Tannat

The detective made some more notes. “What do you mean by tradition?”
“A single literary tradition. The idea that there are only certain writers who deserve to be studied—mostly ‘dead white men.’”
His head snapped up. “Is that a joke?”
“No,” I said, blushing. “Just…unfortunate terminology, given the circumstances.”
Archer stared at me. Hard.
I tried to explain. “It’s shorthand for privileged treatment in the canon—”
“Cannon? As in Revolutionary war?”
“No, C-A-N-O-N. A list of the texts which, over time, people have come to see as the most important.”
“As in Shakespeare?”
“Yes, and Milton, Coleridge, Dickens, and so on. Primarily males—hence the phrase ‘dead white men,’ which is used to challenge the idea that only they had something significant to offer and that time was the only way to measure worth.”
The detective blinked rapidly. “Did you just say ‘hence’?”
I nodded.
Archer sighed and tilted his head slightly. “Where is this list kept?”
“It isn’t officially written down anywhere. But when you meet a colleague who subscribes to the idea of a fixed canon, you can tell.”

Sigh, sigh, and double sigh.