Love Lies Bleeding

Having become a fan of the publishing house of Felony and Mayhem they have done mystery fans a great service in making available titles like "Love lies Bleeding". Having read most of the other Fen novels I found this to be the best, an excellent story with Fen in top form. One of the things I enjoy most about Crispins' novels is his skill in using vocabulary not usually associated with mysteries, half the fun is learning new words to impress family and friends with. For anyone looking for an enjoyable and intelligent reading experience you couldn't do better than the Gervase Fen novels.

"Love Lies Bleeding" (1948) is the fifth of the Professor Fen mysteries, falling between "Swan Song" (1947) and "Buried for Pleasure" (1948). It involves foul play at the Castrevenford School for Boys, the second of Crispin's mysteries to take place outside of Fen's usual haunts in Oxford.From 1943 to 1945 the author, Bruce Montgomery a.k.a. Edmund Crispin worked as an assistant master at Schrewsbury School, and he attributes his "knowledge of the criminal in human nature" to this experience. I'm certain the fictional Castrevenford School and its inhabitants bear a close resemblance to Schrewsbury School and its inhabitants. In fact, my Penguin edition of "Love Lies Bleeding" does not include the usual disclaimer about 'work of fiction whose characters bear no resemblance, etc. etc...'Hopefully, there weren't quite as many homicides at Schrewsbury.One of my favorite characters in the Fen mysteries, the ancient and possibly senile Professor Wilkes, is missing from "Love Lies Bleeding." However at Castrevenford, Professor Wilkes has an eerie alter-ego in the ancient and possibly senile mixed Bloodhound, Mr. Merrythought. In fact, the dog almost steals the stage from Fen:"'Good God,' said Fen in a muffled voice."The dog was a large, forbidding bloodhound, on whose aboriginal color and shape one or two other breeds had been more or less successfully superimposed. He stood just inside the doorway, unnervingly immobile, and fixed Fen with a malevolent and hypnotic stare...."'He ought to be put away, really,' said the headmaster, regarding Mr. Merrythought with considerable distaste. 'The trouble is, you see, that he's liable to homicidal fits.'"'Oh,' said Fen. 'Oh.'"Mr. Merrythought turns out to be a hero, not a murderer although there are plenty of those to go around. Fen is invited to Castrevenford by his old friend the Headmaster, as a last-minute substitute to give out the prizes on Speech Day. By the time Fen arrives, a student from the nearby Castrevenford Girls' High School has gone missing. By the end of the day, two of the teachers at Castrevenford School for Boys are dead."Love Lies Bleeding" is less farcical than many of the Fen mysteries. The school setting and its characters are marvelously depicted, without the exaggeration that Crispin sometimes used in his other books. If it weren't for the murders, "Love Lies Bleeding" could be classified as a minor gem of an English pastoral. It's my favorite Fen. Of course, no Fen mystery is complete without a thicket of literary allusions. If you are familiar with Wordsworth's poem, "Love lies bleeding," then you may be able to guess the fate of the missing schoolgirl:"You call it, "Love lies bleeding,"--so you may,/ Though the red Flower, not prostrate, only droops,/ As we have seen it here from day to day,/ From month to month, life passing not away:/ A flower how rich in sadness!..." (William Wordsworth)

