Detective Fiction: A Close Reading of An Unsuitable Job for a Woman

This passage is from P.D James’ An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, published in 1972 by London publishing house Faber & Faber.  This novel is the first of only two Cordelia Gray novels (An Unsuitable Job for a Woman and The Skull Beneath the Skin, 1982). This passage details a poignant moment in the novel where Cordelia is attacked upon arriving back to the victim’s, Mark’s, cottage in Cambridge by his father’s lab assistant, Chris Lunn, although this is unknown during the time of the attack. The timing of the attack is one to note as it follows Cordelia’s discovery of rethinking who Mark’s mother is and the “three-quarters of a million pounds” [P.188] that would be left to him and his mother entirely.  This already indicates to the reader that the attacker must be someone close to the case.

On first reading of the passage, the chronological layout draws the reader in to Cordelia’s world by establishing proximity to her character. Her seemingly mundane actions – writing a cheque, visiting Trafalgar square, or even contemplating her next meal – the narrative builds a sense of relatability. This relatability to the archive of location is almost flattering the reader, therefore familiarity and flattery not only aligns the reader with Cordelia making them both victim and detective, but lulls them into a false sense of security, making the suddenness of the attack much more jarring.

When first looking at this passage, you can’t help but notice the empty space between transition paragraphs creating white ‘gap’ with a star in the middle. This is a reoccurring textual device throughout the novel signifies a long gap in time. This specific gap signals the time jump between Cordelia being in London and her arriving back at Mark’s cottage in Cambridge. There is a second ‘gap’ that occurs. The second use of white space in this passage can be seen as a deliberate stylistic choice that reflects Cordelia’s loss of conscious in the attack.  This ‘gap’ in the text serves as a visual and structural representation of Cordelia’s unconsciousness. Here, the established connection between her and reader momentarily fractures.

You can’t look at this passage without seeing the interchangeability between time and text. The narrative distinguishes between the attack and Cordelia falling in to well through shifts in the text and time, solidifying the interchangeability of the two of them. The attack is delivered in a short, abrupt tone that conveys the attacks suddenness and the brutality in a matter-of-fact manner. Phrases such as “the attack took her completely by surprise” [P. 191] and “there was a cord around her neck” [P.191] emphasise the clinical and detached nature, in turn mirroring Cordelia’s shock.  

In contrast to the attack, the fall is marked by longer, more emotive sentences that reflect Cordelia’s emotional response to the attack. Something that should’ve lasted quicker than the “half a second” [P.192] attack, the fall, seem longer, more constructed, and most importantly, more emotive. Descriptions like “falling, falling in helpless astonishment” [P.192]and how “old nightmares” [P. 192] are brought up underscore the gravity of the moment. Furthermore, during the fall, Cordelia goes through a transition from physical danger to a deeper, more existential vulnerability. This is reflected through her concentration on the moon. The “blue light” [P.192] acting as her last connection to the outside world before it got covered by the wells lid, solidifying Cordelia in her vulnerability before she starts working her way out.

With the reader’s proximity to Cordelia firmly established, the narrative allows readers to delve in not only into their own emotional archive but also Cordelia’s. When Cordelia is falling “a confusion of old nightmares, unbelievable seconds of childhood terrors recalled” [P.192] in her mind. This phrasing links Cordelia’s current terror to her traumatic past, invoking the reader’s memory of earlier details about her neglectful father who “hadn’t bothered to answer” [P. 77] young Cordelia.  By exposing Cordelia’s deep-seated fears, the narrator enables the reader to empathise with her, effectively tapping into their own emotional archives. This creates a layered reading experience where the reader observes Cordelia’s terror that mirrors her regression into the frightened child she once was.

Additionally, the passage also invites readers to act as detectives, subtly piecing together clues about attackers’ identity as Cordelia “never saw her assailant” [P. 192]. This detective trope of withholding information stimulates “the reader’s desire to find this information and thus to establish meaning” [Martens, P.] Here, we see this in play. The proximity of the attack at Mark’s cottage suggest that the attacker must be familiar with the case and Cordelia’s movements, therefore implying that it is someone the reader has encountered before, like Sir Ronald Callender’s dinner party with his fellow scientists, which we would eventually find out to be Chris Lunn.

A poignant detail within this passage is the “dry strong-smelling fibres” [P.191] that knock her unconscious. This detail suggest that the assailant possess a certain level of education or access to specialised chemicals. This marks a stark departure from traditional ‘Golden Aged’ detective tropes where the criminals are often written as outsider to society. Instead, the novel positions the assailant as a middle-class man [Grella, P.32]. Furthermore, the use of “fibres” [P. 191] can add another layer of detection, “fibres” and “wool” link directly to Mark’s Grandfathers wool industry, another link to the family in this chain of detection.

This inversion of genre conventions challenges the expectations of the readers. Here, the attacker remains anonymous, he launches a surprise attack and then uses an easy and quick method, subverting traditional power dynamics often seen in detective fiction. Lunn’s eventual fatal car crash adds to the unsettling unpredictability of the story, further linking the novel to broader literary themes such as those found in Raymond Chandler’s The Lady in the Lake (1943) where there is also a justice deciding car crash.

This can be seen to the fleeting yet critical detail – the mention of Cordelia’s handbag – emerges as the piece of evidence later in the novel that ultimately ties the crime to Lunn when he later returns the bag to the cottage. This moment activates the reader’s archival knowledge of the narrative, encouraging them to connect previous subtle hints. The handbag then becomes a ‘smoking gun’, emblematic of the weaving of clue throughout the novel.

Through this passages’ intricate interplay of proximity, the readers archives, and subtle clues the reader is immersed in both Cordelia’s emotional experience and the detective work in to uncovering her attacker. The merging of Cordelia’s fears with the reader’s own archive deepens empathy, while the inversion of classic tropes elevates the novel beyond Golden Age detective fiction.

Bibliography

Martens, B. Dramatic Monologue, Detective Fiction, and the Search for Meaning, Nineteenth-Century Literature, Vol. 66, No. 2, University of California Press

Grella, G. Murder and Manners: The Formal Detective Novel, NOVEL: A Forum on Fiction, Vol. 4, No. 1 1970

James, P.D, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman, Faber & Faber, 1972