Looking Back: "The Three Coffins"

As our Classic Mysteries podcast this week features impossible crime mysteries, I find it impossible to talk about such books without invoking what I still believe is the finest single example of the genre: John Dickson Carr's "The Three Coffins." I reviewed that book a couple of years ago.

That's the book which includes - as Chapter 17 - "The Locked-Room Lecture," in which our detective, Dr. Gideon Fell, essentially halts the book while he reviews, for the other characters and of course for the reader, all the ways in which so-called "locked room" and "impossible crime" puzzles can be set up and/or solved.

And the puzzles presented to the reader in "The Three Coffins" are given to us with flair - and a challenge. In the opening paragraph of the book, Carr tells the reader exactly what he is about to do:

[T]wo murders were committed, in such fashion that the murderer must not only have been invisible, but lighter than air. According to the evidence, this person killed his first victim and literally disappeared. Again according to the evidence, he killed his second victim in the middle of an empty street, with watchers at either end; yet not a soul saw him, and no footprints appeared in the snow.

If you don't find that an irresistable challenge, let me assure you that Carr's mastery of atmosphere make this book genuinely frightening - yet the solutions, of course, are entirely natural. I re-read this one every couple of years, and I am struck constantly by the book's fairness. The reader is given the clues needed to solve the case - if he or she can pick them out and piece them together.

"The Three Coffins" remains out of print, but Amazon.com has a number of used copies available. If you prefer, the book is in print in the U. K. and available (under its British title, "The Hollow Man") from Amazon.co.uk. By way of disclosure, I should note that, if you care to buy it, Amazon pays me a few cents on the US links, but not for sales from Britain. And, as always, if there is a mystery bookstore near you, I'm pretty sure the people there can find a copy for you.

Comments

[Josiah]

I was lucky enough to find the ImPress Mysteries edition of The Three Coffins at one of the many Portland-area Goodwill thrift stores.

(Do you know about ImPress? It's a publishing effort by Readers' Digest--I think-- to republish classic mysteries in brightly-colored hardback volumes with foil-embossed covers; the books look kind of like childrens' toys.)

After reading & listening to your reviews, I decided to pick up my copy and dig in. I'm about a third of the way through, and it's really great so far. There's so much information to keep track of, that I had to break down and start underlining passages and writing in the margins, but it's a really fun challenge.

I also read somewhere that Dr. Gideon Fell (great name) is based on Gilbert Chesterton, and at one point Superintendent Hadley says, "I always dread the time when you begin to trot out your damned paradoxes."

So, that sealed it. Fell is definitely based on G.K. Chesterton

[Les Blatt]

I'm not familiar with the Reader's Digest series - and even on Google, they're hard to find. I can't tell if they're still going; Library Thing has a list which suggests they were publishing at least through last year.

Yes, Dr. Fell is based on Chesterton - physical descriptions of Dr. Fell seem to match those of Chesterton, who was certainly one of Carr's favorites. Doug Greene, in his excellent biography of Carr, calls Chesterton "Carr's literary idol," and notes that Dr. Fell's speech patterns are also drawn from Chesterton. The paradoxes are another clue; so, I believe, is Dr. Fell's fondness for good English beer.

[Josiah]

I've only managed to find the odd ImPress book through second-hand stores. I don't think there's anywhere online that specializes in selling them. I think the Readers' Digest website has a few of the more current volumes for sale. It might be a book or two by Dorothy Sayers, if I remember right. Like you can't find those anywhere else.

Which brings us to the weirdness of the ImPress ImPrint. Some of the books are hard-to-find classics like Calamity Town by Ellery Queen (which I own, but have yet to read) and Ashenden, or the British Spy by Somerset Maugham (which I have yet to find, but I'm looking).

But the ImPress line also puts out ubiquitous books like The Maltese Falcon, The Big Sleep, and The Scarlet Pimpernel, which don't--under any circumstances--cry out for new editions.

But I guess I can't complain too much. Readers' Digest isn't a house run by-mystery-nerds/for-mystery-nerds.

I should just thank them for The Three Coffins.