"Love Lies Bleeding" (1948) is the fifth of the Professor Fen mysteries, falling between "Swan Song" (1947) and "Buried for Pleasure" (1948). It involves foul play at the Castrevenford School for Boys, the second of Crispin's mysteries to take place outside of Fen's usual haunts in Oxford.From 1943 to 1945 the author, Bruce Montgomery a.k.a. Edmund Crispin worked as an assistant master at Schrewsbury School, and he attributes his "knowledge of the criminal in human nature" to this experience. I'm certain the fictional Castrevenford School and its inhabitants bear a close resemblance to Schrewsbury School and its inhabitants. In fact, my Penguin edition of "Love Lies Bleeding" does not include the usual disclaimer about 'work of fiction whose characters bear no resemblance, etc. etc...'Hopefully, there weren't quite as many homicides at Schrewsbury.One of my favorite characters in the Fen mysteries, the ancient and possibly senile Professor Wilkes, is missing from "Love Lies Bleeding." However at Castrevenford, Professor Wilkes has an eerie alter-ego in the ancient and possibly senile mixed Bloodhound, Mr. Merrythought. In fact, the dog almost steals the stage from Fen:"'Good God,' said Fen in a muffled voice."The dog was a large, forbidding bloodhound, on whose aboriginal color and shape one or two other breeds had been more or less successfully superimposed. He stood just inside the doorway, unnervingly immobile, and fixed Fen with a malevolent and hypnotic stare...."'He ought to be put away, really,' said the headmaster, regarding Mr. Merrythought with considerable distaste. 'The trouble is, you see, that he's liable to homicidal fits.'"'Oh,' said Fen. 'Oh.'"Mr. Merrythought turns out to be a hero, not a murderer although there are plenty of those to go around. Fen is invited to Castrevenford by his old friend the Headmaster, as a last-minute substitute to give out the prizes on Speech Day. By the time Fen arrives, a student from the nearby Castrevenford Girls' High School has gone missing. By the end of the day, two of the teachers at Castrevenford School for Boys are dead."Love Lies Bleeding" is less farcical than many of the Fen mysteries. The school setting and its characters are marvelously depicted, without the exaggeration that Crispin sometimes used in his other books. If it weren't for the murders, "Love Lies Bleeding" could be classified as a minor gem of an English pastoral. It's my favorite Fen. Of course, no Fen mystery is complete without a thicket of literary allusions. If you are familiar with Wordsworth's poem, "Love lies bleeding," then you may be able to guess the fate of the missing schoolgirl:"You call it, 'Love lies bleeding,'--so you may,/ Though the red Flower, not prostrate, only droops,/ As we have seen it here from day to day,/ From month to month, life passing not away:/ A flower how rich in sadness!..." (William Wordsworth)

This is a literate British cozy that takes place in a school setting. The mystery begins with a missing schoolgirl, the murder of two faculty members, and a theft from the chemistry lab. Eccentric characters include the amateur detective, Oxford English professor Gervase Fen; a rustic innkeeper; a ponderously Johnsonian carpenter/lay preacher and his obsequious assistant; and an elderly bloodhound mix, Mr. Merrythought, an unlikely hero who saves the day. Well written, with a light touch, "Love Lies Bleeding" is full of literary allusions and plenty of humor. If you like Michael Innes' mysteries, there's a good chance you'll like Edmund Crispin's too.

"'Do you never read Matthew Arnold?' demanded Fen. 'Oxford is proverbially the home of lost corpses.'"In this, the fifth Gervase Fen novel, Crispin has set a plot rife with intrigue and entertainment in a style which is inimitably his. Taut and clever, 'Love Lies Bleeding' revolves around events which begin at the Castrevenford Schools, separate boys and girls institutions where small disturbances have surprising ramifications.Gervase Fen, the Oxford Professor of Language and Literature, who has been called in to speak for the schools' Speech Day by the Headmaster, an old university acquaintance, is soon in the thick of a mystery which grows deadlier as it becomes more inexplicable. Was young Brenda Boyce assaulted, and, if so, by whom? Who has broken into the chemistry laboratory, and what have they stolen? And what, if anything, is worth the risk of committing murder?As Fen pursues the increasingly convoluted path toward the truth, he discovers that the motive behind these events may be one that is very old indeed, and a motive which he, in his professional capacity as a scholar, may understand better than anyone else involved.The Gervase Fen detective novels are certainly among the best undiscovered treasures that many devotees of mystery fiction could hope to unearth. A perfect combination of suspense, humour, and intelligent dialogue, these tales are not to be missed.