By Lisa Hopkins

This book explores why crime fiction so often alludes to Shakespeare. It ranges widely over a variety of authors including classic golden age crime writers such as the four ‘queens of crime’ (Allingham, Christie, Marsh, Sayers), Nicholas Blake and Edmund Crispin, as well as more recent authors such as Reginald Hill, Kate Atkinson and Val McDermid. It also looks at the fondness for Shakespearean allusion in a number of television crime series, most notably Midsomer Murders, Inspector Morse and Lewis, and considers the special sub-genre of detective stories in which a lost Shakespeare play is found. It shows how Shakespeare facilitates discussions about what constitutes justice, what authorises the detective to track down the villain, who owns the countryside, national and social identities, and the question of how we measure cultural value.

London; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016. 211p.

By Charles Dickens

Illustrations by John Leech. Probably Dickens’s best known work, certainly a permanent fixture every Christmas. Feuding with his publishers, Dickens financed the publishing of the book himself, ordering lavish binding, gilt edging, and hand-colored illustrations and then setting the price at no more than five shillings. This combination resulted in disappointingly low profits despite high sales.

Chapman and Hall. (1843) 101 pages.

Edited by George S. Larke-Walsh

Gangster films have consistently been one of America’s most popular genres. In 1954, Robert Warshow calls their protagonists the logical development of the myth of the Westerner and suggests they “appeal to that side of us which refuses to believe in the normal possibilities of happiness and achievement” (454). Earlier, in 1946, Warshow had stated a gangster’s “tragic flaw” as their refusal to accept limitations, thus arguing the inevitability of their downfall in every film. As such, gangsters are symbols of freedom and selfexpression, but with a concurrent inability to control their impulses. Warshow’s descriptions provide easily understood and pragmatic reasons for the gangster’s appeal, and consequently these two analyses have dominated responses and writings about the gangster film ever since their mid century publication.

Gangster films are unique in comparison to other crime films, because they are not narratives about petty criminals, mentally disturbed serial killers, or individuals on a crime spree. They are narratives about organization, about loyalties and betrayals, and about success or failure; achievement is often measured simply through an individual’s ability to survive their environment. Cinematic gangsters don’t have lives outside of their profession; they don’t have the ability to walk away from their criminal identities. In these ways, the gangster genre is much more than just a type of crime film Warshow calls their protagonists the logical development of the myth of the Westerner and suggests they “appeal to that side of us which refuses to believe in the normal possibilities of happiness and achievement”

Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2018. 567p.

By Fran Mason

Much analysis of gangster movies has been based upon a study of the gangster as a malign figuration of the American Dream, originally set in the era of the Depression. This text extends previous analysis of the genre by examining the evolution of gangster movies from the 1930s to the contemporary period and by placing them in the context of cultural and cinematic issues such as masculinity, consumerism and technology. With a close examination of many films from Scarface and Public Enemy to Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction , this book provides a fascinating insight into a topical and popular subject.

Basingstoke, Hampshire. UK; New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. 203p.

By Gene D. Phillips

In this book, noted film and literature scholar Gene D. Phillips looks at the crime film genre. In addition to the usual suspects like Little Caesar, and The Godfather Part II, which he examines with a fresh perspective, Phillips also calls attention to some of the less heralded but no less worthy films and filmmakers that represent the genre.;The rise of the gangster film -- Little Caesar and The public enemy -- The story of Temple Drake and No orchids for Miss Blandish -- Dead end and This gun for hire -- Criss cross and White heat -- John Huston's Key Largo and The asphalt jungle -- The lady from Shanghai and The great Gatsby -- Fritz Lang's You only live once and The big heat -- The godfather, part II -- Bonnie and Clyde and The untouchables -- The grifters and The departed -- Dillinger and Public enemies -- Gangster squad (2013) and other films.

Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014. 191p.

By Jack Shadoian

Dreams and Dead Ends provides a compelling history of the twentieth-century American gangster film. Beginning with Little Caesar (1930) and ending with Things To Do In Denver When You're Dead (1995), Jack Shadoian adroitly analyzes twenty notable examples of the crime film genre. Moving chronologically through nearly seven decades, this volume offers illuminating readings of a select group of the classic films--including The Public Enemy, D.O.A., Bonnie and Clyde, and The Godfather--that best define and represent each period in the development of the American crime film. Richly illustrated with more than seventy film stills, Dreams and Dead Ends details the evolution of the genre through insightful and precise considerations of cinematography, characterization, and narrative style.

