A comparative study on Ahmet Umit's and Dashiell Hammett's detective novels in terms of crime: Kavim and The Maltese Falcon

In this study, the elements in Ahmet Umit (1960- )?s Kavim (2005) and Dashiell Hammett (1894-1961)?s The Maltese Falcon (1930), including the historical background of the detective novel are comparatively given. Ahmet Umit, who is one of the most important detective novel writers of the modern Turkish Literature and Hammett, who is one of the most important American detective novel writers of the 1930s and 1940s are at the same time the representatives of the different detective novel genres. The former represents the police procedural type of the detective novel, which emerges in American literature after 1950s while the latter represents the hard boiled genre, which starts in the publications of the Black Mask Magazine in the 1920s. It should be noted that Umit?s police procedural Kavim includes the very elements of the hard-boiled detective novel, too. In choosing these two novels to be compared, their being among the best representatives of the detective genres and also their writers? perfect presentations of the period with political, social, economic and moral aspects have been effective.In the introduction part of the study the historical background of the detective fiction, not only in American and Turkish literatures but also in various literatures including several European ones like English, French and Russian is given. Besides, the features of the detective novel kinds like the-turn-of-the-century, the Golden Age, the hard-boiled and the police procedural which represent the characteristics of the detective novel from various literatures are accordingly explained. Additionally, the reasons why the detective fiction in Turkish literature could not develop as much as it could in European literatures and why it is so common and a developed genre in USA is presented with the answers. The fact that sociological reasons of the crime in The Maltese Falcon attract the attention while the psychological factors overweigh in Kavim is also stated.In the first chapter, the compared books are technically analyzed in terms of their plot, style, point of view, atmosphere and character. In this chapter the kinds of the plots like embedded, the apparent, the revealed and the plot of feud are represented. The questions why Kavim and The Maltese Falcon are police procedural and hard-boiled and their mystery features; the personal characteristics of the detective heroes and the concept of double identity are explained. Lastly, the common points inspired by Poe are given in a detailed way. The important distinctive characteristics of the detective hero Nevzat and the murderer Can in Kavim and the detective hero Spade and the villains Brigid and Gutman in The Maltese Falcon are given.In the second chapter, the symbols in both books are given. The literary and contextual meanings of the symbols like Diatessaron, Flitcraft parable, femme fatale, woman and the falcon and the reasons of their deliberate usage are explained. The literary and contextual richness that these symbols brought to both books are also stated.In the third chapter, which also constitutes the basic part of the study, the concept of ``crime?? and the psychological and socio-economic reasons of crime in Kavim and The Maltese Falcon are made clear. The reasons of the criminals? engagement in crime are clearly uncovered through the points of view of several psychiatrists such as Sigmund Freud, Bruce D. Perry, Anne Freud and Friedrich Nietzsche and sociologists such as William Glasser, Edwin Sutherland, and Robert Agnew. The personal psychologies of the detective heroes Nevzat and Spade during their crime investigations and in their social lives are also analyzed.In the conclusion, the study is briefly summarized and the findings are stated.Key Words: Kavim, The Maltese Falcon, symbol,crime, criminal psychology, socio-economic reasons of crime.