True crime novel. Between literature and journalism

The paper tries to define the true crime novel in the context of the relation between the literature and the journalism. The author looks at the fact-based crime literature against the wide cultural background seeking the first realizations of this genre in criminal biographies and the socalled Newgate Novel inspired by the Newgate Calendar. The juxtaposition of the contemporary genre realizations – the novelized or beletrized reportage popularized by Truman Capote (In Cold Blood) and Norman Mailer (The Executioner’s Song) and the novel inspired by true events but not fulfilling the factographic pact with the reader – allows presenting the two types of the true crime novel – one characterized by the literary dominant, the other by the journalistic dominant.