The contemporary Detective Fiction: the legal thriller and forensic fiction
Educational Objectives: Educational Objectives: The course will analyze the detective fiction genre in its contemporary developments with specific attention to the legal thriller and forensic fiction, as well as to their reciprocal intersections.
Syllabus: The course will focus on the analysis of legal thrillers such as P.D. James’ and Lisa Ballantyne’s novels and on the analysis of the forensic fiction, in particular Kathy Reichs’ narrative. Specific attention will be devoted to the figure of the detective, the lawyer and the forensic doctor, as well as to their search for justice and truth, the characteristic tenets of the genre which are disrupted and re-read in the light of postmodern theories and assume a metanarrative dimension.
Bibliography:
Primary Texts (to be read in English, in any edition):
P.D. James, A Certain Justice (1997)
Kathy Reichs, Deja Dead (1998)
Lisa Ballantyne, The Guilty One (2012)
Critical Texts
- D. Carpi, L’ansia della scrittura. Parola e silenzio nella narrativa inglese contemporanea, Napoli, Liguori, 1995. (Introduction and Ch. 1)
- S. Knight, Crime Fiction, Palgrave Macmillan (2004 or 2010)
Manuals: from the Victorian Age to the contemporary period
- P. Bertinetti, a cura di, Storia della Letteratura Inglese, Torino, Einaudi, 2000
Requirements
Primary texts are to be read in English.
Students unable to attend lectures are required to get in touch with the teachers before preparing for the exam.
orale exam
