School
may be getting out for the summer, but the Tuesday Night Bloggers are
donning their academic robes and enrolling in a month of sinister summer
school. Throughout the month of June our group of Golden Age Detective
aficionados will be taking our examinations and writing papers on the
dastardly deeds of academe. Academic mysteries are one of my favorite
sub-genres of the field and so I will be collecting the papers here at
the Block. If you'd like to join us for a month of academic mysteries,
please stop by every Tuesday for group discussion and I'll add your
posts to the list. We focus on the Golden Age of crime
fiction--generally accepted as published between the World Wars, but
everyone seems to have a slightly different definition and we're pretty
flexible.This week's Star Pupils and their essays:
Kate at crossexaminingcrime: "Six Reasons Writers Have Used the Academic Milieu and/or Academic Sleuths"
JJ at The Invisible Event: "Life Imitating Art in 'The Day the Children Vanished' (1958) by Hugh Pentecost"
Moira at Clothes in Books: "Oxford vs. Cambridge"
Brad at ahsweetmysteryblog: "Man Proposes, Miss Pym Disposes"
John at Pretty Sinister Books: "Death & the Professors -Kathleen Sproul"
Curtis at The Passing Tramp: "Down These Mean Lanes a Librarian Must Go"
Helen at Your Freedom & Ours: "Is This Where It All Started?"
For Review: Last Week's Essays
JJ at The Invisible Event: "Life Imitating Art in 'The Day the Children Vanished' (1958) by Hugh Pentecost"
Moira at Clothes in Books: "Oxford vs. Cambridge"
Brad at ahsweetmysteryblog: "Man Proposes, Miss Pym Disposes"
John at Pretty Sinister Books: "Death & the Professors -Kathleen Sproul"
Curtis at The Passing Tramp: "Down These Mean Lanes a Librarian Must Go"
Helen at Your Freedom & Ours: "Is This Where It All Started?"
For Review: Last Week's Essays
**********************************
Okay, class, today's session will begin with a pop quiz. Put your books away and close down your search engines. Let's see how much time you've spent with your suggested readings list and looking over the essays from our last meeting. In part one, each question has four entries--three entries share a common theme, setting, authorial characteristic, etc. beyond the common thread of "academic mystery." Your job is to identify the imposter. Extra credit for correctly identifying the common denominator--especially if it matches the common denominator your instructor has in mind. Other common denominators will be considered for half credit.
In part two, please match the academic detective to the appropriate title.
Pencils ready? Please click the link below to begin. Please be sure to enter your name if you would like credit for correct answers.
Answers to the Pop Quiz will be announced with next week's TNB post.
I have had two people take the Pop Quiz--one with no name attached and one with only the letter "L" in the name entry. Anybody want to fess up to an entry?
ReplyDeleteMy goodness but that was hard! not really sure I want to know how I did. But I did, I hope, put my name in a recognizable form, so can I boost my grade for that?
ReplyDeleteMoira: I'm sorry it was hard! And--yes, extra credit for putting your name on it. :-)
ReplyDeletePlease don't embarrass me by publishing my results ;-) Those questions are TOUGH!!
ReplyDeleteBut a lot of fun and thanks very much for creating it.
Noah: I won't publish answers. I'll just announce the winner (and maybe a runner-up). Honestly, you all are so well-read, I thought maybe it would be too easy....
ReplyDeleteI have one that I was working on but ended up posting today. Oops. Will you please add it to the links above?
ReplyDeleteDeath and the Professors by Kathleen Sproul
Doing the test right now. My submission on the way...
Crikey, straight to the bottom of the class for me!
ReplyDelete