Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa, Lady Mallowan, DBE (15 September 1890 – 12 January 1976), commonly known as Agatha Christie, was an English crime fiction writer of novels, short stories and plays. She also wrote romance novels under the name Mary Westmacott, but is best remembered for her 80 detective novels and her successful West End theatre plays. Her works, particularly featuring detectives Hercule Poirot or Miss Jane Marple, have given her the title the 'Queen of Crime' and made her one of the most important and innovative writers in the development of the genre.
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Easton Press Agatha Christie books
Sleeping Murder
The Murder at the Vicarage
Curtain: Poirot's Last Case
6 volume Hercule Poirot set including titles:
Murder on the Orient Express
Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Mystery of the Blue Train
The ABC Murders
Death on the Nile
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
Franklin Library Agatha Christie books
Mousetrap and Other Plays by Agatha Christie - Library of Mystery Masterpieces - 1987
Agatha Christie biography
Agatha Christie was born as Agatha Mary Clarissa Miller in Torquay, Devon, to an American father and an English mother. She never claimed United States citizenship. Her father was Frederick Alvah Miller, a rich American stockbroker, and her mother was Clarissa Margaret Boehmer, the daughter of a British army captain[3]. Christie had a sister, Margaret Frary Miller (1879 – 1950), called Madge, eleven years her senior, and a brother, Louis Montant Miller (1880 – 1929), called Monty, ten years older than Christie. Her father died when she was eleven years old. Her mother taught her at home, encouraging her to write at a very young age. At the age of 16 she went to Mrs Dryden's finishing school in Paris to study singing and piano.
Her first marriage, an unhappy one, was in 1914 to Colonel Archibald Christie, an aviator in the Royal Flying Corps. The couple had one daughter, Rosalind Hicks, and divorced in 1928. It was during this marriage that she published her first novel in 1920, The Mysterious Affair at Styles.
During World War I she worked at a hospital and then a pharmacy, a job that influenced her work; many of the murders in her books are carried out with poison.
On 8 December 1926, while living in Sunningdale in Berkshire, she disappeared for ten days, causing great interest in the press. Her car was found in a chalk pit in Newland's Corner, Surrey. She was eventually found staying at the Swan Hydro (now the Old Swan hotel) in Harrogate under the name of the woman with whom her husband had recently admitted to having an affair. She claimed to have suffered a nervous breakdown and a fugue state caused by the death of her mother and her husband's infidelity. Opinions are still divided as to whether this was a publicity stunt. Public sentiment at the time was negative, with many feeling that an alleged publicity stunt had cost the taxpayers a substantial amount of money. A 1979 film, Agatha, starring Vanessa Redgrave as Christie, recounted a fictionalised version of the disappearance.
In 1930, Christie married the archaeologist Sir Max Mallowan. Mallowan was 14 years younger than Christie, and a Roman Catholic, while she was of the Anglican faith. Their marriage was happy in the early years, and endured despite Mallowan's many affairs in later life, notably with Barbara Parker, whom he married in 1977, the year after Christie's death.
Christie's travels with Mallowan contributed background to several of her novels set in the Middle East. Other novels (such as And Then There Were None) were set in and around Torquay, Devon, where she was born. Christie's 1934 novel, Murder on the Orient Express was written in the Hotel Pera Palace in Istanbul, Turkey, the southern terminus of the railroad. The hotel maintains Christie's room as a memorial to the author. The Greenway Estate in Devon, acquired by the couple as a summer residence in 1938, is now in the care of the National Trust. Christie often stayed at Abney Hall in Cheshire, which was owned by her brother-in-law, James Watts. She based at least two of her stories on the hall: The short story The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding which is in the story collection of the same name and the novel After the Funeral. "Abney became Agatha's greatest inspiration for country-house life, with all the servants and grandeur which have been woven into her plots. The descriptions of the fictional Styles, Chimneys, Stoneygates and the other houses in her stories are mostly Abney in various forms.
In 1971 she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.
