Agatha Christie’s detective novels (66) read worldwide

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Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, was born September 15, 1890 and wrote 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections. Her fictional detectives, Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, have been read across the globe.

Dame Agatha Christie poses in March 1946 for a photographer in her home, Greenway House, in Devonshire, England. Submitted photo

In 1971 she was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire for her contributions to literature. Guinness World Records list Christie as the best-selling fiction writer of all time because her novels have sold more than two Billion copies.

Detective Hercule Poirot. Shown on WTTW, Channel 11, was a masterful story. Miss Lemon would make tea, and they would sit in luxurious rooms. Often in posh hotels. Often stopping at tiny chocolate shops. Beautiful cars abounded. Poirot would mention his “little grey cells” as he unwound the mystery. His distinctive walk went past country homes and city streets. I love these episodes and wish they could return to public television.

Christie was born into a wealthy family in Torquay, Devon and was largely home-schooled. It was there that she learned to play the piano and the mandolin. She was initially an unsuccessful writer with six consecutive rejections. This changed in 1920 when The Mysterious Affair at Styles, featuring Poirot, was published.

Her first husband was Archibald Christie and they wed in 1914. They had one child before divorcing in 1928. She served in hospital dispensaries during both World Wars which gave her a thorough knowledge of the poisons featured in many of her novels, short plays, and stories. She wed archaeologist Max Mallowan in 1930 and spent several months each year on digs in the Middle East. Hence, her first-hand knowledge of that profession was in her fiction.

In 1955 Christie was the first recipient of the Mystery Writer of America’s Grand MasterAward. In 2013 she was voted the best crime writer and the Murder of Roger Ackroyd the best crime novel ever by 600 professional novelists of the Crime Writers’ Association. Most of Christie’s books and short stories have been adapted for television, radio, video games, and graphic novels. More than 30 films are based on her work.

In April 1901 at age 10, she wrote her first poem, “The Cowslip.” When her father died in 1901, Christie remarked that event “Marked the end of her childhood”. She was 11 years old. Christie had begun reading by age four. Christie was a voracious reader from an early age. She enjoyed Charles Dickens, Alexandre Dumas, Lewis Carroll, and Walter Scott.

By age 20, she enjoyed country house parties, riding, hunting, dances, and roller skating. She had short-lived relationships with four men and an engagement to another. It was in October 1912, she met Archibald Christie at a dance.

In 1905 her mother sent her to Paris where she was schooled in a series of pensionnats (boarding schools.) She focused on voice training and piano playing. She found, however, that she did not have the temperament or talent so she returned to England. Her mother and she spent the Winter in the warm climate of Egypt at the Gezirah Palace Hotel in Cairo. She began writing short stories, plays, and novels.

Agatha Christie died January 12, 1976 at Winterbrook House, Wallingford, Oxfordshire. Her resting place is at the Church of St. Mary in Cholsey, Oxfordshire.

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