Other Voices, v.1, n.3 (January 1999)
Adrienne Gosselin
Like Dashiell Hammett, Rudolph Fisher, author of The Conjure-Man Dies (1932) experimented with the clue puzzle format dominating the so-called Golden Age of detective fiction in the 1920s and early 1930s. Also like Hammett, Fisher's experiment involves combining classical detective fiction with elements of the newly developing hard-boiled formula. Among the ways Fisher's experiment is unique is in its transfer of the detective plot to an all-black setting. As a result, The Conjure-Man Dies is the first text to replace the “formulaic combination of characters, settings, and events designed to represent a microcosm of middle-class society” (Grella 42) with characters, settings, and events designed to represent a microcosm of urban black society. [1]
The plot of The Conjure-Man Dies centers on the murder of N'Gana Frimbo, a Harlem conjure-man who is also an African king and Harvard graduate. Midway into the investigation, the corpse disappears and, shortly thereafter, Frimbo “resurrects” himself, seated in the very chair on which he had been murdered. Unable to convince the police what they mistook for death to be suspended animation, Frimbo offers to assist the police in finding his would-be murderer. Leading the police investigation is Perry Dart, one of the ten black policemen on the Harlem police force and the only black to be promoted from patrolman to detective. Working with Dart is John Archer, a pedantic black physician with a Latinate vocabulary and a penchant for solving crimes. [2] Of equal importance, but overlooked by critics, is Bubber Brown, [3] an ex-sanitation worker turned private investigator, who works to clear his partner, who has been framed for Frimbo’s murder. [4] In the course of the investigation, it is discovered that the murdered victim is not the conjure-man but, rather, N’Ogo Frimbo, the conjure-man’s assistant and fellow countryman. While Archer and Dart, with assistance from Bubber Brown, pursue Frimbo as the murderer, Frimbo—who is innocent—pursues the real criminal, whom he reveals at the novel’s conclusion, but at the cost of his life.
RECOMMENDED LITERATURE:
1. Кухаренко. В.А. A Book of Practice in Stylistics. pp. 108-120.
2. Кухаренко В.А. Seminars in Style. pp. 113-126.
3. Galperin I.R. Stylistics pp. 246-307.
UNIT 11
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