Mrs. Christie, You Write Great Books

March 5, 2015 4:44 PM

Fan Letters To Agatha Christie show how her works reached across the world to bring entertainment and solace to a wide variety of people, from prisoners to school children.
posted by purplesludge (24 comments total)

Another reminder that I need to read more Agatha Christie.
posted by Fizz at 5:18 PM on March 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

It's funny, from some perspectives her novels are awful, but boy, when you're in the mood for an Agatha Christie, they really hit the spot. I vividly remember devouring my brother's shelf of them decades ago and being unable to put them down.
posted by languagehat at 5:20 PM on March 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

When I was in elementary school I read all the Nancy Drew books and most of the Hardy Boys. Then I graduated to Agatha Christie and read all of her novels and plays. I've never revisited them, and obviously my circumstances weren't dire like some who wrote her, but they meant so much to me. Thank you, Dame Agatha.

But one thing haunts me to this day -- I even made a passing reference to it in a recent comment here -- and that is, of course, the "monkey paws." I will seriously expose my skin to harsh cleaning solutions for way too long before I break down and put on a pair of rubber gloves.
posted by Room 641-A at 5:51 PM on March 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

On Twitter, @pulplibrarian has posted a couple of surprising and creepy Christie covers today.
posted by OmieWise at 6:07 PM on March 5, 2015

One of my more upsetting memories is reading some textbook where they spoiled The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, which I had not yet gotten to. Sigh.
posted by jeather at 6:15 PM on March 5, 2015

Imagine how I felt.
posted by roger ackroyd at 7:45 PM on March 5, 2015 [12 favorites]

I remember reading The Murder of Roger Ackroyd as a young teen, loving it, and recommending it to my mother. She was FURIOUS with me.
posted by Shohn at 5:56 AM on March 6, 2015

Thank you for posting this! If there were Agatha Christie-cons, those are the cons I would attend. I have so, SO many feelings about Miss Marple and Poirot and the Mysterious Mr. Quin.

Also, so much anger about the way Tommy and Tuppence are treated by their children in the later books. I know that it is a commentary on how spies can't actually tell anyone what they do and "no man is a hero to his valet" and ageism and everything, but the way their kids think their parents are adorable and pathetic for thinking their lives matter makes me want to SCREAM.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 6:52 AM on March 6, 2015

I LOVE Agatha Christie! One of the best presents anyone has ever gotten me was in college where my husband bought a lot of over seventy Agatha Christie books off e-Bay. It was fantastic! I was an English major so I was reading a lot of dense stuff and having books that were easy to read but still super, super enjoyable was such an enormous relief. I still read them all the time, over and over, even though I know who did it and how and why for pretty much every one (although I don't re-read some of the later kind of paranoid ones as much -- Postern of Fate and Passenger to Frankfurt are not my favorites by a long shot).

I think it's also easy to overlook how funny so many of them can be! Sometimes when I am cranky, I think of this section from "How Does Your Garden Grow?" about Miss Lemon, Hercule Poirot's secretary:

Very occasionally her employer appealed to her human, as opposed to her official, capacities. It slightly annoyed Miss Lemon when he did so -- she was very nearly the perfect machine, completely and gloriously uninterested in all human affairs. Her real passion in life was the perfection of a filing system beside which all other filing systems should sink into oblivion. She dreamed of such a system at night.

and it always cheers me up and makes me giggle. I also think that SPOILER ALERT FOR THE MOVING FINGER when Jerry has decided to propose to Megan and all he can think to say when he sees her is "Hullo catfish" it is actually really sweet and romantic. There are definitely some feminist issues with other parts of the book/relationship, but I just absolutely love that. "Hullo catfish"! For whatever reason it just feels like it reflects such a beautiful, healthy sentiment. There is an Agatha Christie book for every mood and my life would be much, much poorer without her.

Thanks so much for this post! It is so exciting to read the words of other people who feel the same way.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:10 AM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]

OH MAN MRS. P I LITERALLY USED MY SNOW DAY YESTERDAY TO RE-READ THE MOVING FINGER

(also I love how Mrs. Dane Calthrop is like "let's call in an expert on human wickedness" and then Miss Marple spends several days knitting before taking care of the whole thing)
posted by a fiendish thingy at 7:12 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]

Of possible interest: The episode of Paul F. Tompkins' Dead Authors podcast with Jessica Chaffin as Agatha Christie is one of the funniest.
posted by Room 641-A at 7:12 AM on March 6, 2015

I never liked Tommy and Tuppence.

But I remember listening to Murder on the Orient Express as an audiobook and being absolutely SHOCKED at the ending. I loved it. I actually blame my early Christie reading for why I still miss mysteries where the last chapter is The Detective Explains Everything (waaaaaaaaay out of fashion), and why I loved those Dumbledore Sums Up The Book chapters in Harry Potter.
posted by jeather at 7:13 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]

OH MAN MRS. P I LITERALLY USED MY SNOW DAY YESTERDAY TO RE-READ THE MOVING FINGER

Because you are an awesome and sensible person! What better possible way to use a snow day? Man that is so smart! Mr. Pterodactyl and I are planning a Treat Yo' Self Day and one of my plans is to treat myself to a re-read of some of my favorite Agatha Christies.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:14 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]

jeather, you just reminded me of another thing I love-- the detectives often mention their previous cases and other murderers, with just enough information that you can identify them if you've read the book, and it is so much fun! I thought of it because in Death on the Nile, Poirot mentions the "impertinence" of the whole "scarlet kimono in Poirot's valise" episode from Murder on the Orient Express.

Impertinence indeed!
posted by a fiendish thingy at 7:16 AM on March 6, 2015

But I remember listening to Murder on the Orient Express as an audiobook and being absolutely SHOCKED at the ending. I loved it.