Oxford, UK; New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. 397p.

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By Ron Wilson

This volume examines the gangster film in its historical context with an emphasis on the ways the image of the gangster has adapted and changed as a result of socio-cultural circumstances. From its origins in Progressive-era reforms to its use as an indictment of corporate greed, the gangster film has often provided a template for critiquing American ideas and values concerning individualism, success, and business acumen. The gangster genre has also been useful in critically examining race and ethnicity in American culture in terms of "otherness." Films studied include Musketeers of Pig Alley (1912), The Racket (1928), The Captive City (1952), The Godfather, Part Two (1974), Goodfellas (1990), and Killing Them Softly (2012).

New York: Wallflower Press, 2015. 144p.

By Melvin Purvis with Alex Tresniowski

By the end of 1934 Melvin Purvis was, besides President Roosevelt, the most famous man in America. Just thirty-one years old, he presided over the neophyte FBI's remarkable sweep of the great Public Enemies of the American Depression -- John Dillinger; Pretty Boy Floyd; Baby Face Nelson. America finally had its hero in the War on Crime, and the face of all the conquering G-Men belonged to Melvin Purvis. Yet these triumphs sowed the seeds of his eventual ruin. With each new capture, each new headline touting Purvis as the scourge of gangsters, one man's implacable resentment grew. J. Edgar Hoover, Director of the FBI, was immensely jealous of the agent who had been his friend and prot'g', and vowed that Melvin Purvis would be brought down. A vendetta began that would not end even with Purvis's death. For more than three decades Hoover trampled Purvis's reputation, questioned his courage and competence, and tried to erase his name from all records of the FBI's greatest triumphs.

Alston Purvis is Melvin's only surviving son. With the benefit of a unique family archive of documents, new testimony from colleagues and friends of Melvin Purvis and witnesses to the events of 1934, he has produced a grippingly authentic new telling of the gangster era, seen from the perspective of the pursuers. By finally setting the record straight about his father, he sheds new light on what some might call Hoover's original sin -- a personal vendetta that is one of the earliest and clearest examples of Hoover's bitter, destructive paranoia..

New York: Public Affairs, 2009. 400p

By T.J. English

Here is the shocking true saga of the Irish American mob. In Paddy Whacked, bestselling author and organized crime expert T. J. English brings to life nearly two centuries of Irish American gangsterism, which spawned such unforgettable characters as Mike "King Mike" McDonald, Chicago's subterranean godfather; Big Bill Dwyer, New York's most notorious rumrunner during Prohibition; Mickey Featherstone, troubled Vietnam vet turned Westies gang leader; and James "Whitey" Bulger, the ruthless and untouchable Southie legend. Stretching from the earliest New York and New Orleans street wars through decades of bootlegging scams, union strikes, gang wars, and FBI investigations, Paddy Whacked is a riveting tour de force that restores the Irish American gangster to his rightful preeminent place in our criminal history -- and penetrates to the heart of the American experience.

New York: HarperCollins, 2006. 480p.

By Allan Pinkerton

The stories which compose this volume are taken from the author’s original notes on three actual cases, which were placed in his hands several years ago. Whatever else may be said of these tales, they cannot be denied the merit of strict truthfulness ; and it is to this quality, more than to any pretensions to literary excel¬ lence, that the author trusts in presenting them to the public. The patrons of the old Clifton House in Chicago will readily recall the occurrences related in “ Claude Melnotte,” and many of the regular boarders will recognize the characters herein depicted. In some very minor details, a small ingredient of fiction has been introduced, but the accuracy of the story has not been perceptibly affected thereby. It is hardly necessary to state that the names given are all fictitious ; the characters, however, are genuine, and the localities are correctly described. The same is the case with the dramatis persona of the “Two Sisters”; but, for obvious reasons, the scene of the abduction is located at some distance from the town where it actually occurred. The operations of Jules Imbert, “ The Frenchman,” are given literally, without the slightest departure from the facts. (From Preface)

Chicago : W.B. Keen, Cooke & Co. ; Chicago : Lakeside Publishing and Printing Co. 1875. 346p.

