Please welcome SMFS list member M. A. Monnin to the blog
today…
HANDSHAKES & HUGS
Or, What Would Agatha Do?
By M. A. Monnin
Handshakes
and hugs, or not? That’s the question on every writer’s mind these days, it
seems. Specifically, as authors, do we include references to the pandemic in
our writing, showing an authentic view of life as it is in 2020, or do we leave
those references out, ready to put 2020 and all its difficulties behind us? The
topic comes up often when writers gather these days—in io groups, writing
chapter get-togethers, and even in group pitching sessions. There is a lot of
anxiety about it: on the part of authors, as those that produce fiction, on the
part of agents, who have to sell to publishers, and on the part of publishers,
who have to sell to the reading public.
It’s hard
to see friends and colleagues stressing over this, so I thought, why not check
and see what the Golden Age mystery writers did? The world-wide Covid19
pandemic is new to us, but the world has been here before.
According
to cdc.gov, the 1918 influenza pandemic spread worldwide during 1918-1919. An estimated
500 million people or one-third of the world’s population became infected, with
approximately 50 million deaths. Just like Covid19, with no vaccine, and also
no antibiotics to treat secondary bacterial infections associated with
influenza, control efforts focused on isolation, quarantine, good personal
hygiene, use of disinfectants, and limitations of public gatherings. Photos of people
wearing masks, as well as those protesting masks from the time period have been
circulating on Facebook and Twitter, showing that humanity has pretty much
remained the same when it comes to wanting to wear a mask for the greater good.
Any writer
published in the years 1919 and 1920 would have been painfully aware of the
influence the pandemic had on daily life. But did they write about it in their
fiction? Consulting my at-home library, since I can’t browse my local in
person, I looked for books and short stories published in those years.
Agatha
Christie’s first book, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, came out in 1920. In
the name of research, I reread it. For the fourth time. Christie makes not one
mention of the flu pandemic. The setting of The Mysterious Affair at Styles is England
in the grip of the Great War. Hastings, after all, has been invalided out, and
goes to Styles to recuperate. Poirot is there as a result of the war also, and
there are a dozen little details that relate to the changes made in everyday
ordinary life due to the war. But not to the pandemic. Not one reference to “X”
dying of the horrible ‘flu, no reference to sanitizing practices, no hated
masks.
I read another
mystery novel written from that time frame. Dope, by Sax Rohmer, was first
published in 1919. Again, no mention of influenza. However, I was delighted
that his heroine was described wearing a “creased Burberry.” Some styles are
timeless.
Sax Romer’s
short crime story “The Death-Ring of Sneferu” was published in Tales of
Secret Egypt in 1918. No mention of the flu, or any pandemic influences.
The same was true of Aldous Huxley’s “The Gioconda Smile.” Published in Mortal
Coils in 1921, it’s a bit late for my research purposes, but it did feature a
wife with a vague illness, giving it plenty of scope to pull in some recent
practice involving infection or debilitating disease. But Huxley didn’t choose
to. None of the stories, whether short or novel length, in my small,
unscientific sample mentioned any habits, fears, or government protocols
pertaining to the influenza pandemic, a world-wide phenomenon that killed 50
million people, had citizens wearing masks in public, and motivated people to
protest. Why not?
It comes
down to the single most important tenet of fiction writers, perhaps even more
important for short mysteries than other genres. You’ve heard it. We’ve all
heard it. When considering what to include in a story and what to leave out, we
must ask ourselves: Does it move the story
forward? If it doesn’t, it doesn’t go in.
In the mysteries
I read as samples, the stories didn’t need that extra bit of setting and color
to set the scene or provide motive. That’s not to say that there isn’t a
plethora of stories published a hundred years ago that do include references to
the influenza pandemic.
And for
us, today? We will have habits that remain after the vaccines come out and
we’re allowed to socialize normally again, and I do think that some of them
will have a place in future fiction, if only because they’ll become second
nature. Some lessons are learned bone deep. Although my mother had a lovely set
of cannisters, and stacks of Tupperware, until her dying day, she washed and
kept Planters cashew jars and empty Cool-Whip containers. Who knew when she
might need more containers for leftovers or another cannister for that
odd-shaped pasta? She was born during the Depression, and learned to keep
things for a rainy day. That included money that could have been spent buying a
second set of cannisters or Tupperware.
For us mystery
writers, I can see that in some future tale, one of our characters might hide a
valuable trinket or blackmail evidence behind that reserve pack of toilet paper
he or she has stashed away on a basement shelf.
Come on
now. I know I’m not the only one that will have reserve TP stashed away for the
rest of my life.
M. A. Monnin ©2020
M. A. (Mary) Monnin's short mysteries have appeared in the Anthony Award-winning Malice Domestic 14: Mystery Most Edible and the pulp anthology All That Weird Jazz. Her latest story, St. Killian's Choice, will be out this month in Black Cat Mystery Magazine #8. She is a board member of the Midwest Chapter of Mystery Writers of America.