Agatha Christie died on 12 January 1976, at age 85, from natural causes, at Winterbrook House in the north of Cholsey parish, adjoining Wallingford in Oxfordshire (formerly Berkshire). She is buried in the nearby St. Mary's Churchyard in Cholsey.
Christie has been called — by the Guinness Book of World Records, among others — the best-selling writer of books of all time and the best-selling writer of any kind, along with William Shakespeare. Only the Bible is known to have outsold her collected sales of roughly four billion copies of novels. UNESCO states that she is currently the most translated individual author in the world with only the collective corporate works of Walt Disney Productions superseding her. As an example of her broad appeal, she is the all-time best-selling author in France, with over 40 million copies sold in French versus 22 million for Emile Zola, the nearest contender.
Her stage play, The Mousetrap, holds the record for the longest initial run in the world, opening at the Ambassadors Theatre in London on 25 November 1952, and as of 2008 is still running after more than 20,000 performances. In 1955, Christie was the first recipient of the Mystery Writers of America's highest honor, the Grand Master Award, and in the same year, Witness for the Prosecution was given an Edgar Award by the MWA, for Best Play. Most of her books and short stories have been filmed, some many times over (Murder on the Orient Express, Death on the Nile, 4.50 From Paddington), and many have been adapted for television, radio, video games and comics.
In 1998, the control of the rights to most of the literary works of Agatha Christie passed to the company Chorion, when it purchased a majority 64% share in Agatha Christie Limited.
Christie's only child, Rosalind Hicks, died on 28 October 2004, also aged 85, from natural causes. Christie's grandson, Mathew Prichard, was heir to the copyright to some of his grandmother's literary work (including The Mousetrap) and is still associated with Agatha Christie Limited.
Mousetrap and Other Plays
This special collection of Agatha Christie's greatest suspense plays includes The Mousetrap (the longest running play in history), Ten Little Indians, Witness for the Prosecution, Appointment with Death, The Hollow, Towards Zero, Go Back to Murder, and The Verdict.
Hercule Poirot Books by Agatha Christie
Murder of Roger Ackroyd
Considered
to be one of Agatha Christie's greatest, and also most controversial
mysteries, 'The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd' breaks the rules of traditional
mystery.
The peaceful English village of King’s Abbot is
stunned. The widow Ferrars dies from an overdose of Veronal. Not
twenty-four hours later, Roger Ackroyd the man she had planned to
marry is murdered. It is a baffling case involving blackmail and death
that taxes Hercule Poirot’s “little grey cells” before he reaches one of
the most startling conclusions of his career.
The Mystery of the Blue Train
A
mysterious woman, a legendary cursed jewel, and a night train from
London to the French Riviera ingredients for the perfect romance or
the perfect crime? When the train stops, the jewel is missing, and the
woman is found dead in her compartment. It's the perfect mystery, filled
with passion, greed, deceit, and confusion. Is Hercule Poirot is the
perfect detective to solve it?
Murder on the Orient Express
Just
after midnight, a snowdrift stops the famous Orient Express in its
tracks as it travels through the mountainous Balkans. The luxurious
train is surprisingly full for the time of the year but, by the morning,
it is one passenger fewer. An American tycoon lies dead in his
compartment, stabbed a dozen times, his door locked from the inside.
One of the passengers is none other than detective Hercule Poirot. On vacation.
Isolated and with a killer on board, Poirot must identify the murderer in case he or she decides to strike again.
The ABC Murders
When
Alice Asher is murdered in Andover, Hercule Poirot is already looking
into the clues. Alphabetically speaking, it's one letter down,
twenty-five to go.
There's a serial killer on the loose. His
macabre calling card is to leave the ABC Railway Guide beside each
victim's body. But if A is for Alice Asher, bludgeoned to death in
Andover, and B is for Betty Bernard, strangled with her belt on the
beach at Bexhill, who will then be Victim C? More importantly, why is
this happening?
Often considered to be one of Agatha Christie's best.
