In 1919, the Christie couple had a daughter, Rosalind.
In 1928, her marriage to Colonel Christie ended in divorce; in 1930, Agatha Christie married archaeologist Max Mallone.
In 1920, Agatha Christie's first detective novel, The Mysterious Crime at Styles, was published, the main character of which, the Belgian private detective Hercule Poirot, later became the hero of numerous novels by the writer. (Poirot dies in one of Christie's last novels, The Curtain (1975)).
In 1930, a new character appeared in the novel "Murder at the Vicarage" - a lover of private investigation, the insightful Miss Marple.
Agatha Christie - "The Murder of Roger Ackroyd" (1926), "Murder on the Orient Express" (1934), "Death on the Nile" (1937), "Ten Little Indians" (1939), and "Meeting in Baghdad" (1957), " What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw" (1957). Among her later novels, The Dark of Night (1968), The Halloween Party (1969) and The Gates of Destiny (1973) stand out.
Christie also performed successfully as a playwright - 16 of her plays were staged in London, and films were made from some of them. The plays "Witness for the Prosecution", staged in 1953 in London and in 1954-1955 in New York, and "The Mousetrap", staged in 1952 in London and withstood the largest number of performances in the entire history of the theater, enjoyed great success.
In 1974, the writer made her last public appearance at the premiere of the film version of Murder on the Orient Express.
Christie was awarded the Order of the British Empire, 2nd class.
In 1971, the writer was awarded the noble title of Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire.
Agatha Christie is one of the symbols of Great Britain. She is one of the world's most famous crime fiction authors, and her books are the most published after the Bible and the works of Shakespeare. Agatha Christie's books have been translated into more than 100 languages.
In 2005, an unknown manuscript by Agatha Christie was discovered by a specialist in the writer's work, John Curran, in the attic of her country house. After several years of painstaking work, he managed to restore the text and establish the history of the creation of the novel "The Taming of Cerberus", which was published in 2009.
Agatha Christie's grandson Matthew Pritchard discovered 27 tapes in the closet of the writer's house on the Greenway estate, on which Christie herself talks about her life and work for 13 hours.
Agatha Christie's house on the Greenway estate was open to visitors. In 2000, the estate was transferred to the management of the National Trust for the protection of cultural monuments. For eight years, only the garden, boat house and paths were open to visitors, while the house itself underwent extensive reconstruction.
The material was prepared based on information from RIA Novosti and open sources
GettyImages Agatha Mary Clarissa Miller was a very shy child. While her older brother and sister playfully played with each other, she acted out the scenes that appeared in her imagination with herself. She also did not study brilliantly, even according to the modest requirements that were imposed on young students at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Girls were then prepared mainly for marriage: they were taught music, dancing, and needlework. Until the end of her life, Agatha Christie will write with gross spelling errors - which, however, will not interfere with her career as a writer.
The girl sang beautifully, but due to extreme shyness she never decided to perform in front of an audience. It was as if she felt that fate actually had a completely different destiny in store for her.
Love for Archibald
Wikipedia, Link
Shortly before the outbreak of the First World War, young Agatha often attended balls of the English aristocracy. Studying at a Parisian boarding school increased her self-confidence, and outwardly the girl was always pretty. It is not surprising that one evening Agatha was noticed by RAF Lieutenant Archibald Christie. Separated from her husband, performing the difficult duties of a nurse in a military hospital, she first tried to write down the story that was born in her head. Daily work with medicines and poisons suggested the murder weapon - the hero of the novel died from poisoning, and the crime was solved by a funny little Belgian with the big name Hercule Poirot. Agatha “copied” the appearance of the character from a real person, having once seen a group of refugees from Belgium on the streets of the city.
Archibald Christie, two family friends and Agatha Christie, Link
Time passed, Archibald returned from the war and tried to become a businessman to support his family. Agatha gave birth to his daughter Rosalind, and it was a bit crowded for the three of them in the small rented apartment. But business didn’t work out. One day my husband jokingly asked how her manuscript was doing? By that time, Agatha was determined to become a writer. But The Mysterious Affair at Styles was rejected by six publishers one after another. Archie's question prompted her to try her luck with the seventh.
