Gender and sexuality

Kishwar Desai’s Simran Singh series: Crime, detection, and gender

“…Simran’s body is also kept central within the novels as its flaws and features are either celebrated or picked apart in Simran’s internal dialogue throughout the texts. Gill Plain’s examination of bodies in contemporary crime fiction in Twentieth-Century Crime Fiction: Gender, Sexuality, and the Body (2001) is useful here. Plain highlights the pivotal nature of gender to discussions of crime: “The increasing centrality of gender to studies of crime fiction is the inevitable outcome of a belated critical acknowledgement that the genre’s profound investment in the dynamics of power inevitably incorporates discourses of gender and sexuality” (2001: 8).…”

“…Gill Plain’s examination of bodies in contemporary crime fiction in Twentieth-Century Crime Fiction: Gender, Sexuality, and the Body (2001) is useful here. Plain highlights the pivotal nature of gender to discussions of crime: “The increasing centrality of gender to studies of crime fiction is the inevitable outcome of a belated critical acknowledgement that the genre’s profound investment in the dynamics of power inevitably incorporates discourses of gender and sexuality” (2001: 8). While much of Plain’s text deals with situating queerness in paradigms of detection, her emphasis on the embodied nature of detectives and victims alike is noteworthy (2001: 13).…”

“…Plain highlights the pivotal nature of gender to discussions of crime: “The increasing centrality of gender to studies of crime fiction is the inevitable outcome of a belated critical acknowledgement that the genre’s profound investment in the dynamics of power inevitably incorporates discourses of gender and sexuality” (2001: 8). While much of Plain’s text deals with situating queerness in paradigms of detection, her emphasis on the embodied nature of detectives and victims alike is noteworthy (2001: 13). Ultimately, Plain identifies the genre as one which presents a “façade of gender conformity” (2001: 25), concluding her argument as follows:In the original paradigm of detection, the monstrous was woman — or, more specifically, the feminine.…”

“…While much of Plain’s text deals with situating queerness in paradigms of detection, her emphasis on the embodied nature of detectives and victims alike is noteworthy (2001: 13). Ultimately, Plain identifies the genre as one which presents a “façade of gender conformity” (2001: 25), concluding her argument as follows:In the original paradigm of detection, the monstrous was woman — or, more specifically, the feminine. [ … ] “Woman” has returned not only as the other, but as the self of the detective, and has exploded this self with her contradictory and multiple desires — with her refusal to adhere to the patriarchal codes of rationality, explicability, and order.…”

“…[ … ] “Woman” has returned not only as the other, but as the self of the detective, and has exploded this self with her contradictory and multiple desires — with her refusal to adhere to the patriarchal codes of rationality, explicability, and order. (2001: 246)…”