Agatha Christie

[Julie2owlsdene]

Something to do with trees being felled!

Unless of course they're covering up a murder!

[pete9012S]

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An original SIGNED AUTOGRAPH LETTER FROM Agatha Christie to Madame Roux, 1932.

[Moonraker]

What appalling handwriting!

[Courtenay]

True, but if your books are the third best-selling in history after the Bible and Shakespeare, I guess you're entitled to write any way you like.

(I know she wasn't that famous yet in 1932, but somehow I doubt she neatened up her handwriting once she was.)

[pete9012S]

Agatha hated fame and notoriety and sadly for her,both her enigmatic disappearance in 1926 and then the publication in June of that year of the sensational Murder of Roger Ackroyd brought massive national interest in her and her personal life before the year 1932.

A few life-changing events for Agatha Christie led up to her famous disappearance of December 3, 1926. Earlier that year, Agatha's mother Clara Miller had passed away after a terrible bout of bronchitis. Agatha's husband Archie Christie had been away in Spain when she had been ill, and as Archie hated "illness, death, and trouble", promptly went away to London leaving Agatha to deal with her mother's death. Clearly it was difficult to clear the family home of Ashfield, where Mrs. Miller had died, because Agatha had so many wonderful memories there. No doubt Agatha was physically and emotionally drained. She described that time as a period of loneliness (she didn't receive any support from Archie or any visits from him) and started letting little things confuse her, getting her mind all muddled. She started having glimpses of a nervous breakdown then: she would burst into tears simply for her car not starting, or having trouble remembering her own name when signing a check.

Agatha received some relief when The Murder of Roger Ackroyd was released that year in June. It had brought her great critical acclaim, especially great because it was her first published book with a new publisher, William Collins Sons & Co. The book catapulted her into the literary stratosphere. She, too, was able to return to hers and Archie's home of Styles, but then a greater blow was dealt to her.

Even back in 1928 she was wealthy and famous enough to plan exotic travel.
This in a roundabout way was how she met he second husband, the archaeologist Max Mallowan...

Max worked at Ur under the archaeologist Sir Leonard Woolley three years after Woolley began. Woolley was excavating Ur on behalf of the British Museum and the University of Pennsylvania. He and his wife Katharine had met Agatha Christie in 1928, the same year she was divorced from her husband Archie. She had plans to go to the West Indies and Jamaica, to get away and "seek sunshine", as she put it. However, two days before her departure, she was at a dinner party in London, where she met a young naval officer who started talking about Baghdad and visiting Ur. He and his wife were so enthusiastic about it, telling Agatha where exactly to go, that she changed her tickets for Jamaica to the Middle East instead. It was in Ur she did meet the Woolleys, but Mr. Mallowan was absent during Agatha's first trip.

Agatha and the Woolleys became instant friends; the Woolleys stayed in a new London cottage of Agatha's after the season was over. They encouraged her to return again to Ur. She agreed, and went down to "the cradle of civilization" in March 1930. It was there she met Max, when he was 26 years of age. She described him as "a thin, dark, young man, and very quiet." She described Max also as a man who succeeded managing people, like the workmen at the dig or even Mrs. Woolley. Managing Katharine Woolley was an accomplishment, for she was a temperamental woman and always made people feel they were walking on eggshells or something similar. Max was set to depart to England after the season of work, but was asked by Mrs. Woolley to give Agatha a tour of the various digs and cities. Agatha felt terribly bad about this; she was certain this young man (thirteen years younger than Agatha) was looking forward to heading home. Max, always pleasing Katharine Woolley, did take Agatha on a tour to Nippur, Nejef, and Kerbala. The sight-seeing trip was certainly successful. Agatha and Max got to know each other well and enjoyed being in each other's company.

