Murder on the Leviathan by Boris Akunin - Essay Example

Boris Akunin Murder on the Leviathan is the third entry in the Erast Fandorin historical detective series by the well celebrated Russian author, Boris Akunin, even though, it was the second novel in the series, which was translated into English (Dilevko 343). Its title is “hermetic detective”. Akunin envisioned the Fandorin series as a summing up of all kinds of detective literature, with each novel symbolising a diverse genre. Murder on the Leviathan is his kind of Agatha Christie's style, with an interesting setting, a cast of strange characters who have their own secrets and a bizarre murder to begin the action (Dilevko 343). This paper will discuss this book. It will include a couple of paragraphs about Akunin, analyse the style and explain why they author is one of the most popular Russian writers. The book is set in the late 1800’s, 1878, in particular. It begins with the killing in Paris of Lord Littleby and 10 of the people who live in this house, seven of his workers and two of their children (Dilevko 343). The servants were all poisoned apart from Littleby, who was beat to death with an antique Indian artifact, a golden statue of Shiva that belonged to the Lord and was taken from his quarters, together with an old Indian shawl. Gustave Gauche, a French officer, charged with the investigation, boarded the passenger vessel "Leviathan" (Dilevko 343). He makes out that the killer must be one of the first-class travelers as one of the unique golden emblems for the ship's first-class travelers was found in the lord’s room. Among the culprits are an addled English aristocrat, a Japanese army officer, a clever young Russian diplomat and a married Swiss woman, all on their way to Japan. Upon reaching Southampton and getting on the Leviathan, Gauche finds himself coupled with Erast Fandorin, a good-looking, inexperienced Russian detective with a stun of white hair (Dilevko 347). It is an unwilling joining up on Gauche’s part, even though he acknowledges that Fandorin may be useful. He would have been even more reluctant if he discerned that Fandorn was a walking armory of concealed weapons and a mastermind at crime solving. Fandorin disagrees with each and every of the incompetent Gauche's mistaken conclusions and eventually takes it upon himself to unearth the killer. Attractive, elegant and overwhelming to women, Fandorin is a human and genial hero who unites fundamentals of James Bond, The Wild West, the original Nick Carter, as well as Ellery Queen, in this bright and clever with Gauche (Dilevko 347). The novel veers from wild ventures to relatively straight detection, from serial killers to con men, and finds Fandorin at a variety of stages in his memorable career, frequently caught between clever villains, dangerous gorgeous women, as well as his own deceitful superiors. Boris Akunin offers the reader with a bright description of Erast Fandorin. The protagonist is of normal height, with a slender build. He has a minute moustache, black hair dark and blue eyes. The passing away of his wife made his hair turn grey overnight. It also made him a stammer, but this tends to lessen as tensions increase (Dilevko 345). He is always perfectly dressed and can be vain about his appearance; for instance, he always wears a corset to enhance his figure. He is a talented linguist as in the novel he speaks in English, German, French and Japanese with fluency and confidence, along with a working knowledge of both Turkish and Serbian in The Turkish Gambit (Akunin 153). In the novel, Fandorin is depicted as the master of disguise, which he utilises to break into criminal hideouts, as well as in stakeouts. When he is masquerading, he does not falter at all (Dilevko 345). The author explains that it is because that this is since he always assumes the traits of the disguise that normally agitates that he should not falter. He realises how to present evidence through making a register "That is one. That is two and that is three" (Akunin 153). Fandorin is courageous and strong-minded and has to murder a number of men during his investigative adventure with Gauche, but he is still disgusted by the view of blood. When in Japan, he learnt the art of the Japanese ninjas or "silent ones" as Akunin referred to in the book. He is physically fit and sporty. After that, Fandorin turns into a devotee of the freshly invented automobile. He is extremely lucky, a common characteristic in the Fandorin family, which skips every other generation; allusion to this character trait appear in the Murder on the Leviathan (Dilevko 345). He is never beaten in a bet and flourishes at all sports. He has, nevertheless, lost the appetite for gambling when in the Ship as it soon becomes boring. This is mainly because he was caught up in the investigation (Dilevko 345). He was popular with females, partially since he still torments and cries over the loss of his first wife - this grief appears to attract women. A number of the main characters end up dead, and one is sternly injured, not counting the ten casualties of the murder who set the entire plot in motion (Akunin 153). The murder is imprisoned, but the plan was so careful that the instigator is believed to get off with a short prison sentence and also, the goal of the murderer, a destiny in gems is maybe lost forever. Literary fiction go a long way to show us the wrong doers can never go unnoticed, even if they hide it for a long time (Akunin 153). One of the