To her surprise, the novel was published, and she was given a fee of 25 English pounds. “Now you can earn a lot of money!” - this phrase from her husband finally confirmed Agatha in the idea that writing should be turned from a hobby into a real job.
Unlucky 1926 In six years - from 1920 to 1926 - she published six novels, Poirot could already compete in popularity with Sherlock Holmes, and Agatha and her husband changed their rented apartment to their own house in the suburbs and even bought a car. The white streak in her life ended unexpectedly. First, Agatha's mother died. Not having time to recover from the loss, she was faced with a new misfortune. Archibald Christie admitted that he fell in love with someone else: his golf partner Nancy Neal.
A quarrel followed, Archie left the house, slamming the door, and returned home only in the morning. The house was empty: Agatha left by car, leaving a note that she was going to Yorkshire. But there was only an abandoned car there. But the strangest thing was the name under which the writer registered: she called herself Teresa Neal, taking the surname of her rival. She and Archibald divorced two years later, in 1928. She did not give any comments or explanations for her behavior in those 10 days for the rest of her life. Agatha once told a particularly meticulous journalist that she didn’t remember anything—thus, the version of amnesia due to nervousness was born. After the writer's death, British scientists analyzed her later manuscripts and stated that Agatha Christie suffered from Alzheimer's disease. But her grandson Matthew Pritchard denied these rumors.“I never discussed this act of hers either with herself, or with her mother, or with the people who witnessed the disappearance. I can only say that when people suffer, when they acutely experience misfortune, they are capable of very strange things.”
“The only thing I can say with confidence is that my grandmother did not, as many people think, strive for publicity, to attract attention to herself or her books. She was very unhappy at the time, and a lot of people in her place would have behaved in a similar way,” Pritchard said.
The archaeologist's favorite woman Agatha Christie decided to heal from her misfortunes by working and traveling. She booked a compartment on the Orient Express train (yes, that same one) and went to Baghdad. It was there, in Iraq, that the writer met her second love, the architect Max Mallowan. He was her guide at the excavations of the ancient Sumerian city of Ur. Throughout the entire season of excavations, Max was there: showing the country, talking about ancient monuments of civilization, even entrusting the processing of the found shards.
“I thought then, as I often thought later, what a wonderful person Max is. So calm, he takes his time to console. He doesn't talk, he does. She does what she needs to do, and this turns out to be the best consolation,” Agatha later wrote in her autobiography. When the excavation season ended, the archaeologist volunteered to accompany her to England - and proposed. She also fell in love with him, but did not decide to get married right away. The previous bad experience and the age difference were scary: Max was 15 years younger, he was only 25, and she was already 40! Agatha Christie and Max at the excavations -
http://www.gwthomas.org/murderinmeso.htm Their marriage with Max turned out to be happy and lasted until the end of their lives. Together they traveled throughout the Middle East, which gave the writer many ideas for her detective stories. He survived her by only two years.
After Agatha Christie's death in 1976, the last novel about Hercule Poirot and her autobiography were published.
“Thank you, Lord, for your virtuous life and for all the love that was given to me,” she finished her last manuscript with these words.
Agatha Mary Clarissa, Lady Mallowan (Agatha Mary Clarissa, Lady Mallowan), née Miller (Miller), better known by the name of her first husband as Agatha Christie was born September 15, 1890 in Torquay, Devon.
Her parents were wealthy immigrants from the United States. She was the youngest daughter. The Miller family had two more children: Margaret Frary (1879-1950) and a son, Louis "Monty" Montan (1880-1929). Agatha received a good education at home, in particular music, and only stage fright prevented her from becoming a musician.
During the First World War, Agatha worked as a nurse in a hospital; she loved the profession and described it as “one of the most rewarding professions a person can engage in.” She also worked as a pharmacist in a pharmacy, which subsequently left an imprint on her work: 83 crimes in her works were committed through poisoning.