Death on The Nile
Agatha Christie's most daring travel mystery.
The
tranquility of a lovely cruise along the Nile is shattered by the
discovery that Linnet Ridgeway has been shot. She was young, stylish and
beautiful, a girl who had everything until she lost her life.
Who
is also on board? Christie's great detective Hercule Poirot is on
holiday. He recalls an earlier outburst by a fellow passenger: ‘I’d like
to put my dear little pistol against her head and just press the
trigger.’ Despite the exotic setting, nothing is ever quite what it
seems…
Curtain - Poirot's Last Case
Arthritic and
immobilized, Poirot calls on his old friend Captain Hastings to join him
at Styles to be the eyes and ears that will feed observations to
Poirot's still razor sharp mind. Though aware of the criminal's
identity, Poirot will not reveal it to the frustrated Hastings, and dubs
the nameless personage 'X'. Already responsible for several murders, X,
Poirot warns, is ready to strike again, and the partners must work
swiftly to prevent imminent murder.
Poirot’s final case, a
mystery which brings him and Hastings back to Styles where they first
solved a crime together. The story was both anticipated and dreaded by
Agatha Christie fans worldwide, many of whom still refuse to read it, as
it is known to contain Poirot’s death.
Agatha Christie wrote it
during World War II, as a gift for her daughter should she not survive
the bombings, and it was kept in a safe for over thirty years. It was
agreed among the family that Curtain would be published finally in 1975
by Collins, her long-standing publishers, and that Sleeping Murder (the
Marple story written during the war for her husband, Max) would follow.
The
reception of Poirot’s death was international, even earning him an
obituary in The New York Times; he is still the only fictional character
to have received such an honour. The first actor to take on the role of
portraying Poirot in his final hours was David Suchet, as the final
episode of the series Agatha Christie’s Poirot for which he’d been
playing the role for twenty-five years. The episode was adapted in 2013.
The Mysterious Affair at Styles
Agatha Christie's debut novel was also the first to feature Hercule Poirot, her famously eccentric Belgian detective.
A
refugee of the Great War, Poirot has settled in England near Styles
Court, the country estate of his wealthy benefactor, the elderly Emily
Inglethorp. When Emily is poisoned and the authorities are baffled,
Poirot puts his prodigious sleuthing skills to work. Suspects are
plentiful, including the victim’s much younger husband, her resentful
stepsons, her longtime hired companion, a young family friend working as
a nurse, and a London specialist on poisons who just happens to be
visiting the nearby village.
All of them have secrets they are
desperate to keep, but none can outwit Poirot as he navigates the
ingenious red herrings and plot twists that contribute to Agatha
Christie's well-deserved reputation as the queen of mystery.
Other books by Agatha Christie:
And Then There Were None
First,
there were ten a curious assortment of strangers summoned as weekend
guests to a little private island off the coast of Devon. Their host, an
eccentric millionaire unknown to all of them, is nowhere to be found.
All that the guests have in common is a wicked past they're unwilling to
reveal and a secret that will seal their fate. For each has been marked
for murder. A famous nursery rhyme is framed and hung in every room of
the mansion:
"Ten little boys went out to dine; One choked his
little self and then there were nine. Nine little boys sat up very late;
One overslept himself and then there were eight. Eight little boys
traveling in Devon; One said he'd stay there then there were seven.
Seven little boys chopping up sticks; One chopped himself in half and
then there were six. Six little boys playing with a hive; A bumblebee
stung one and then there were five. Five little boys going in for law;
One got in Chancery and then there were four. Four little boys going out
to sea; A red herring swallowed one and then there were three. Three
little boys walking in the zoo; A big bear hugged one and then there
were two. Two little boys sitting in the sun; One got frizzled up and
then there was one. One little boy left all alone; He went out and
hanged himself and then there were none."
When they realize that
murders are occurring as described in the rhyme, terror mounts. One by
one they fall prey. Before the weekend is out, there will be none. Who
has choreographed this dastardly scheme? And who will be left to tell
the tale? Only the dead are above suspicion.
