Dorothy L Sayers’ Quiz Answers

Last Friday I posed an unusual quiz based around Sayers’ opinions on various writers and their works, not all of which were that complimentary. To have a go at the quiz click here. To find out the answers read on.

1. Thankfully Sayers was a fan of Christie’s sleuth Poirot (Answer: L), finding him to be of ‘bounding vitality’ and a ‘charmer’.

2. For ‘flesh creep[ing]’ prose Sayers recommended turning to the work of Carter Dickson (Answer: G).

3. It was poor Milward Kennedy’s novel, Poison in the Parish (Answer: A) which Sayers deemd to be ‘the primmest and quietist murder tale ever written.’ Though it seems she was often not very complimetary about his work.

4. Nor was Sayers a big fan of S. S. Van Dine’s serial sleuth, Philo Vance (Answer: F), hoping that some criminal would bump him off.

5. It was Ellery Queen’s writing style (Answer: D), which came under criticism by Sayers in this question.

6. Equally one does feel quite sorry for Henry Wade (Answer: E), as his Sayers was far from favourable about his ability to ‘depict sexual passion.’ This quote came from Sayers’ review of Mist on the Saltings (1933).

7. The Chinese Orange Mystery (Answer: K) had for Sayers a murderer who took ‘the absolute bun’ when it came to ‘perverted ingenuity’.

8. It was John Rhode (Answer: B) who Sayers thought would try out ingenuious murder methods on his dog.

9. Perry Mason (Answer: J) was the criminal laywer Sayers liked despite finding him ‘odd’.

10. The Blind Barber (Answer: H) was the book Sayers described as ‘gorgeous’.

11. In slightly more polite tones Sayers was also critical of R Austin Freeman’s (Answer: C) ability to depict romance in his stories.

12. Who knew books could be likened tocaviare? Well according to Sayers they can and it was King’s Obelists En Route (Answer: i) which gained this foody epitaph.