By George Barton

It is a trite saying that "truth is stranger than fiction. " Like most proverbs, this one has to be taken with the proverbial grain of salt. It is a fact, nevertheless, that the raw truth often possesses greater human interest than the most polished fiction. Crime, in itself, is painful and sometimes repulsive, but a study of the methods of criminal investigation by which difficult problems are solved and the guilty brought to justice , is entertaining and may be profitable. With this thought in mind, the reader is invited to a consideration of a few of the famous cases that are to be found in the history of the world's greatest detectives. Each story is complete in itself, and outside of its own interest is intended to illustrate the peculiar system of the official and the nation therein portrayed. (From the Preface)

New York : McKinlay Stone & Mackenzie, 1909.

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By Allan Pinkerton

Maroney, the expressman, is living in Georgia, having been released during the war. Mrs. Maroney is also alive. Any one desiring to convince himself of the absolute truthfulness of this narrative can do so by examining the court records in Montgomery, Ala., where Maroneywas convicted. The facts stated in the second volume are well known to many residents of Chicago. Young Bright was in the best society during his stay at the Clifton House, and many of his friends will remember him. His father is now largely interested in business in New York, Chicago,and St. Louis. The events connected with the abduction of " The Two Sisters," will be readily recalled byW. L. Church, Esq., of Chicago, and others. The storyof " Alexander Gay," the Frenchman, will be found in the criminal records of St. Louis, where he was sentenced for forgery. So with the stories in this volume. The characters in "The Detective and the Somnambulist," will be easily recognized by many readers in the South. As the family of Drysdale are still living and holding a highly respectable place in society, the locality is not correctly given, and fictitious names are used throughout. (From Book)

Toronto, Belford , 1877. 274p.

By Allan Pinkerton

Containing numerous detective sketches : collected from private records. “ The life of a Detective is naturally a varied and excitable one. At one time he is engaged in the pursuit of the hardened Criminal, whose hands are crimson with the blood of his victim—at another, the Burglar, whose manipulations of the protecting appliances which have been invented to secure the wealth of others from his rapacious grasp, engrosses his attention—and anon he is found working his silent way through the intricate mazes of science, where the Counterfeiter and the Forger, with their miraculous chemicals and deft handiwork, require not only a familiarity with their mode of procedure, but an astute knowledge of human nature and their various characteristics. In the succeeding pages will be found a series of incidents which will fully justify my previous expressionsj and will throw a ray of light upon some of the hidden mysteries which surround the Criminal, but which must eventually present themselves to the intelligent eye of the Detective.”

New York : G.W. Carleton & Co., 1883. 682p.

By William A. Pinkerton

Address Given at the Annual Convention of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, 1907. “Heretofore my addresses have been upon subjects with which most of us are familiar and, while I know there are among those present, members of this Association who have had more or less t(3 do with the apprehension of the train robber or ''hold-up" criminal, a product we have that no other country has ex- cept as our fugitives ; I believe some reminiscences of these outlaws will be of interest. As the detective agents throughout the United States of many railroad, express and stage companies and of the American Bankers' Association, and co-operating with police officials, United States marshals, sheriffs, railroads detectives and various other law enforcement authorities, for over fifty years our agency has been, engaged investigating many of the robberies of railroad trains, banks and stages by this desperate robber ; my father, the late Allan Pinkerton, my brother Robert and I, often in these years personally taking part in running down this now almost extinct outlaw.

Wm. A. and Robert A. Pinkerton, Chicago and New York. 1907. 86p.

By Allan Pinkerton

“one of the cardinal principles of my detective system, viz.: "That crime can and must be detected by the pure and honest heart obtaining a controlling power over that of the criminal." The history of the old man who, although in the possession of unlimited wealth, leaves the shores of his native land to escape the imagined dangers of assassination, and arrives in America, only to meet his death — violent and mysterious — at the hands of a trusted servant, is in all essential points a recital of actual events.”

New York: G.W. Gillingham, 1880.

