Closed Society Mysteries
 

 

The term “Closed Society” in mystery fiction came from an essay by W.H. Auden, “The Guilty Vicarage:  Notes on the Detective Story, by an Addict,” Harper’s Magazine, May 1948, in which Auden writes:  “a murder occurs; many are suspected; all but one suspect, who is the murderer, are eliminated; the murderer is arrested or dies…the detective story has five elements – the milieu, the victim, the murderer, the suspects, the detectives.”  About the milieu, Auden writes that the story requires,

  A closed society so that the possibility of an outside murderer is excluded; and a closely related society so that all its members are potential suspects.  ... Such conditions are met by: (a) the group of blood relatives (the Christmas dinner in the country house); (b) the closely knit geographical group (the old world village); (c) the occupational group (the theatrical company); (d) the group isolated by the neutral space (the Pullman car)…

          I have put together a list of late twentieth-early twenty-first century “Closed Societies” I have encountered in mystery fiction, but I suspect my list is far from complete:

          Airplanes
          Business organizations
                   Insurance companies
                   Publishing firms
          Clubs
          Educational institutions
                   Boys’ schools
                   Girls’ schools
                   Colleges

 
 

          Government departments or agencies

          Hotels
          Legal institutions
                   Court rooms
                   Law offices
          Medical institutions
                   Hospitals
                   Nursing colleges
                   Psychiatric wards
                   Retirement homes
          Museums, Art Galleries
          Religious institutions
                   Cathedral Closes
                   Churches
                   Convents
                   Monasteries
          Ships
          Theatre/Opera companies
          Trains
          Villages

          The number of kinds of closed societies has probably increased since Auden wrote his essay, but a closed world still limits the number of available suspects.  Even when there are 70 or more potential suspects, as in V.C. Clinton-Baddeley’s My Foe Outstretch’d Beneath a Tree, 1968 (a mystery set in a private club in London), that is considerably fewer than the potential suspects in the search for a serial killer in New York City, a very open society.

          Besides limiting the number of suspects, closed society mysteries lend themselves to timetables and alibis, beloved of Golden Age writers, and those of us who like that kind of mystery, full of clues and puzzles for the reader.

          My favorite closed society mysteries are those that take place in schools or colleges.  I’ve outlined below of the types of schools I’ve encountered in mystery fiction, with examples of books using each as a setting. 

  1. English boys’ boarding schools/prep schools

    Barnard, Robert.  School for Murder, 1983.
    Bruce, Leo. Death at St. Asprey’s School, 1967.
    George, Elizabeth.  Well Schooled in Murder, 1990.
    Gilbert, Michael.  The Night of the Twelfth, 1976.
    Le Carré, John.  A Murder of Quality, 1962
    Mitchell, Gladys.  Tom Brown’s Body, 1949.
     

  2. English girls’ boarding schools/prep schools

    Christie, Agatha.  Cat Among the Pigeons, 1959.
    Lemarchand, Elizabeth.  Death of an Old Girl, 1967.
     

  3. Colleges, excluding Oxford or Cambridge

    Cross, Amanda.  Death in a Tenured Position, 1981.
    Gosling, Paula.  Monkey Puzzle, 1990.
    Hill, Reginald.  An Advancement of Learning, 1971.
    Neel, Janet.  Death Among the Dons, 1993.
    Tey, Josephine.  Miss Pym Disposes, 1946.
     

  4. Mysteries set in Oxford

    Crispin, Edmund.  The Moving Toyshop, 1946.
    Dibdin, Michael.  Dirty Tricks, 1997.
    Fraser, Antonia.      Oxford Blood, 1985
    Holt, Hazel.  The Cruellest Month, 1991.
    Masterman, J.C.  An     Oxford Tragedy, 1933.
    Sayers, Dorothy.  Gaudy Night, 1935.
    Stallwood, Veronica.      Oxford Fall, 1996.
    Strong, Tony.  The Poison Tree, 1997
     

  5. Mysteries set in Cambridge

    Clinton-Baddeley, V.C.  Death’s Bright Dart, 1967.
    Daniel, Glynn.  The     Cambridge Murders, 1945.
    George, Elizabeth.  For the Sake of Elena, 1993.
    James, P.D.  An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, 1972.

My all-time favorite closed society novel is one that, by my own definition, isn’t a true “Golden Age” mystery, although it was written at the right time: Dorothy Sayer’s Gaudy Night, 1935.  I’m not going to tell you why I don’t think it’s a perfect mystery, because that might spoil the book for you, but like To Kill a Mockingbird, and Pride and Prejudice, it’s on my 100 Favorite Books List.  It’s not only a great love story, it’s very suspenseful.

More of my favorite mysteries set in academia are listed below.  To make my list, the mystery had to take place in a truly closed society (an outsider could not have sneaked in and murdered someone), and the solution to the mystery had to surprise me.

                   Christie, Agatha.  Cat Among the Pigeons, 1959.
                   Gilbert, Michael.  The Night of the Twelfth, 1976.
                   Le Carré, John.  A Murder of Quality, 1962. (also anexcellent film)
                   Lemarchand, Elizabeth.  Death of an Old Girl, 1967.
                   Neel, Janet.  Death Among the Dons, 1993.
                   Tey, Josephine.  Miss Pym Disposes, 1946.              

          Another type of closed society mystery that appeals to me are those set in churches, convents, or monasteries, especially the contemporary (or near contemporary) ecclesiastical mystery.  Again, I excluded any that are not truly “closed,” like Catherine Aird’s The Religious Body, 1966; and Antonia Fraser’s Quiet as a Nun, 1977.  Some of my favorites:

Charles, Kate.  Appointed to Die, 1993.  (Charles’s entire series is interesting.)
Gilbert, Michael.  Close Quarters, 1947.
Gilbert, Michael.  The Black Seraphim, 1983.
Greenwood, Diane.  Idol Bones, 1993.