S. S. Van Dine Quotes & Sayings

We're all servants. Some to our fellow men. Some to our vices. — S. S. Van Dine

It has long been a source of wonder to me why the leading criminological writers
men like Edmund Lester Pearson, H. B. Irving, Filson Young, Canon Brookes, William Bolitho, and Harold Eaton
have not devoted more space to the Greene tragedy; for here, surely, is one of the outstanding murder mysteries of modern times
a case practically unique in the annals of latter-day crime. — S. S. Van Dine

Of all the criminal cases in which Philo Vance participated as unofficial investigator, the most sinister, the most bizarre, the seemingly most incomprehensible, and certainly the most terrifying was the one that followed the famous Greene murders. — S. S. Van Dine

Only, as long as we're going insane we may as well go the whole way. A mere shred of sanity is of no value. — S. S. Van Dine

A detective novel should contain no long descriptive passages, no literary dallying with side-issues, no subtly worked-out character analyses, no 'atmospheric' preoccupations. Such matters have no vital place in a record of crime and deduction. They hold up the action and introduce issues irrelevant to the main purpose, which is to state a problem, analyze it, and bring it to a successful conclusion. To be sure, there must be a sufficient descriptiveness and character delineation to give the novel verisimilitude. — S. S. Van Dine

But society is ignorant and venomous, devoid of any trace of insight or understanding. It exalts knavery, and worships stupidity. It crucifies the intelligent, and puts the diseased in dungeons. — S. S. Van Dine

There are few punishments too severe for a popular novel writer, — S. S. Van Dine

We all do things in a certain individual way, according to our temperaments.
Every human act - no matter how large or how small - is a direct expression of
a man's personality, and bears the inevitable impress of his nature. — S. S. Van Dine

There simply must be a corpse in a detective novel,
and the deader the corpse the better. — S. S. Van Dine

Giving full rein to one's cynicism as one goes along produces a normal outlet and maintains an emotional equilibrium. — S. S. Van Dine