Transgressive Settings and Contrary Ideologies

in Allohistorical Detective Fiction

By Bianca van de Water

Detective fiction is considered a conservative genre that affirms rather than questions
political institutions and social structures (Stowe 570). These conventions serve hegemonic
discourses, stabilising readers into social myths proposing that crime can be solved, the truth
known with certitude, and order restored (Burton Harrington 366). Setting is a crucial literary
device that achieves these purposes through identifiable depictions of locale so that readers
can authenticate the sites, develop trust in the detective, and, ultimately, suspend disbelief
in the fiction (Craig 14). Traditional detective fiction is set in commonplace environments,
which ordinary people would visit on a typical day on the basis of socioeconomic status
(McManis 320). Relatively mundane places rather than the unusual, the formidable, or the
abstract, were the basic geography of the genre (Ibid.). Robert Harriss Fatherland and
Michael Chabons The Yiddish Policemens Union disrupt these conventions by depicting
existing but counterfactual settings that demonstrate significant genre transgressions. The
present essay discusses these two texts, whereby the settings functions will be identified;
purposes for genre transgressions will be explored; and, potential implications for
contemporary detective fiction will be formulated. However, the two texts specific genre
hybridity will be outlined first.

Fatherland and The Yiddish Policemens Union could be categorised as hard-boiled detective
fiction, in that they feature marginalised detectives, who follow their own moral values and
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code of ethics (Ogden 82). Both texts combine this genre with alternate, or counterfactual,
histories, a science fiction subgenre that proposes an alternative outcome for a historical
event (Rovner 132). The alternative should appear as a plausible, realistic option in the
historical record (Piattti and Hurni 333). Accordingly, allohistorical settings contain real-life
places which have been re-modelled according to the texts counterfactual premise (Ibid.).

Brutalist Berlin in Fatherland

Fatherland is based on the premise that Nazi Germany triumphed and established a fascist
empire comprising Russia, Central and Eastern Europe. The narrative is set in 1964 during the
week of Hitlers seventy-fifth birthday anniversary and predominantly unfolds in Berlin,
capital of the Greater German Reich (Harris 191). This re-imagined city is based on authentic
historical sources, including Hitlers descriptions and maps drawn by chief architect Albert
Speer (Piatti and Hurni 334). According to Harris, the Berlin of this book is the Berlin that
Albert Speer planned to build (383). The map preceding the text demonstrates that the city
is a hybrid of fact and fiction, in that it features existing as well as fictitious buildings, whereby
the latter includes Hitlers Palace and the Great Hall of the Reich.

Nonetheless, the re-modelled city is a readily identifiable place due to depictions of

stereotypical landmarks such as the Brandenburg Gate and Reichstag Building. Crime writers
describe well-known icons of local identity to demarcate the world of the story, create a
setting immediately recognisable to the audience, and increase the credibility of the fiction
(Reijnders 171-172). Fatherlands Berlin is readily recognisable and thus imparts the
suggestion that the crimes described could have happened here. Hereby, the text establishes
crucial behavioural rules of recognition so as to achieve readers suspension of disbelief.
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Furthermore, the setting complies with a generic convention characteristic of cultural crime
fiction, whereby the setting functions as an indispensable key to the commission, discovery
and resolution of the crimes (Hausladen 63). Fatherland would be an implausible or even
absurd narrative if it had been set elsewhere. The plot line reveals that the murder victims
were high-ranking Nazis responsible for designing and implementing the Final Solution.
Contrary to the historical record, the Holocaust has remained a state secret, which
necessitates the elimination of those responsible as they could leak inconvenient truths. The
main protagonist, SS-major Xavier March, gradually discovers clues regarding the murder
victims identities and genocidal pasts. These state secrets could only be discovered through
local knowledge and contacts in the secretive criminal justice system and labyrinthine
ministerial bureaucracies. For instance, March locates incriminating documentation through
the assistance of an acquaintance at the Reichsarchiv, who has insider knowledge of its arcane
filing system. This highlights the requisite relationship between plot and setting, in that the
murders would have been an anatopism in any other locale. Furthermore, the truth could
only be unearthed in Berlins administrative mazes.

