and again. I’ve never been so aware of an author’s writing style, especially sentence structure. There were a few formulations in this book that leapt out at me as I read.

1. The first I’ll call the “that … which/that” structure.

“Harley propped his head back against a pine-needle cushion, half closed his eyes, experiencing that sudden fatigue which comes to men whose reserve strength had been sapped by wounds.” [p. 4]

“Adele Blane, sitting on the rock beside him, smiled down at him with that tenderness which women have for men who are recuperating from wounds received in combat.” [p. 4]

“There was still the same charm of manner—that courteous interest in others which was neither effusive on the one hand, nor patronizing on the other, but had the graciousness of dignity about it.” [p. 12]

“Yet there was in the man’s face that grayish look of fatigue which comes to those who are near the point of physical exhaustion from the strain of overwork.” [p. 90]

“For a moment the pair were gripped in that rigid immobility that comes with discovery.” [p. 7]

2. The second I’ll call the “with that” structure.

“The evening had turned chill, with that peculiar penetrating cold which comes at night in the high places, which gets into the blood and settles around the marrow of the bones.” [p. 16]

“The air was cold and still with that breathless chill which polishes stars into glittering brilliance.” [p. 123]

“Hamilton Burger said with that ponderous manner which was so characteristic of him.” [p. 210]

3. Ina number of these examples, a “which/that comes” formulation is used often (underlined above).

None of this is meant as a complaint or critique so much as an observation. I’m just beginning to become aware of certain phrases that I use again and again. It’s hard to get around them and if you obsess on them, you might get stuck and never write another sentence.

*  *  *

Novels and stories are told from either a first or third person perspective, which means we experience the story as “I woke up, dressed, and went out,” or “Bobby woke up, dressed, and went out.”

With first person, someone “in the story” describes the action as we experience everything through that person.

Third person is different. Someone outside the world of the story tells the story. The Perry Mason mysteries are told in the third person.

This gets a little tricky. In a first person story, the author may or may not be the narrator. If the story isn’t true, the person telling the story is likely not the author sharing their experience, but a person from the author’s imagination (allowing for unavoidable autobiographical elements).

A story told in the third person doesn’t necessarily mean that the author is that storyteller either. Some years ago I read James Michener’s Hawaii. It’s a phenomenal book. If I recall correctly, it is written in third person from the beginning, but then at some point the authorial voice shifts for a moment. I don’t want to give anything way, but in a key moment the third-person telling gives way to a first-person comment. And so the rest of the book has two layers. There is the story that Michener is telling—and we wonder, as with all good stories, what will happen next and how will it end—and then there is this mystery of who is doing the telling. It doesn’t seem like Michener is the one telling the story (though, obviously, he wrote the book). Who does this voice belong to? It’s a great thing.

I just finished listening to a book, The Noticer: Sometimes, all a person needs is a little perspective, by Andy Andrews (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, 2009).

I enjoy Mr. Andrews, so this isn’t meant as a critique of what he is teaching (this is an engaging and worthwhile narrative about, as the title says, the importance of perspective), but I found it a little odd that his book began in the first person and then shifted to the third person and by the end was back to the first person. I don’t recall noticing the abrupt shift in point of view when I read the book some months ago, but as I listened to it this past week, that shift in voice didn’t work that well, perhaps because the entire book was read by the author. What if the first person elements were read aloud by Mr. Andrews and then the third person were read by someone else? Probably would have been even more distracting.

In the Perry Mason novels, the third person voice normally describes what can be perceived by an observer. The third person voice does have an omniscience about it. It knows everything that is going on in the story, including what is going on in the hearts and minds of each of the characters. But it limits what it tells us. As readers we accept this. In the case of the Perry Mason novels, we don’t get to see into the hearts and minds of characters. But once in a while, though, something slips:

“Milicent Hardistry dropped into her chair, almost immediately propped an elbow on the arm of the chair, and rested her head against the upraised hand. Her attitude was that of tired dejection. She only wanted to get it over as soon as possible.” [pp. 207–208]

Suddenly, with the last two lines, it appears we are going beyond observation. “Her attitude …” could be a description of how her affect might be perceived. But the last line, “She only wanted to get it over as soon as possible,” seems to be telling us what’s going on inside the character. This is something I will pay attention to in future novels. Are there limits for the omniscient third person narrator? Do those limits change?

*  *  *

I do like the authorial voice to be consistent. When I’m thinking too much about that voice, whether it’s because of a repetitive sentence structure or a major shift in storytelling perspective, it’s a little distracting.

I want that voice to be trustworthy. I want to know that I may rely on that voice to be telling me the truth, at least the truth as they see it. I’m sure there are some novels that play with this, where the narrative voice (either first or third person) has some issues with reliability, which becomes part of the experience of reading the novel. That gets confusing for me. I have enough trouble tracking characters and timelines and details, particularly with mysteries, without wondering if I need to be focused on the narrator as well.

I enjoy it when the authorial voice is interesting. I am remembering the first line of E. M. Forster’s Howards End:

“One may as well begin with Helen’s letters to her sister.”

