AGATHA CHRISTIE

Life and career

Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie (15 September 1890 12 January 1976) was an
English crime novelist, short story writer, and playwright. She also wrote six
romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best known for the 66
detective novels and 14 short story collections she wrote under her own name, most
of which revolve around the investigations of such characters as Hercule Poirot, Jane
Marple, Parker Pyne, Harley Quin/Mr Satterthwaite, and Tommy and Tuppence
Beresford.
The Guinness Book of World Records lists Christie as the best-selling novelist of all
time.

First novels
Christie had long been a fan of detective novels, having enjoyed Wilkie Collins' The
Woman in White and The Moonstone as well as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's early
Sherlock Holmes stories. She wrote her own detective novel The Mysterious Affair at
Styles featuring Hercule Poirot; portrayed as a former Belgian police officer noted for
his twirly large "magnificent moustaches" and egg-shaped head, who took refuge in
Britain after Germany had invaded Belgium. Christie's inspiration for this stemmed
from real Belgian refugees who were living in Torquay.

The famous Hercule Poirot

SPoirot likes things in an orderly manner and approves of symmetry everywhere
(residence Whitehaven Mansions is picked because of its symmetry). He despises
dust and unclean homes and favors the indoors (especially central heating in the
winter). Poirot also values method--to him the greatest method or tool in solving
crime is using the "gray cells" of the brain. He derides such methods as examining
footprints, collecting cigarette ash, searching for clues with a magnifying glass, or
taking fingerprints. He says any crime can be solved with simply placing the puzzle
pieces correctly. He is an armchair detective-- he has to simply "sit still in an
armchair and think".
Of course, Poirot's mustache is as famous as his "little gray cells". He has pride is his
luscious, waxed black mustache and is always meticulously dressed down to his
patent leather shoes.

The mistery of her disappearance

In a plot twist worthy of her own novels, Christie disappeared for 11 days in
1926.Her mother had recently died, and on top of that, her husband was cheating
on her quite blatantly. On December 3, 1926, Agatha kissed her daughter goodnight,
then promptly got in her car and left. Lakes were dredged, 15,000 volunteers
combed the area, and Archie Christies phone was tapped. Those who thought
Archie was guilty of foul play were surprised when Agatha was located safe and
sound a week and a half later, holed up at a hotel and spa in Harrogate, England
but the mystery wasnt over. She never said why she disappeared, leading to wild
speculation. Did she have amnesia resulting from a car crash? Was it a publicity
stunt for her next book? Was she trying to frame her philandering husband for
murder? Its worth noting, though, that Christie checked into the hotel under the
surname Neelethe last name of her husbands lover.

Imitating Agatha s Crimes

There is a history of criminals copying crimes from Agatha's books. There was a
murder very similar to Murder on the Orient Express committed in West Germany in
1981. Two murders and an attempted murder copied the manner of murder in the
Christie novel The Pale Horse. Life imitated Christie's art again in North Carolina in
1979, when a gruesome murder was discovered, similar to the one in the Miss
Marple story Sleeping Murder.

Top 10 facts about Agatha Christie

1. Agatha Christie is believed to have sold more books than any other writer of
fiction with the possible exception of William Shakespeare.
2. Her total sales in all languages are estimated at between two and four billion.
3. She was privately educated at home and did not go to school until she was 11.
4. According to Agatha, she had crisp curly hair and a rather interesting nose.
5. Her best-selling book is And Then There Were None, which has sold 100 million
copies.
6. The only novels to have sold more are A Tale Of Two Cities (Dickens), Lord of the
Rings (Tolkien), The Little Prince (Saint-Exupry) and Harry Potter And The
Philosophers Stone (Rowling).
7. Her works have been translated into 103 languages, making her the most
translated author.
8.. Her gravestone at St Marys, Cholsey, includes a quotation from Spensers Fairie
Queen beginning sleepy after toyle, port after stormy seas.
9. Her long-running character Hercule Poirot is the only fictional character to have
been given an obituary in the New York Times
10. She was made Dame in 1971 by Queen Elizabeth II at Buckingham Palace
What details about scary stories motivate the reader to keep reading?

knowledge of medicines

"'We're not going to leave the island... None of us will ever leave... It's the end, you
see - the end of everything...'"
"'Why make me say it? When it's on the tip of your own tongue. Anthony Marston
was murdered, of course.'"
original and relatable characters
baffling mysteries

What draws us to reading suspenseful stories?

 foreshadowing
reversal
mystery
dilemma
"'He's nearer the day of judgement than I am!' But there as it happens, he was
wrong...'"
"'It is perfectly clear. Mr. Owen is one of us...'"

What is it about our human nature that makes us curious?

short scenes
shifts viewpoints
Opinions

"the most baffling mystery Agatha Christie has ever written"

"a towering figure in the history of crime literature"
Critics:
"The very best Christies are like a magician's tricks, not only in the breathtaking
sleights of phrase that deceive us but also in the way that, looking back afterward,
we find the tricks to have been handled so that our deceit is partly self-induced."
Self: life experiences never excluded any characters, logic and reasoning, intricate
puzzles, logical and consistent

Bibliography
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agatha_Christie
http://www.agathachristie.com/