E. Clerihew Bentley is credited with the invention of the ‘clerihew’, or humorous verse aphorism, on biographical subjects.
This collection, which was illustrated by G. K Chesterton, contains thirty-nine irregular quatrains on historical and contemporary celebrities, starting with Sir Christopher Wren and concluding with the publisher, T. Werner Laurie.
Written in 1912 as a light-hearted reaction against the solemnity of the Sherlock Holmes stories, Trent's Last Case, with its ingeniously twisting plot and cheerfully self-mocking hero, is the first classic of the golden age of English detective fiction.
When a powerful and ruthless American millionaire is found murdered in his English country garden, Philip Trent'English painter, poetry lover, and amateur detective' delves into the crime. He successively uncovers three different, plausible solutions to the murder, and in the process, comes face to face with his own fallibility, in detection and in romance.
This masterwork of the detective genre features freelance investigator Philip Trent in a case involving the murder of an American financier.
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Trent's Last Case, published when Conan Doyle and Chesterton were both at the pinnacle of their respective literary careers, was the first detective story to use finger-printing as a means of detecting the criminal.
Sigsbee Manderson was an unpopular millionaire - so when his body was discovered in the grounds of his mansion, not many people were heart-broken by his death. His widow, butler, business assistant and personal assistant become immediate suspects.
Trent, who wrote for The Record, was summoned by his editor, with an eye for a good story, to investigate. Through many twists and red-herrings, and one of the most amazing literary double twists in the final minutes, the listener is kept enthralled and guessing to the end.
Dedicated to his friend G K Chesterton, E C Bentley, a journalist first with the Daily News and then with The Daily Telegraph, intended the book to be a gentle parody of the detective genre, only for it to be quickly hailed as a classic.