For many years, I have been a fan of Robert Van Gulik's marvelous mysteries featuring Judge Dee, of T'ang Dynasty China. Dee Jen-djieh was, in fact, a real, historic figure who served in the Imperial Court and elsewhere around the latter part of the seventh century. While Van Gulik, a Dutch diplomat and scholar who served in China and elsewhere, wrote all of the later Judge Dee mysteries by himself, he began by translating an existing Chinese manuscript, Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee. I reviewed it on the podcast several years ago. It remains a favorite book. Here's the text of my original review, slightly edited (mostly for time references).
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Those of us who relish good, classic mysteries – and enjoy the occasional foray into exotic settings and historical mysteries – are fortunate to have more than a dozen books by Robert Van Gulik about the exploits of Judge Dee. Judge Dee was a real person who lived in seventh century China. For much of his early career, he was a district magistrate, the most powerful local official in early Chinese society, before moving on later in life to become a leading official at the imperial court. Van Gulik – an orientalist and Dutch diplomat – introduced many western readers to imperial China, with his original novels and short stories about Judge Dee. But he began in 1949 with a truly classic mystery – a Chinese detective story, written in the 18th century, featuring Judge Dee, which Van Gulik translated for western readers. The book was called Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee.
The traditional Chinese detective story was different in many ways from the kind of mystery that those of us in the west enjoy. In his introduction to Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee, Robert Van Gulik notes five primary characteristics that might surprise many readers. First, the criminal is generally revealed at the outset of the book, so that the reader is less concerned with the question of whodunit than how and why the detective catches the culprit. Second, there is often a supernatural element, with the detective aided by ghosts or dreams. Third, there is an excess of details and digressions. Fourth, there is an enormous population of characters. And fifth, there are incredibly detailed and gruesome descriptions of the criminal’s ultimate execution.
Van Gulik picked Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee, written by an anonymous Chinese author in the 18th century, to translate because most of these factors were far less prominent than they were in many other traditional novels. He did take some liberties in his translation, trying to make the book more palatable to western readers – and I think he succeeded admirably.
Judge Dee, as noted earlier, was a historical figure. In this book, he is the magistrate of the district of Chang-ping. The magistrate was the central local authority and civil official in any district, called “the father-and-mother figure” by the people, responsible for everything from maintaining land records to solving crimes. In Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee, he is presented with three difficult crimes which must be solved, sometimes at considerable risk to himself. There is the murder of a silk trader, whose body is found lying by the side of a road. There is another murder in a nearby village, which proves both difficult and dangerous to solve. And there is the poisoning of a bride on her wedding night. While the cases are not related to each other, the judge must solve them all nearly simultaneously.
Van Gulik’s introduction provides a great deal of information about the Chinese justice system and how it worked, and the background information is invaluable in making the book readable and enjoyable. While there is a supernatural element involved in the plot, it is far less important in this novel (at least according to Van Gulik) than in many others, as the supernatural guidance tends merely to reinforce the judge’s own observations and deductions. Overall, the book provides a fascinating look inside another culture that few of us can really claim to know well. More to the point, it is an enjoyable mystery. It is fascinating to see how the judge reaches his conclusions and how he manages to solve the crimes and bring them home to the guilty. Van Gulik’s introduction and notes add considerable value to his translation. In those notes after the book, by the way, he observes:
I think that it might be an interesting experiment if one of our modern writers of detective stories would try his hand at composing an ancient Chinese detective story himself.
Apparently nobody took him up on his challenge – so Van Gulik himself went on to write 15 novels and a volume of short stories, all about Judge Dee, all put together along the lines of the Classic Chinese detective story. I find them thoroughly enjoyable, in no small measure for what they reveal about what was, to me, a little known or understood way of life. If you want to see how it all started, try Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee, by Robert Van Gulik.
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You can listen to the original podcast review by clicking here.
Next: The Case of the One-Eyed Witness, by Erle Stanley Gardner.
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