1 Isabell Grosse Lecturer for Cultural Studies & PhD Candidate, Leipzig University Email: isabell.grosse@uni-leipzig.de Re-Imagining the Golden Age Lady Detective Abstract At the 2014 Queens of Crime Conference in London, Val McDermid was asked why crime fic- tion is reigned by queens rather than by kings, and she responded that the reason for this was mainly a sociological one: From an early age on, girls are taught to express empathy towards others so that, as women, they develop into shrewd observers of human nature. 1 This idea is supported by the predominance of female writers on the lists of best-selling crime novels, par- ticularly in the subgenre of the ‘domestic noir’. Moreover, statistics of reading habits in the UK as well as in the US indicate that around 70 per cent of crime fiction readers are female. 2 Con- sidering the development of the genre over the course of the 20 th and 21 st centuries, it appears justified to say that it was not only shaped by women, but it also repeatedly challenged norma- tive constructions and the victimisation of womanhood. Although novels by the queens of Golden Age detective fiction touch upon “anxieties about women’s place in society and changing modes of femininity,” they are often accused of limiting women sleuths to the domestic sphere and to stereotypical roles such as the spinster sleuth. 3 Despite or maybe because of this seemingly one-sided portrayal, contemporary adaptations of the traditional clue puzzle concentrate on female detectives, yet spice them up with wry hu- mour and a feminist spirit. In my paper, I intend to introduce and compare two examples of contemporary re-imaginings of female Golden Age detectives: Rhys Bowen’s Her Royal Spy- ness series featuring the penniless, but resourceful Lady Georgiana (thirty-fourth in line for the British throne), and the Australian TV adaptation of Kerry Greenwood’s Miss Fisher’s Mur- der Mysteries with the glamorous Phryne Fisher as its female lead. Set in the 1920s and 1930s, both series present female private investigators who defy social expectations and play accord- ing to their own rules. In order to illustrate how adaptations can be used to re-write historical conventions and genre conventions, my comparison will focus on the depiction of education, class, and gender in both texts. On the whole, I hope to show how historical detective fiction that imitates the Golden Age style re-writes the profession of the female detective and, at the same time, integrates feminist ideas into popular culture. 1 cf. McDermid 2014 2 cf. Nielsen 2015; Whitney 2015 3 Hoffman 17; cf. Irons xi