Ian Rankin at Cardiff University, Monday 3 March 2008, Part 1 of possibly 3?

As part of the Cardiff Humanities Research Institute's "Crime Narratives in Context" series (see here for more detail and mission statement), Ian Rankin delighted a packed lecture theatre with his presence last night.  Billed as a public lecture entitled "Why Crime Fiction is Good for You", a mixed audience was present with ages ranging from undergraduates through to the more mature; academics and those who simply love crime fiction; men and women of equal representation.

The scene was set: after walking the lengths of spotlessly clean wood panelled corridors and down a set of stairs, the doors opened into a steep lecture theatre with the usual blackboards at the front.  One board had not been cleaned and accompanying a spidery delivered diagram were words such as Eurotropic, DNA, parasitic and the expression "Fast reproduction - must have sex".

Following introductions, Rankin took up the baton, walked briskly to the diagram, laid his fingers on one part and boomed out "Gentlemen, if your penis looks like that, please seek medical attention immediately."  This was clearly Rankin on a roll.

He'd had lunch in Cardiff earlier that day and seen the reviews of the opera he'd been involved in, which opened last weekend.  The reviews were "awful".  They seemed to say "Stick to the day job, Ian Rankin".  But Rankin was not about to hide in shame and dwell on that.  Next, he announced that he didn't do lectures, much like Mariah Carey doesn't do stairs.  He said he would "burble" for a while and then take questions.

And if the ground hadn't disappeared from under the feet the audience yet, he then declared that all were there under false pretenses:

• The audience because the title of the lecture had been determined on the hoof - it was something he'd prepared a few years before - and even though he had a bundle of A4 paper, he also had a small piece of paper representing the few lines he'd saved and commandeered for the night.  (Neither were referred to during the course of proceedings; all words came from the moment and heart.)
• Rankin himself was there under that false pretense as he never set out to be a crime writer.  To explain, he set out his background...

Having graduated, Rankin was not too impressed with the real world out there.  He liked university life, wanted to stick around and do a PhD.  Thomas Pynchon was his subject of choice.  Funding for such a PhD in Edinburgh was not an option, he was told.

"Well, who'd I get finding on?"  he asked.

"Muriel Spark."

"Who?"

The last thing he wanted to do was a PhD on the novels of Muriel Spark, said Rankin.  He wanted to write poems, short stories and books.  But the PhD fulfilled one of his objectives...

His first book was called "Summer Rites" and featured a one-legged schizophrenic librarian called Janine.  The first 2/3rds were considered "interesting" the latter third "needed work".  Rankin was pleased to announce that his wife "still says" the book is "his best work".

Then came "The Flood" and Rankin got into trouble on the autobiographical side.  He may have changed the name of his home town - slightly - but the novel was about a boy growing up in small town, much like him.  Character names reflected real neighbours; something his father was keen to point out.

Back to the PhD, Rankin was reading the novels of Muriel Spark and became interested in her character Jean Brodie, a descendant of Deacon Brodie.  Said Rankin of Deacon Brodie, "He was eventually hanged on a gibbet of his own devising".  Rankin observed that Brodie was an influence on R. L. Stevenson when he came to write the "Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde", suggesting that Stevenson was a Jekyll and Hyde type character himself.

Further back in his life, Rankin admitted to being an outsider, someone who lived on the periphery, always observing life.  He wrote unrequited love poetry when at school.  He became a chameleon and felt like Robert Louis Stevenson.

Spark, said Rankin, was influenced by the ballads of the borders and this led on to James Hogg's " The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner".  Here, urged Rankin, we have a member of God's elect, someone who can get away with anything, who kills his own brother.  Here, we have an early psychological, Gothic crime novel, which could never be Christie or Chandler.

Proving he actually did some work on that PhD and didn't just write what he wanted to, Rankin then went on to talk about Spark's novel "The Driver's Seat", published in 1970.  Spark wrote about a woman who wanted to commit suicide, but felt she couldn't.  Thus she hires a serial killer to kill her, but still she wants to be in control.  For Rankin, this was fascinating. 

