Since the 1970s, Lawrence Block has been writing award-winning novels and short fiction featuring Matthew Scudder. Now, with both himself and his detective half a century older, the author found himself charged with writing a book about his protagonist. And he decided he wasnt the right person for the job. Lawrence Block: What was Matts family like? How did he spend his childhood? What steered him toward the NYPD, and how did he get all the way from the Police Academy to a detectives gold shield? Who were the influences and what were the experiences that made him the man weve come to know? These were important questions. There were certainly stories to be told, but that didnt mean I was the person to tell them. If Matt Scudder was to have a memoir, he ought to write it himself. So Block passed on the assignment to his most enduring fictional character, and the resultThe Autobiography of Matthew Scudderis a remarkable document, at once a convincing bildungsroman and the indispensable capstone of an outstanding series. Since his 1976 debut in The Sins of the Fathers, Matthew Scudder has aged in real time, so, too, remarkably enough, has his creator. Lawrence Block turned 84 on June 24, 2022, while Mr. Scudder reached that same milestone on September 7. The Autobiography of Matthew Scudder demonstrates clearlyand irresistiblythat neither one of them has lost a step.
