A Hero of the Times: “The Saint” in Leslie Charteris’s The Misfortunes of Mr. Teal

Abstract

In The Misfortunes of Mr. Teal (1934), Leslie Charteris’s upper-class vigilante, “The Saint,” is heroic in vanquishing criminals of the English upper class, reflecting major ideologies of the time. A conservative, non-revolutionary hero, he cleanses and revalidates that class in its leadership role rather than seeking to remove it.