However, the text demonstrates a significant departure from generic locale descriptions, in
that main events occur in disagreeable and extraordinary places. Conventional detective
fiction is usually set in peaceful, beautiful settings to provide a contrast with the interruption
caused by the crime (Reijnders 175). This generic rule emphasizes the drama of the murder
and symbolises that the world has been turned upside down (Ibid.). Contrarily, Fatherlands
Berlin is characterised by brutalist architecture that matches the cold-hearted nature of the
murders. The cityscape consists of granite monoliths (Harris 132) and ugly, concrete blocks
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of buildings (74). This genre transgression is enhanced by descriptions of extraordinary

places inaccessible to ordinary citizens, in contradiction to traditional crime fiction which is
often set in everyday locales (McManis 320). In the line of duty, March visits the huge and
claustrophobic SS-academy, which reminded him of visiting prisoners in jail. . . The same
high walls and patrols of guards (75). Marchs research furthermore takes him to Gestapo
Headquarters, where he walked down a corridor lined with swastikas and marble busts of
the party leadership to an interrogation room with small brown stains on the floor which
looked like dried blood (130-131). These depictions suggest that the murders constitute a
continuation rather than a disruption of their physical and political environment, in that
oppression and violence seem commonplace.

Stowe argues that politically-motivated writers deliberately disrupt detective fiction

conventions for their own critical purposes (575). The depictions in Fatherland suggest that
Harris intended to portray Berlin as a guilty landscape, an environment thus imbued with
negative symbolism that it evokes associations with past injustices and atrocities (Reijnders
175-176). This interpretation is supported by the ubiquity of swastika symbolism. The
Hakenkreuz is stamped in passports, printed on stationary, pinned on lapels, etched on photo
frames and carved into decorative daggers. In the days leading up to Hitlers birthday,
swastika banners are becoming thus omnipresent, that the city would soon be a forest of
red, white and black (Harris 136). This symbolism suggests that fascism was widely supported
in German society, an interpretation that is reinforced by the characterisation of Berlins
inhabitants. The narrator explains that they had come of an assembly line of . . . Hitler Youth,
National Service. . . They heard the same speeches, read the same slogans . . . They were the
regimes workhorses, had known no authority but the party (129). These depictions
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contradict a significant detection fiction ideology, namely the illusion of an innocent society
temporarily disrupted by crime, but soon to be restored to a state of grace (Stowe 572).
Contrarily, Fatherlands descriptions amount to a strong indictment of German society,
whereby its entire population appears to be corrupted, indoctrinated and tainted with
fascism. This transgression suggests that the novel promotes an alternative ideology, namely
the idea of a guilty society thoroughly permeated with corrupted ideals. This may be a
deliberate transgression, employed to support Harriss communicative purpose of reminding
readers of Germanys tainted national heritage.

However, alternate histories are fundamentally presentist and their main function is to
explore the past less for its own sake than to utilise it instrumentally to comment on the
present (Rosenfeld 93). Fatherland was published in 1992, a significant period in European
history: West- and East-Germany had recently reunited and the European Union was on the
verge of increased cooperation involving the establishment of a single monetary union. It
could be argued that the text explores contemporary social anxieties about the relationship
between Germany and other nations in the Union. These fears have been given concrete
shape in Berlins re-imagined cityscape. The European Parliament, which, tellingly, has been
re-located to Berlin, flies the flags of all member nations, whereby the swastika which flew
above them was twice the size of the other standards (Harris 108). Germanys dominance is
further symbolised in the description of the imagined, Berlin Arch of Triumph, which is thus
grandiose that the original structure in Paris will fit into it forty-nine times (24). These
depictions shatter ideological rules that detective fiction should present a pleasing,
comforting worldview (Holquist 190). Contrarily, Fatherlands disturbing setting highlights
social anxieties and visualises a perturbing scenario, namely the possibility that Germany is
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still an inherently fascist society and could dominate the European Union. Instead of
promoting reconciliation and social healing for anxious readers (Hannerz 267), the text
warns of possible and perhaps unpalatable future changes. In doing so, Fatherland establishes
new behavioural rules stimulating readers to reflect on modern history, current affairs and
Europes political institutions rather than seek comfort in reassuring cultural myths.

