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The Sleeping Sphinx

Page history last edited by Jon 14 years, 10 months ago

Carr, John Dickson - The Sleeping Sphinx (1947)

 

Review by Nick Fuller

4/5

"Here is a sleeping sphinx. She is dreaming of the Parabrahm, of the universe and the destiny of man. She is part human, as representing the higher principle, and part beast, as representing the lower. She also symbolises the two selves: the outer self which all the world may see, and the inner self which may be known to few."

 

Sir Donald Holden, war hero, returns from the war — but he is legally dead. At once, we are plunged into the familiar Carrian world of the topsy-turvy.

 

In love with Celia Devereux, Holden expects to find her sane and healthy; his only fear is that she might be married. Instead, he finds that tragedy has struck. Her sister, Margot Marsh, has died of a cerebral haemorrhage — but Celia believes that Margot's husband, Thorley Marsh, drove his wife to take her own life through his wife-beating. Marsh, on the other hand, is fully convinced (or pretends to be), and has spread the word around, that Celia is mad. It is into this emotional situation that Holden steps. The matter is further complicated with news of Marsh's affair with a local landowner's daughter — this much to the horror of her likeable young fiancé -- and with irrefutable proof of Celia's madness. It is not until these complicated strands have been established that Dr. Gideon Fell enters the scene. The plot accelerates, taking in a memorable impossible occurrence: the locked vault containing Margot's coffin — sealed by Dr. Fell himself, with the ring of the sleeping sphinx — is disturbed, the coffins "flung" about — yet the door is sealed and no footprints are evident on the sandy floor. A distraught tale of ghosts stepping Ruddigore-like out of their frames and a dingy fortune-teller's office are also involved, before Fell unmasks the killer. The solution relies on the annals of crime so beloved of Carr and Anthony Berkeley, and on sexual psychology.

 

Only two problems with the book: the protracted disclosure of Celia's ghost story, and the awkward phraseology of one of the clues.

 

Note similarities to The Peacock Feather Murders in the setting at a murder party; and In Spite of Thunder in the solution.

 

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