The Documents in the Case

infobox Book |
name = The Documents in the Case
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption =
author = Dorothy L. Sayers and Robert Eustace
cover_artist =
country = United Kingdom
language = English
series =
genre = Mystery Epistolatory novel
publisher = Victor Gollancz
release_date = 1930
media_type = Print (Hardcover, Paperback)
isbn = ISBN 978-0450002434
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"The Documents in the Case" is a 1930 novel by Dorothy L. Sayers and Robert Eustace.

Plot introduction

A struggling young writer shares a Bayswater flat with an acquaintance, a talented but immoral painter, who embarks on an affair with the pretty young second wife of a neighbour. The neighbour dies suddenly, having apparently poisoned himself by gathering and eating dangerous fungi in mistake for edible ones. However, there are those - including the writer and the neighbour's son - who believe that the death was suspiciously convenient.

Plot summary

This is an epistolary novel, told in the form of letters between some of the major characters. This collection of documents - hence the novel's title - is explained as a dossier of evidence collected by the victim's son as part of his campaign to obtain justice for his father.

The main narrator, Munting, takes rooms with Lathom, an artist acquaintance. The downstairs neighbour, Harrison, a staid, middle-aged widower, has remarried to a passionate and rather foolish young wife. Lathom and Mrs Harrison begin an affair, the husband suspecting nothing, and Lathom paints a portrait of her which makes his reputation on the London art scene. Lathom is almost discovered by the Harrisons' live-in spinster companion during a night-time prowl to see his mistress, but is mistaken for Munting: there is an ugly scene and Munting moves away and marries his fiancee.

Harrison owns a simple country cottage, 'The Shack', in Devon and enjoys spending time there. He is interested in gathering and cooking wild foods and is an expert on mushrooms. Lathom persuades Munting to accompany him there and they find Harrison dead, apparently poisoned by fungi. However, Harrison's son Paul suspects his stepmother has egged Lathom on murder her husband, and Munting is drawn unwillingly back into the case. He discovers accidentally that muscarine - the poison that killed Harrison - can exist in a natural or a synthetic form. One is asymmetrical at the molecular level, the other is symmetrical, and the two forms can be distinguished only by using polarised light. The muscarine consumed by Harrison proves to be synthetic; it was added to the harmless fungi deliberately, and Lathom is hanged for murder.

Characters in "The Documents in the Case"

*Jack Munting – an aspiring young writer
*Lathom – a struggling artist, acquaintance of Munting
*Harrison – middle-aged downstairs neighbour of Lathom and Munting
*Mrs Harrison – considerably younger than her husband. Engaged in a secret affair with Lathom
*Agatha Milsom – live-in spinster companion of Mrs Harrison
*Paul Harrison – engineer. Adult son of Mr Harrison by a previous marriage.

Major themes

Dorothy L. Sayers intended this to be a major novel. As a practising Christian, she was pleased with the religious-scientific theme offered to her by "Robert Eustace", which was based on the idea that the asymmetry of living molecules was an indication of the hand of God in creation.

However, she was ultimately disappointed with the way the book turned out. "In my heart," she wrote, "I know I have made a failure of it... I wish I could have done better with the brilliant plot.". [Reynolds, Barbara. "Dorothy L Sayers: Her Life and Soul" p 221. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1993. ISBN 0-340-58181-4]

Allusions to actual history, geography and current science

Dorothy Sayers' co-author, Robert Eustace, was the pseudonym of Dr Eustace Barton, a physician who also wrote medico-legal thrillers. Barton suggested the scientific content crucial to the novel's denouement, which concerns the difference between organic and inorganic matter and the use of the polariscope to differentiate between them. He travelled to University College Hospital in August 1928 to consult colleagues and see a practical demonstration of the effect. [Reynolds, Barbara. "Dorothy L Sayers: Her Life and Soul". London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1993. ISBN 0-340-58181-4]

Footnotes