Amorphous Sitka in The Yiddish Policemens Union

The Yiddish Policemens Union is based on a nexus event, the defining moment at which
history diverges to a parallel world (Piatti and Hurni 333), namely the US Congress hearings
of the 1940 proposal to relocate European Jews to Alaska. The then Interior Secretary Harold
Ickes envisaged a masterplan involving development of local industries, whereby labour
would be provided by new settlers comprising refugees fleeing the Holocaust (Scanlan 518).
The proposal was rejected in Congress to become an obscure footnote in history (Piatti and
Hurni 334; Rovner 144). Contrarily, in the novel, the proposal had been ratified and the
Alaskan city of Sitka becomes a provisional homeland for European Jews. Sitka is an existing
Alaskan town that straddles Baranof and Chichagof Islands. However, the textual landscape
has been significantly re-modelled whereby imaginary topographic features have been
added, including for instance the Baranof Range, Mount Edgecumbe, and Oysshtelung Island.

The Yiddish Policemens Union demonstrates a significant departure from descriptions of

setting in traditional detective fiction, in that Sitka constitutes an abstract place. It contains
no iconic man-made landmarks and the cityscape is ill-defined. The text does not indicate
whether the re-imaged settlement is a small country town or a bustling state capital.
Furthermore, most settings have not been described, but merely identified by name,
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including for instance Baranof Theatre, Einstein Coffee Shop and Goldblatts Diary
Restaurant. This abstract setting disrupts behavioural rules as readers cannot identify the
location. This may be a deliberate transgression in order to critique detective fiction
ideologies that the world is a knowable place (Stowe 577). Instead, it affirms fundamental
social anxieties that the real world is disorienting and unknowable (Tuan 58). As such fears
have become more pertinent since the September 11 terrorist attacks (Neria, DiGrande, and
Adams 430), the alienating effect of the transgression may feel familiar and may thus connect
readers with the text.

The texts symbolism suggests that the setting functions as a marker of a social rather a
geographical milieu, in that customs disclose more information about this specific
environment than its architecture. The most prominent feature is the inhabitants patois,
which is an invented variation of Yiddish (Kravitz 100). For instance, the main protagonist,
detective Meyer Landsman, is the most decorated shammes in Sitkas police department
(Chabon 2), who carries a sholem (2) to neutralise shtarkers (6) interrupting social order.
Furthermore, identity is revealed in dress sense, in that most men wear either a yarmulke or
a black hat and women sport glossy wigs spun from the hair of poor Jewesses of Morocco
and Mesopotamia (101). These descriptions allude to Orthodox Jewry, who traditionally
wear such head coverings, thus emphasizing the settings function as a marker of social milieu.

The abstract locale in conjunction with cultural explicitness suggests that the setting operates
as a metaphor for the Jewish diaspora. Sitkas Jewish communitys locale is thus amorphous
it could be anywhere and everywhere thus representing the nebulous, worldwide Jewish
diaspora. Several literary devices support this interpretation. Firstly, the most prominent
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street in the city is Max Nordau Street, referring to one of the founders of the World Zionist
Organisation. Secondly, Sitkas residents demonstrate itinerant rather than settled behaviour,
in that they will soon disperse across the globe once Sitkas interim status terminates and the
city reverts to the Alaskan Federal State.

However, the text allows an additional interpretation, in that Sitka could be understood as an
allegory for the State of Israel. Although this is not supported in depictions of geographical
locale, the settings political context is strongly reminiscent of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,
with comparable settlement disputes. Sitkas population had rapidly increased to two million,
whereby new settlers had spread beyond the agreed boundaries in direct violation of the
[Settlement] Act (Chabon 29). These events resemble current illegal occupations of
Palestinian lands which likewise contradict United Nations Resolutions. In Sitka, private land
is continually extended by a boundary maven (106), a surveyor with the authority of a Rabbi
(111), who has strong-arm tactics behind him (110). The maven legalises annexations, in
that given enough string and enough poles . . . you could tie a circle around pretty much any
place and call it an eruv (110), i.e. private property. The Tlingits, Sitkas indigenous
population, occasionally retaliate, whereby the Synagogue Riots remain the lowest moment
in the bitter and inglorious history of Tlingit-Jewish relations (43). These fictitious historical
events resemble the Palestinian Intifada thus strengthening the impression that the setting
functions as an allegory for contemporary Israel.