daily articles in the novel is signed by G. du Roy, an insinuation to the famous reporter Georges Duroy. The entire book was based on allusions. Akunin normally made the unlikeliest protagonist guilty (Dilevko 345). This can be depicted in the 10 characters who were constantly under the watch of Gustave Gauche and Erast Fandorin. This occurred a lot till it became a cliche (Akunin 154). A skilled reader could discern the killer by only discerning some few likely suspects (Dilevko 347). Boris Akunin built these tropes into what is now regarded classic mystery organisation: a man slaughter is committed, there are many suspects who are all keeping secrets, and the investigator regularly unearths these secrets in the course of the novel, finding out the most dreadful twists at the end (Dilevko 347). At the end, in Murder on the Leviathan, the police officer gathered the remaining suspects into one room, clarifies the course of their deductive reasoning, and declares the guilty person, even though, there was a case where it is left to the guilty party to clarify all (Akunin 154). Boris Akunin rarely included stereotyped depictions of characters into the book and mainly in regard to Jews, Italians, as well as non-Europeans (Akunin 154). The novel was made clear due to Akunin’s fascination of archaeology. The allure of history came up to grab him. He confirms this in his book by saying that he wanted to see a dagger gradually appearing, with its sliver glint, which was romantic (Dilevko 347). The caution of lifting objects and pots from the soil filled him with a desire to be an archaeologist himself. He believes that it is historical artifacts that were used to beat to death the characters in this book, which makes the story so alluring (Akunin 154). Finally, Akunin used travelling in most parts of her novel to enhance the adventure. When they characters got into the ship, the entire book revolved in the ship till the perpetrator was found (Dilevko 348). She ship travelled all the way to Egypt then to Japan, and that is where the killer was found. The mysteriousness of the journey is what made it fun to read as the suspects could not escape to any place. Boris Akunin was born to a Georgian father, in Zestafoni, and, since the late 50’s, has stayed in Moscow. Persuaded by Japanese Kabuki theatre, Akunin joined the historical-philological school of the Institute of African and Asian Countries of Moscow State University as a specialist on Japanese culture (Dilevko 348). He worked as junior to the chief editor of the Foreign Literature Magazine, but departed in the year 2000 to pursue a career in fiction writing (Dilevko 348). Under his baptism name, Grigory Chkhartishvili, Akunin works as chief editor of the 20-volume Japanese Anthology Literature, chairman of the board of "Pushkin Library" and is also the writer of the novel, The Writer and Suicide, published in 1999. Akunin has also contributed criticism and translations to literary from American, Japanese and English literature under his own name. He has been known to smoke a pipe and is left-handed (Dilevko 348). Chkhartishvili opts to work with historical objects and has been referred to as the unchallenged winner of Russian offense fiction provided that he has composed over 10 crime books and has been broadly acknowledged by discerning critics (Dilevko 348). His books have been translated into a number of languages. The name Akunin is a Japanese word, which translates freely to "villain". In this novel, he redefines an "akunin" as someone who develops his own rules. This book can only be recommended to lovers of classic literary and British mysteries, staunch followers of historical fiction and any person who is interested in Indian legend and folklore (Dilevko 348). One of the astonishing advantages of the fall of the ex-Soviet Union was the job of Russian fictional writer Boris Akunin, with his book on Erast Fandorin now being sold in the west too. Akunin is Grigori Chkhartichvili, a critic, philologist, essayist, as well as a Japanese translator, who made use of the newly found freedom in Russia to develop an accepted series about 19th Century investigator Erast Fandorin, a unique agent of the Russian Police whose journeys take him from his childhood days to middle age and from Moscow to interesting adventures all over the globe (Dilevko 348). Akunin confirms himself a skillful of the genre because he pulls out all the stops from his option of 10 for the amount to occupy the salon to the "types" elected: an outsider, a Japanese person who has been learning in France, the addled English aristocrat, the young expectant Swiss woman journeying to join up with her husband, single woman on just this side of spinsterhood, the prim, the apparently reputable ship's doctor and his wife, a lecturer of Indology, the ship's Captain, the detective (Erast Fandorin) and certainly the Commissioner himself (Dilevko 347). All in all, the book is a classic arrangement of people and situation, which lead to the interesting endeavour. For sure, Akunin has contributed his personal deft touches. In Christie's books, British moral superiority is taken as a fact, but, on the ship, they are no more tolerated like the plague or any other unattractive invasion. Works Cited Akunin, Boris. Murder on the Leviathan. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2004. Print. Dilevko, Juris et al. Contemporary World Fiction: A Guide to Literature in Translation. New York: ABC-CLIO, 2011. Print. Read More