S.S. Van Dine

Sleuthing out a Solution: Edgar Allan Poe and His Crypto-Mysteries

By Susan Amper

October 7, 2020

On this, the 171st anniversary of his death, Edgar Allan Poe is more popular than ever and more misunderstood. Mystery writer S. S. Van Dine describes the detective story as a contest, in which the author seeks to “outwit the reader” by presenting a puzzle that the reader is unable to solve, despite being given…

Philo Vance's creator, author S.S. Van Dine (aka Willard Huntington Wright)

Where Have You Gone, Philo Vance?

By David Cranmer

May 8, 2015

In March 1980, Jon L. Breen wrote in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, “The reputation of S.S. Van Dine, creator of Philo Vance and once the most famous American writer of detective stories, has sadly slipped in recent years, not entirely deservedly.” Now, thirty-five years after Mr. Breen’s column and seventy-six years after Van Dine’s death,…