At the end of the season at Ur, Mr. Mallowan came and visited Agatha and her daughter Rosalind in Devon. She took Max on a tour of the moors there under the Devon rain. It was the second night he was staying at Ashfield that he proposed to Agatha. She immediately said "no", arguing with him for roughly two hours. She was concerned about the difference in age between the two (remember, Max was thirteen years younger than her); she went back and forth in her mind saying "yes" to marriage and then to "no" again. Her supporters were her daughter Rosalind and her secretary, Carlo Fisher; James Watts (her brother-in-law) changed his stance on Agatha's decision of marriage after he met Max. Madge (James' wife and sister of Agatha) was adamant in her opinion that Agatha not marry Max. Agatha and Max did marry in September of 1930, just six months after first meeting each other. It was a quiet affair with no reporters (just what they wanted) and it was simply just Rosalind, Carlo Fisher, Mary (Carlo's sister), and Peter (Agatha's wirehaired terrier) witnessing the wedding. They were married in St. Columba's Church in Edinburgh, Scotland. The honeymoon was solely planned by Mr. Mallowan, which took them to Italy, then to Yugoslavia (cities in what is now Croatia), and finally to Greece.

[sixret]

Quotes From Agatha Christie:Autobiography

A success breeds hatred,jealousy and uneasiness among other people.I
just ignore them and do what I do best.Writing.

It's a wonder how people like to talk and talk and talk.I prefer to
listen and observe....

I cannot satisfy all the readers.They can choose what they read...

Yes,there are detective stories that I do not like but I would not
judge other fellow writers...

I do read detective novels by other writers so that I won't write the
same plot...

Maybe ones have the same idea but ones execute the idea
differently...

Quoted from one of the Miss Marple novel:

Women are wicked but sometimes they can be gentle.

Quoted from Margery Allingham in Daily Graphic about Agatha Christie:

I have often thought that Mrs. Christie was not so much the best as
the only living writer of the true or classic detective story...Her
simple aim for she IS a simple person with acute mind and very
observent is to write a puzzle story to keep us curious and leave us
pleased, and she pulls it off every blessed time.

[Anita Bensoussane]

Quote From Agatha Christie:

It's a wonder how people like to talk and talk and talk.I prefer to listen and observe....

If everyone did that, there'd be nothing to listen to!

[sixret]

Precisely, Anita!

[pete9012S]

Nice post sixret.I was wondering were you had got too!

What are your favourite Christie's? I was thinking recently of the ones I can remember being impressed with the first time I read them....Ackroyd obviously,Sleeping Murder,Lord Edgeware Dies and Endless Night was superb considering how late it appeared and how old Agatha Was when she wrote it....

[Moonraker]

Coming Soon

[pete9012S]

The Official Agatha Christie Newsletter

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[Julie2owlsdene]

They are filming an Agatha Christie down here at the moment, over in Mullion and Kynance Cove. I believe the film is to be a TV adaptation of the book - And Then There Were None. The main character is being played by the guy who plays Poldark. Can't remember his name.

[pete9012S]

Ian McNeice?

[sixret]

Nice post sixret.I was wondering were you had got too!

What are your favourite Christie's? I was thinking recently of the ones I can remember being impressed with the first time I read them....Ackroyd obviously,Sleeping Murder,Lord Edgeware Dies and Endless Night was superb considering how late it appeared and how old Agatha Was when she wrote it....

From the GAD yahoo group, Pete.

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/GAd ... ages/17846" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[pete9012S]

In her Autobiography Agatha Christie wrote that Mr. Quin and Mr. Satterthwaite (whom she called Quin's emissary) became her favourite characters. The reason was that she did not exploit them as much - she refused to make series of books about them, writing only when she felt like it. Here is how she described the protagonist: "Mr Quin was a figure who just entered into a story - a catalyst, no more - his mere presence affected human beings. There would be some little fact, some apparently irrelevant phrase, to point him out for what he was : a man shown in a harlequin-coloured light that fell on him through a glass window; a sudden appearance or disappearance."

There are two extra stories to read:The Love Detectives and The Harlequin Tea Set (from Problem at Pollensa Bay and Other Stories) also feature Mr. Quin.

I really like these short stories.It would be great to see them filmed properly with good actors playing the roles.
I wonder which two actors would be most suitable?