The most salient function of setting in The Yiddish Policemens Union is its role in signalling
mood. It conveys a sense of danger and corruption, which complies with the conventions of
hard-boiled detective fiction, which is often set in a dangerous, urban centre (Ogden 71).
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The entire city of Sitka is marred by crime and decay. The community on Verbover Island has
amassed a stockpile of Russian firearms . . . adequate to the needs of a guerrilla insurgency
in a small Central American republic (Chabon 103). In alleyways a quieter market thrives,
which offers prescription drugs, gold, automatic weapons (382). Meanwhile, everyday life
has ground to a halt, in that restaurants are as empty as an off-duty downtown bus (69)
whereas the only shopping centre constitutes an empty wreck that marks the end of the
dream of Jewish Sitka (179).

The communicative purpose of hard-boiled detective fiction is to expose societal corruption

and perversion (qtd. in Ogden 76), which is successfully conveyed in The Yiddish Policemens
Union. The corrupted cityscape indicates that the murder site is a continuation rather than a
disruption of its environment. The victim is murdered in Hotel Zamenhof, a narrow pile of
dirty white brick and slit windows with the allure of a dehumidifier (Chabon 16), where the
night manager normally takes a motherly interest in the [heroine] user population (1).
Tellingly, the hotel is located in Max Nordau Street, the thoroughfare that was to pay homage
to autonomous Jewish power (Anderson 92). Contrarily, this street suffers the greatest
amount of social rot (Ibid.) implying that the local community is inherently corrupted and
may thus be culpable in the present homicide and possibly other crimes as well.

The allohistorical setting allows a political agenda to be communicated, which could not have
been conveyed in historical fiction. Allohistories emphasize that humans make history
(Winthrop-Young 109), whereby the nexus point highlights that different choices could have
been made, resulting in different outcomes. Rosenfeld argues that allohistories commonly
occur as either fantasy or nightmare scenarios (93). Contrarily, Sitkas political context is
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strikingly similar to Israels political situation, in that Sitkas Jews commit identical social
injustices as their historical counterparts in contemporary Israel. This signals the implied
authors perspective that Jewish people would repeat similar mistakes and injustices,
regardless of spatial and temporal milieu. Thus, the allohistorical setting works in conjunction
with the hard-boiled genre, in that the social ills uncovered by the detective have been given
critical meaning through a counterfactual setting. In doing so, it provides a mirror for
contemporary Israel and invites readers to think in new ways about the Palestinian-Israeli
conflict.

New Ideologies
The discussion of Fatherland and The Yiddish Policemens Union demonstrates that setting
plays a crucial role in creating mood, symbolising contemporary social anxieties, and
portraying geographic locale or social milieu. In doing so, it establishes an essential
connection between police procedurals and settings thus further strengthening the credibility
of the fiction. However, the discussion also demonstrates that contemporary detective fiction
is less conservative and stable as is commonly argued. Through various genre transgressions
the texts shatter cultural myths that society can be returned to a state of grace and that good
will prevail over evil (Burton Harrington 378). On the contrary, the texts contain
unconventional ideologies, proposing that crime arises as a consequence of their
environment, which, instead of innocent societies, consist of inherently violent and
corrupted milieus. Thus, new crimes, perhaps even worse crimes, will occur and recur as long
as social and political ills remain ignored and unresolved. Thus, politically-motivated authors
can successfully transgress genre conventions to suit unconventional communicative
purposes such as providing social critiques or raising political awareness. In doing so, the texts
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establish new behavioural rules. Rather than allaying social anxieties with convenient cultural
myths, they invite readers to reconsider geo-political problems, societal issues and political
institutions. Considering that both novels have become best-sellers (Piatti and Hurni 334;
Rovner 144), it could be argued that contemporary detective fiction readers are ready to
receive shock therapy rather than a panacea for social anxieties.

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