By Allan Pinkerton

FROM PREFACE. Almost every community has known one or more periods when the dissolute elements of the place have seemed to be unusually active, and the majesty of the law so little regarded and feared as to cause a perfect carnival of crime. Under such circumstances, the honest portion of the population become bewildered and disheartened, and the rogues apparently take charge of affairs, until some sudden dis- covery brings to punishment a number of the guilty men, and then order returns. Such was the experience of "The- Model Town." It was a very pleasant and thriving inland place, the law- abiding people far outnumbering the law-breakers; yet previous to the time when my services were engaged there was a period of almost total disregard of law and authority.in the place. In a few weeks my detectives were successful in identifying the ringleaders of all the evil-doers of the town, and I was able to gather them in for punishment in small groups, without exposing my plans or alarming the others, whose guilt was yet to be discovered. At length, having effectually broken up all the parties of thieves, counterfeiters, burglars, and incendiaries, I left the place to enjoy a career of peace and prosperity. There are many persons yet living who will remember the circumstances herein related, and they will recall how complete the reformation was worked by the arrest and conviction of the criminals. From the moment it was re- vealed that Pinkerton's detectives were at work in the town, the orderly character of the place was assured for an indefi- nite length of time, and the good effect lasted many years after my men had been withdrawn. As the story of " Byron as a Detective " may call forth some discussion, I merely desire to say that, concerning his being the son of Lord Byron, I have no means of determining the truth or falsity of the claim ; and only give the facts, which were then common among his associates, to the public for what they are worth. There were doubtless hundreds of other men of legitimate, as well as illegitimate, birth, each one of whom chance might have thrown into habits of reckless adventure resulting in crime, the temperament and mental conditions of each of whom might have given rise to the theory of being Byron's son, especially when the claim was so persistently put forward and so commonly accepted as in this case.

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By Allan Pinkerton

“The characters with whom the reader will make acquaintance have all been in the flesh. But few of them, so far as I know, have yet quitted it. The identity of some has been veiled by fictitious names. ..any one of those introduced would be able to recognize a faithful account of the events narrated. ..of the events themselves it will be sufficient for me to state that they had a wide public notoriety at the time of their occurrence….the slight embellishment which is here given them…” from the Preface.

New York: G.W. Dillingham, 1881. 364p.

By Alan Pinkerton

The governing idea in the mind of the author, while preparing this volume for the press, has been to give details connected with the MOLLIE Maguires, and follow strictly the truth concerning the adventures of the detectives during three years passed in their midst. He is aware that, in many places, the relation reads much like fiction, and that it will be accepted as romance by very many who are totally unacquainted with the country and the people attempted to be described. It has been the constant endeavor to adhere closely to facts, and if the incidents are, in a great degree, novel and absorbing, it is due to these facts, and they were worked out, through arduous labors, in sleepless nights and undivided attention to the ends to be gained. The coal regions of Pennsylvania are inhabited by a mixture of races, the ingredients perhaps more widely differing, in character and origin, than those of any other portion of the globe. Living within a stone's throw of each other will be found the German, Swede, Norwegian, Pole, Irish, Scotch, English Bohemian, and Russian. And in moving across the country, from one colliery to another, representatives of nearly all of these widely separated nations may be encountered, with here and there an American and Pennsylvania German. All endeavor to express themselves in Anglo-Saxon, but their foreign idioms and native eccentricities will, spite of themselves, occasionally crop out. Hence the life of a person, who is sensitively alive to diversified phases of human nature and having a keen sense of the humorous, in the mining districts, cannot well be devoid of enjoyment. Some extraordinary habits and peculiarities are found in the coal fields not discovered elsewhere.

New York: G.W. Carleton, 1880. 552p.

By Allan Pinkerton

The Mississippi River has for many years more especially since the close of the war been infested by a class of men who never would try to get an honest living, but would prey upon their neighbors or attack the property of southern railroads and express companies ; these marauders could be seen any day prowling along the banks of the Mississippi, in fact, the shores and immediate neighborhood were peopled by just such a class, who cared not how they obtained a living ; for the crimes they committed, they often suffered infinitely worse punishment, more so than any suffering which could hare been entailed on them from leading a poor but honest life. The story of the "Mississippi OUTLAWS AND THE DETECTIVES '' is written to illustrate incidents which took place in the southern section of the country at no rery remote date. " DON PEDEO AND THE DETECTIVES " is another story of detective experience, which came under my own observation and management ; it is a truthful narrative, and shows that some men are worse than known criminals, and can squander the money they have obtained by false pretenses, in a very lavish manner. " THE POISONER AND THE DETECTIVES " is a well- known bit of detective experience, which, when read, will be recognized by any one who ever takes an inter- est in crime, and the bringing to justice its perpetrators. The reader must remember that fictitious names are used in all of these stories, otherwise the facts are plainly and truthfully told as they occurred. (From Preface)

New York: G.W. Dillingham, 1882. 377p.

By John Milton Scanlan

A History of the "Gun Men" And Outlaws, and a Life-Story of the Greatest Sheriff of the Old Southwest. “Though simple and not attended by ostentation, the ceremonial was very impressive, and there were tears for the brave and generous Pat Garrett as his mortal remains were consigned to earth.”

El Paso, TX: Carleton F. Dodge, 1908. 42p.