Delightful.

Less delightful though fantastically compelling is the authorial voice in Remains of the Day, by Kazuo Ishiguro. Here is that opening line:

“It seems increasingly likely that I really will undertake the expedition that has been preoccupying my imagination now for some days.”

Not delightful. Pained, really. The genius of this novel is that Ishiguro has, unforgettably, captured the voice of a butler.

Note: I suppose there is such a thing as second person writing. It seems to me that falls more in the realm of advertising and self-help:
You can have whiter teeth and fresher breath.
You can take control of your life if you will follow these nine steps.
My experience with stories, though, has them in first or third person.

One of my goals is to read the complete Perry Mason mysteries. There are 85 of them. My connection to them goes back to my grandmother. As a child at her house, I remember her watching the show on her little black & white TV, although it wasn’t a show I could appreciate or follow as a child. Watching it today is nostalgic.

Books, of course, are different from television and movies. And, reliably, the books are better, or at least much different.

It’s especially true with this series.

I haven’t read one of the Perry Mason mysteries for a while but just finished The Case of the Careless Kitten. (Erle Stanley Gardner | New York: William Morrow & Company, 1942.)

Although the publishing date is early in World War 2, there isn’t much direct mention of the war except for the fact that one of the characters has come out of basic training. He is in love with a girl whose aunt (and protector—no mention of what happened to her parents) disapproves. As he and she talk one evening, a crime is committed in the house and he is seriously wounded by a gunshot. While he is in surgery, the girl observes,

“I guess we used to think we were entitled to happiness as a matter of right. Now, people are dying all over the world and . . . well, I’ve got to learn how to take it—and so has everyone else.”

While the war isn’t mentioned overtly, the attitudes, more specifically, the prejudices of the era, are quite explicit. Uncomfortably so.

A servant who self-identifies as Korean is referred to as “Jap” by a police officer.

His name is Komo, which does sound like a Japanese name. One would understand why he wouldn’t want to be identified as such. In response, he says “with dignity,”

“Excussse please . . . I am not Japanese. I am Korean. My sentiments for Japanese are not friendly.”

A co-worker of the servant says to Perry, “I can’t stand having a darned Oriental snooping around.” He goes on to call him “that damned Jap.”

When that co-worker makes claims about that servant, Perry Mason uses the same sort of kind of language: “Those Japs certainly are clever. The Orientals know a lot about drugs that we don’t know.” This is surprising. Is this language Perry would use, or is he simply using the language to get into the confidence of this co-worker?

I can’t imagine the Perry Mason of television saying anything like this. I have another five novels to go that were published during World War 2. It will be interesting to see if and how the language changes.

In an earlier novel, I remember Paul Drake and Perry wanting to interview some witnesses. Perry tells Paul to talk to someone, Perry says, “I’ll talk to the Chink.” It makes you cringe.

In 2018, the words feel entirely inappropriate and disrespectful. I can separate the attitudes of a character from his author, but it’s weird to consider a world where that was okay.

Part of my attraction to the books (and the television show as well) is the anachronisms—cars, police methods, the unceasing and abundant smoking, which is startling to consider. Clearly, though, propriety in language has changed. For the better.

One quote I really enjoyed. A lawyer, Gerald Shore, who Perry Mason has taken on as a client tells Perry, “I see that I’ve got to be frank with you.”

He adds,

“I think you’ll realize that no one ever knows how honest he is. He goes through life thinking he’s honest, because he’s never been confronted with a sufficient temptation; then suddenly he’s confronted with some crucial situation where he finds himself facing ruination on the one hand and with a chance to turn defeat into victory by doing something which seems very simple but which is—well, not dishonest but not strictly legal.”

Perry is not interested in “excuses.” But it does feel honest. Perhaps an affirmation of 1 Corinthians 10:12:

“[I]f you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!”

There are funny expressions in the Perry Mason books. Della Street wakes up, pushes away the kitten she is taking care of, and says, “Not now, Amber Eyes. The strident clang of the alarm calls me to industry.” Not sure who talks like that. Apparently Della does.

There are funny similes, too. In another book, Gardner writes something to the effect of “Della Street looking as crisp as a chilled lettuce leaf …”

It’s hard not to think of the television personalities as you read the books. The one that doesn’t fit the description is Lt. Tragg, who is younger in the books than on television. While not explicit, Perry and Della’s relationship in the book clearly goes beyond the professional.

At 54, I feel a certain anxiety about, among many things, the short list of books I read each year and, cumulatively, looking at the limits of age and time will never read this side of eternity. On the one hand, I do read some books every year which puts me, according to this study, in the 70th percentile, above those people who have not  touched even one book this year.

The same study referenced above says that Americans read an average of 12 books a year. This number is skewed, though, because the median number of books read is four, indicating that at least some people who read books read lots of books. The number that was important to me was the 17 books per year read by college graduates. I’d like to be better than average.

Over the Christmas holiday in 2015 Read the rest of this entry »