Deconstructing the Detective Genre

📋 Course Outline

1. Deconstruction of detective genre
2. Identity as narrative
3. Language failure and violence
4. New York as labyrinth
5. Radical solitude and isolation
6. Failure of reason and interpretation
7. Meta-narrative and authority crisis
8. Detective story as ontological quest

📖 1. Deconstruction of detective genre

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

Anti-detective story
An anti-detective story is a narrative that employs the conventions of the detective genre but deliberately empties them of their traditional purpose. Instead of leading to a clear resolution or uncovering definitive truths, it subverts the genre’s typical goals, often emphasizing ambiguity, futility, or the impossibility of certainty.

False leads
False leads are misleading clues or directions within a narrative that divert the investigation away from the truth. In the context of City of Glass, the novel multiplies these false leads, preventing any final revelation and contributing to the dissolution of narrative causality.

Narrative causality dissolution
This refers to the breakdown of the logical progression and cause-and-effect relationships that usually underpin detective stories. Instead of a coherent chain of events leading to a resolution, the story fragments into incoherence, undermining the expectation of logical causality.