Out of the Shadows. “Celebritization” of the Polish Crime Novel (and its Authors) in the XXI Century. Reconnaissance

Abstract

The text deals with change in the approach to crime novels and the status of their authors from the audience’s perspective in the times of the “militia novel” present in the People’s Republic of Poland up to democratic times, after the political changes post-1989. The authors of police crime novels in the People’s Republic of Poland very often hid their personal details under pseudonyms — whether out of shame or due to the protection of personal dignity. In democratic times they began to publish under their own names, because the creation of detective or thriller novels was no longer subject to political censorship, nor was it marked a sign of alleged support for the communist regime. The possibilities of the free market and the freedom of expression in democratic Poland after 1989 enabled the authors of crime and thriller novels to gain both real popularity and fair earnings. The most recognizable and popular authors of crime and thriller literature have become not only the inhabitants of the collective imagination, but also the objects of gossip, sensational news (of course not always reliable), as well as important people within mass culture. The article discusses — in general — both the shape of the militia novel from the times of the People’s Republic of Poland and its direction of development — also generally — of contemporary crime fiction in Poland, paying attention to both its specific or original aspects (e.g. the retro-crime subgenre, which seems to be a kind of Polish specialty) as well as inspirations with crime stories — mainly — European (especially the Scandinavian model of socially engaged crime fiction). In conclusion, the text outlines the evolution of Polish crime thriller prose from the crude model of a militia novel to a full-fledged and bloody model of a contemporary crime thriller set in a democratic and free-market world