The academic murder mystery as a popular subgenre from the Polish perspective
The academic murder mystery as a popular subgenre from the Polish perspective

Summary/Abstract: In his chapter devoted to academic mystery fiction included in Critical Survey of Mystery and Detective Fiction (2008), Joseph Rosenblum notices that the substantial collection of academic mystery novels gathered by John E. Kramer in his annotated bibliography Academe in Mystery and Detective Fiction (2000) illustrates the prophetic nature of John Donne’s observation regarding universities as an ideal setting for crime stories. Murder mysteries set in academia constitute a thriving subgenre of academic novels, with many works written by authors connected in some way to British and American tertiary education institutions. While universities in other countries also offer compelling material for novelists, there appears to be a certain kind of reluctance among, for instance, Polish scholars to divulge academic matters to the general public, or to satirize their colleagues for fear of becoming subjects of ridicule themselves, or, even worse, to become depicted as either a victim or a perpetrator of a hideous crime committed within university walls. Nevertheless, there are authors who have chosen to explore the landscape of Polish universities, considering it a fertile ground for constructing captivating mystery plots, albeit, hopefully, without any real-life homicides to serve as inspiration.

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