Then came Edinburgh.  It was not Cardenden, his home town, and not Rankin; he was an outsider and wanted to make sense of the city.   Suddenly, he gets the idea of picture puzzles being sent to someone who wants to block out the past.  He thought he was consciously trying to re-write Jekyll and Hyde with his first Rebus novel "Knots and Crosses" and looked in vain for a TLS review recognising that when it came out.  They missed the point.  With his next Rebus novel "Hide and Seek" the working title had been "Hyde and Seek".

But more importantly, he felt like an outsider in Edinburgh and wanted to make sense of the world.  The reason Rankin writes is to make sense of the world.  It works for him.  He's decided the novel works for him; that the crime novel does it for him.  He became a crime writer by mistake whilst trying to write the "great Scottish novel".

"Do I want to write the kind of books only the academe would read or that my Dad would read?" he once asked himself, recognising that his father was a crime fiction fan in the process.  Even in such academic presence, he admitted to the latter.  And so he should be: he's led the march and the academics have been happy to catch up with him, certainly in south Wales and Cardiff University in particular - Professor Stephen Knight, anyone?

And then we came to the "cosy"; not Rankin's cup of cha.  Over Agatha, he prefers the darker, more urban, more realistic crime school.  Cosy, in his mind, is a bit Shakespearean comedy.  There's a village.  There's a world within that that is shaken up.  The cops are working class and defer to the middle class spinster.  This did not reflect the world Rankin knew.

Rankin considers Chandler to be more realistic with his "mean streets".  Chandler wrote some 10 rules of crime fiction which challenged the "cosy", asserted Rankin.  The mechanics of a "whodunnit" bored Rankin; he preferred a "messy nature", e.g. Chandler's "Big Sleep".  When Chandler was asked who killed the chauffeur, he replied "No idea; it's never been solved."

For Rankin, the crime novel is also an intellectual pursuit.

Rebus had to be "of a certain age" at the outset.  He had to be old enough to have the experience and to have blocked something from his past (for the puzzles in "Knots and Crosses").  Thus he made him about 40 years of age at the start of the series. Then Rankin aged him real time...

Problem no. 1: the CID retire at 60 in Scotland, hence the end is nigh.

Someone texted him on this, someone who had previously texted him along the lines of "Nice to see that you have St Leonard's as Rebus's station, but they don't have CID there."  Rankin can appreciate the fact of the downside, but still manages to laugh at the implications...

Then a certain member of the Scottish Parliament suggested that CID staff retire later, just to keep Rebus going and Rankin said he'd never had had so much "hate mail" from real cops.  Then came a Scottish police cold-case review team - SCREW, so Rankin told us - opening doors, perhaps?  Clearly, no one wanted to see the end of Rebus.

But for the future, Rankin noted the ever increasing development of his female characters.  Initially, he'd lacked confidence in bringing the females to the fore.  But then, both female crime writers and female real-life cops fedback that they liked Templar and Siobhan.  Rebus once had a side-kick, male, but he didn't work out.  Siobhan has now developed into a priority - an accident of sorts - as happens to Rankin with his writing.

Cultural divides?  We heard this too.  Rankin starts his novel writing with a dead body and no idea who or why or how.  Along the way, his American agent has asked him to start with a body on page 1, as his North American readers can't wait for page 9.

Siobhan may have been a minor character once, but like others, she has grown in presence.  Like Watson to Holmes, she provides the proverbial side-kick and mirror, the person who asks questions and garners the explanation from her mentor and lead.  Cafferty too, infinite criminal, was once small and became big.

Rankin then went on to describe his writing style and later took questions from the audience.  Part 2 tomorrow evening, hopefully, on writing; with part 3 on the Q&A session, later in the week.

(Please allow me me some slack for personal reasons!  Believe me, I need the time...)

Comments

[James Bashkin]

Being American, I find I usually prefer to have a dead body on the floor by my bed, so I can trip over it while on the way to pick up my next crime novel!

I think we might have a good career re-writing classics and inserting dead bodies on page one. Might be a stretch for The Bible, but it could "liven up" Genesis.

Thanks for all of the great information about I. R.! Best wishes, Jim

Also found at www.greenchemistry.wordpress.com

[Norm]

Thanks for this cfr slack duly granted.