[PREV - NAKED_LUNCH]    [TOP]

ORWELLS_MURDER

                                                   April 7, 2009

Orwell on the decline of morality
evidenced in crime fiction:                   It's not at all
                                              unusual for me
   "The Raffles stories, written from         to discover that
   the angle of the criminal, are much        the things I've     BRAIN_PULP
   less anti-social than many modern          been saying are
   stories written from the angle of the      already out
   detective. The main impression that        there, often
   they leave behind is of                    covered many
   boyishness. They belong to a time          decades before...
   when people had standards, though
   they happened to be foolish
   standards. Their key-phrase is 'not                        SHOOT_FIRST
   done'. The line that they draw
   between good and evil is as senseless
   as a Polynesian taboo, but at least,
   like the taboo, it has the advantage
   that everyone accepts it.

   "So much for _Raffles_. Now for a
   header into the cesspool."

           George Orwell, "Raffles and Miss Blandish" (1944)
           "Decline of the English Murder and other essays"
           [ref]



--------
[NEXT - ROUGHLY_READ]