Sleeping Murder
Our indomitable Miss Marple turns ghost hunter and uncovers shocking evidence of a very old crime.
Soon
after Gwenda moved into her new home, odd things started to happen.
Despite her best efforts to modernize the house, she only succeeded in
dredging up its past. Worse, she felt an irrational sense of terror
every time she climbed the stairs.
In fear, Gwenda turned to Miss
Marple to exorcise her ghosts. Have they dredged up a “perfect” crime
committed many years before?
The Murder at the Vicarage
‘Anyone
who murdered Colonel Protheroe,’ declared the parson, brandishing a
carving knife above a joint of roast beef, ‘would be doing the world at
large a favour!’ It was a careless remark for a man of the cloth. And
one which was to come back and haunt the clergyman just a few hours
later when the colonel was found shot dead in the clergyman’s study.
But as Miss Marple soon discovers, the whole village seems to have had a
motive to kill Colonel Protheroe.
Agatha Christie movies
Agatha
Christie's works have been adapted into numerous movies and television
productions over the years. The following are some notable films based
on her novels.
Murder on the Orient Express (1974) Directed by
Sidney Lumet, this film adaptation features an ensemble cast, including
Albert Finney as Hercule Poirot. It received critical acclaim and
several Academy Award nominations.
Death on the Nile (1978) Also
directed by John Guillermin, this adaptation stars Peter Ustinov as
Hercule Poirot. The film follows Poirot as he investigates a murder
during a luxurious cruise on the Nile River.
Evil Under the Sun
(1982) Based on Christie's novel of the same name, this film features
Peter Ustinov reprising his role as Hercule Poirot. The story revolves
around a murder on an island resort.
Appointment with Death
(1988) This adaptation, directed by Michael Winner, stars Peter Ustinov
as Hercule Poirot. The film is based on Christie's novel involving a
mysterious death during a tour of the Middle East.
Thirteen at
Dinner (1985) An adaptation of Christie's "Lord Edgware Dies," this film
stars Peter Ustinov as Poirot. It explores the murder of a wealthy
lord, with the detective on the case.
Witness for the Prosecution
(1957) Directed by Billy Wilder, this courtroom drama is based on
Christie's short story and features Charles Laughton, Marlene Dietrich,
and Tyrone Power. The film received widespread acclaim for its
suspenseful plot and twists.
And Then There Were None (1945) This
film adaptation of Christie's novel follows a group of strangers who
are invited to an island, only to discover they are being accused of
past crimes. The title corresponds to the original title of the novel.
The
Murder of Roger Ackroyd (2000) This TV movie is based on one of
Christie's most famous novels and features David Suchet as Hercule
Poirot. Suchet is well-known for his long-running portrayal of Poirot in
the ITV series Agatha Christie's Poirot.
Murder on the Orient
Express (2017) Directed by Kenneth Branagh and starring Tom Bateman,
Kenneth Branagh, Penélope Cruz, Willem Dafoe, Judi Dench, Johnny Depp,
Josh Gad, Leslie Odom Jr., Michelle Pfeiffer and Daisy Ridley.
Death
on the Nile (2022) This film adaptation starring Tom Bateman, Annette
Bening, Kenneth Branagh, Russell Brand, Ali Fazal, Dawn French, Gal
Gadot, Armie Hammer, Rose Leslie, Emma Mackey, Sophie Okonedo, Jennifer
Saunders and Letitia Wright. Directed by Kenneth Branagh.
Agatha
Christie received numerous accolades for her contributions to
literature, including being appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of
the British Empire (DBE) in 1971. She passed away on January 12, 1976,
leaving behind a legacy of timeless mysteries that continue to captivate
readers and influence the crime genre to this day. Agatha Christie's
enduring popularity is a testament to her unparalleled storytelling
skills and her lasting impact on the world of literature. In 1956 Agatha Christie was made a commander of the Order of the British Empire.
Source and additional information: Agatha Christie