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S.S. Van Dine

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Author

The Resume

    (October 15, 1888-April 11, 1939)
    Born in Charlottesville, Virginia
    Birth name was Willard Huntington Wright
    Art and literary critic
    Under his birth name wrote 'What Nietzsche Taught' (1915), 'Modern Painting: It's Tendency and Meaning' (1915), and 'The Creative Will' (1916)
    As S.S. Van Dine wrote a series of mysteries featuring detective Philo Vance
    Titles include 'The Benson Murder Case' (1926), 'The Canary Murder Case' (1927), 'The Greene Murder Case' (1928), 'The Casino Murder Case' (1934), and 'The Gracie Allen Murder Case' (1938)

Why he might be annoying:

    He abandoned his first wife and their child.
    His pro-German views during World War I alienated him from friends like H.L. Mencken and Theodore Dreiser.
    He suffered a nervous breakdown from a combination of overwork and cocaine abuse (1923).
    He was dismissive of mysteries as literature.
    Raymond Chandler called Philo Vance 'the most asinine character in detective fiction.'

Why he might not be annoying:

    His aesthetic theories influenced Georgia O'Keeffe and William Faulkner.
    While recovering from his breakdown, he was banned from reading 'serious' literature by his doctor, so he devoured over a hundred detective stories and was pleasantly surprised by how much he enjoyed them.
    Scribners promoted 'The Benson Murder Case' with the tagline, 'At last: A detective story for the intelligent.'
    A short film he scripted, 'The Skull Murder Mystery' (1932), treats its Chinese characters non-stereotypically, a rarity for the time.

Credit: C. Fishel


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    For 2024, as of last weekly ranking, Out of 2 Votes: 0% Annoying
    In 2023, Out of 3 Votes: 66.67% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 1 Votes: 100% Annoying