This is so true, I totally felt the same way -- the best of her books are the ones where when you finish you are like "well obviously that's what happened, it was super obvious and that's the only thing that makes sense" but you NEVER SAW IT COMING. In so many of the books, she gives you the tools you need to figure out that particular mystery, not just the clues but a framework -- a detective or police officer will say something like "watch out for the person who's always X" and so you try to do that and then at the end, yeah, the murderer was absolutely the person who was always doing X but somehow you still NEVER SAW IT COMING even though it was deeply and profoundly obvious.

I also love Tommy and Tuppence but I have the same love of mysteries being explained at the end of stuff, be it Harry Potter or stupid TV shows or whatever. The only thing more satisfying than thinking "that was super, super obvious and I was never, ever going to get there" is when you actually do figure it out, even partway.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:20 AM on March 6, 2015 [3 favorites]

Appointment with Death references Murder on the Orient Express too -- someone, I think Sarah, mentions to Poirot a time when he let murders go in the interests of justice and he's like "how did you hear about that?".
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:22 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]

The only thing more satisfying than thinking "that was super, super obvious and I was never, ever going to get there" is when you actually do figure it out, even partway.

Ha, I'm kind of the opposite-- "The Mirror Crack'd" is my least favorite book because I knew who the murderer was and why the murder happened BEFORE the murder even happened, and it spoiled the rest of the book for me.

When it comes to guessing, though, my favorite game to play is "Hastings is obviously wrong, so who else could it be?"
posted by a fiendish thingy at 7:52 AM on March 6, 2015 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I see what you mean -- I actually didn't have that for "The Mirror Crack'd" and I don't think I've ever successfully figured out exactly why and how, but when I figure out who the murderer is and a few other tidbits then learning the why and how are super, super satisfying because I can be like "I was totally right!" and ignore the fact that I missed the important parts of the solution.

Also yes, that is a great Hastings game. Hahaha Hastings, what a nitwit <3
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 9:28 AM on March 6, 2015

But a beloved nitwit. One of my favorite Poirot moments is where Hastings says something dopey, and Poirot looks at him with fond eyes and says "Ce cher Hastings." He just loves his friend and his normal-sized brain!

Also in Death on the Nile: a part where Poirot deduces that a guy on the boat has ulterior motives because he wears the same Old School Tie as Hastings, but keeps acting in an un-Hastings-ish way, which makes HIM the weirdo. Hastings as paragon of British normalcy MINUS horrible xenophobia is one of my favorite, favorite things.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 10:10 AM on March 6, 2015 [2 favorites]

I love Christie but she wasn't exactly open to other cultures and it really came through in the books.

My grandparents, when I was -- maybe 9? -- took me to see The Mousetrap and kept telling me to look at the pant cuffs for clues and I did, saw nothing, and was (again) blindsided by the solution. I am pretty sure that's what started me reading Christie.
posted by jeather at 10:20 AM on March 6, 2015

Oh yes I agree that Hastings is beloved -- the "<3" was just as sincere as the "nitwit". Also, I flatter myself that I'd be better than Hastings but, let's be honest, I almost certainly would not.

Man Death on the Nile is so good too!
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 1:09 PM on March 6, 2015

There is nothing in the world so comforting to me as curling up in bed with an Agatha Christie book. My mom had well-stocked bookshelves when I was little and i'd go grab a random book off them and dig in, and the day I read the first Agatha Christie I swear I had stars in my eyes.

(I was raised watching a lot of that Small Village British Crime/Murder Mystery sort of genre, so they felt like home already, in a way.)

The AC books on her shelf gradually migrated to my bookshelves over the years and then I started finding more in the second-hand bookstores we'd go to, until by now I think I own just about all of them. (I've deliberately not hunted too hard, because I don't want it to be over!)

I love Miss Marple and Miss Lemon and Poirot's baffling-to-everyone love for tisanes and Mrs Oliver's haphazard hair decisions and Dear Raymond's distant but sincere affection for Aunt Jane, and poor hapless Japp, Mrs Bantry and and and into infinity. Basically, Agatha Christie novels are where my soul lives, when it needs to retreat and curl up in the absolute most comforting place it can imagine.

Which is to say, I will happily sit here and listen to all of you talk about your favourite AC things, or really any AC things, in this thread forever.

(Oh! I discovered an Agatha Christie fanfic a while back that was a small delight. Even if fanfic isn't your thing, give it a try!)
posted by pseudonymph at 6:22 PM on March 7, 2015 [1 favorite]

Also, Death on the Nile is great, but it was absolutely infuriating when i'd spent years telling my dude that one of things I love about AC novels is that even when I think I know who did it, i'm basically always wrong.

And then the TV version of DotN came on, he watched it for five minutes and calmly said 'X did it, didn't they?'

AND HE WAS RIGHT, I wanted to throttle him.
posted by pseudonymph at 6:25 PM on March 7, 2015

Basically, Agatha Christie novels are where my soul lives, when it needs to retreat and curl up in the absolute most comforting place it can imagine.

Then our souls must frequently curl up there together, because: DITTO.

I just started re-reading Dead Man's Folly, and it sent me into a whirlwind of affection for Ariadne Oliver, one of my favorite female characters of all time (never talked about in terms of romance, but always her career and personality!!!! and sometimes her weird hairstyles), especially because of the way Poirot responds to her.

He disagrees with her fundamental principles of women being better than men at everything, and he knows her "who did it" instincts are usually wrong, but he also knows she's incredibly insightful and clever and able to uncover unusual information, and all it takes is her saying "get on a train and get down here" for him to drop everything and do just that. Hercule Poirot! The famous detective! Because his friend the writer has a bad feeling!
posted by a fiendish thingy at 8:10 AM on March 9, 2015 [1 favorite]