U.S. college students of the 70s and 80s will remember in Political Science classes, author Joseph Wambaugh's best-selling books topped required reading lists.The New Centurions, The Onion Fields and The Choirboys were on every bookshelf. 43 years later, Wambaugh's LAPD Hollywood Station stories continue his crime (fiction writing) spree.
A veteran Los Angeles Police Department 'copper' (his term) Wambaugh's first story The New Centurions was published in 1971. That puts him at nearly a half-centurion, himself!
Lest readers think (like I did) that Wambaugh books are pulp fiction, time to rethink. His time behind the badge give him an edge. But it's not just first-hand experience that put Wambaugh oh-so-much-beyond the penny dreadful.
When I took Poli-Sci my freshman year, 1982, the last thing I wanted to read was modern cop fiction. I looked it as book trash--Harlequin Romances for men. But Wambaugh defined inner-city beat cop life in ways I could respect. No romanticizing, but neither gratuitous violence or obscenity--beyond that which, sadly, is part and parcel of cop experience.
He doesn't frost over seediness or bleakness. Wambaugh's cops aren't super-heroes or martyrs, just folks trying to do their jobs (Bumper Morgan being my favorite) I would call the stories anthems, written not to extol, but to define and perhaps defend the modern police force.
Wambaugh's books have been used to create such high profile television cop shows as Police Story and the multi award winning Hill Street Blues (which continues to be a favorite television show of mine, despite dislike of cop shows). Wambaugh's books have also been made into movies and television shows, themselves.
And they excessive cop-drama schmaltziness
(something I abhor almost more than graphic). When officers die in the line of fire, it seems tacky and irreverent to melodramatize. Wambaugh explores that occupational hazard so we're left with take-aways, not just horrific sadness we can't do anything about.
I think these books should be used in high school law classes and certainly college. For more on books, visit me at kidzliterature.blogspot.com.