Agatha got married for the first time on Christmas Day in 1914 for Colonel Archibald Christie, with whom she had been in love for several years - even when he was a lieutenant. They had a daughter, Rosalind. This period marked the beginning of Agatha Christie's creative career. In 1920 Christie's first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, was published. There is an assumption that the reason for Christie’s turn to the detective was a dispute with her older sister Madge (who had already proven herself to be a writer) that she, too, could create something worthy of publication. Only the seventh publishing house published the manuscript in a circulation of 2,000 copies. The aspiring writer received a fee of £25. In 1922 Together with her husband, Agatha Christie made a round-the-world sea voyage along the route Great Britain - Bay of Biscay - South Africa - Australia and New Zealand - Hawaiian Islands - Canada - USA - Great Britain.
In 1926 Agatha's mother died. Late that year, Agatha Christie's husband Archibald admitted to infidelity and asked for a divorce because he had fallen in love with fellow golfer Nancy Neal. After a quarrel early December 1926 Agatha disappeared from her home, leaving a letter to her secretary in which she stated that she was heading to Yorkshire. Her disappearance caused a loud public outcry, since the writer already had fans of her work. For 11 days, nothing was known about Christie's whereabouts.
Agatha's car was found, and her fur coat was found inside. A few days later the writer herself was discovered. As it turns out, Agatha Christie registered under the name Teresa Neil at the small spa hotel Swan Hydropathic Hotel (now Old Swan Hotel). Christie gave no explanation for her disappearance, and two doctors diagnosed her with amnesia caused by a head injury.
Despite mutual affection at the beginning, Archibald and Agatha Christie's marriage ended in divorce in 1928.
In 1930 While traveling around Iraq, at excavations in Ur, she met her future husband, archaeologist Max Mallowan. He was 15 years younger than her. Agatha Christie said about her marriage that for an archaeologist a woman should be as old as possible, because then her value increases significantly. Since then, she periodically spent several months a year in Syria and Iraq on expeditions with her husband; this period of her life was reflected in the autobiographical novel “Tell How You Live.” Agatha Christie lived in this marriage for the rest of her life.
Thanks to Christie's trips to the Middle East with her husband, several of her works took place there. Other novels (such as Ten Little Indians) were set in or around Torquay, Christie's birthplace. Novel "Murder on the Orient Express" ( 1934) was written at the Hotel Pera Palace in Istanbul (Türkiye). Room 411 of the hotel where Agatha Christie lived is now her memorial museum. The Greenway Estate in Devon, which the couple bought in 1938, is under the protection of the Society for the Preservation of Monuments (National Trust).
Christie often stayed at the mansion Abney Hall in Cheshire, which belonged to James Watts, her sister's husband. At least two of Christie's works were set on this estate.
In 1956 Agatha Christie was awarded the Order of the British Empire, and in 1971 For her achievements in the field of literature, Agatha Christie was awarded the title of Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, the holders of which also acquire the noble title “lady”, used before their name. Three years earlier in 1968 Agatha Christie's husband, Max Mallowan, was also awarded the title of Knight of the Order of the British Empire for his achievements in the field of archaeology.
In 1958 The writer headed the English Detective Club.
Between 1971 and 1974 Christie's health began to deteriorate, but despite this, she continued to write. Experts at the University of Toronto examined Christie's writing style during these years and suggested that Agatha Christie suffered from Alzheimer's disease.
In 1975 When she became completely weak, Christie transferred all rights to her most successful play, The Mousetrap, to her grandson.
The writer died January 12, 1976 at her home in Wallingford, Oxfordshire after suffering from a short cold and was buried in the village of Cholsey.
Agatha Christie's books have been published in over 4 billion copies and translated into more than 100 languages.
She also holds the record for the maximum number of theatrical productions of a work. Agatha Christie's play The Mousetrap was staged for the first time in 1952 and is still on continuous display today.
In 1920 Christie publishes her first detective novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which had previously been rejected by British publishers five times. Soon she has a whole series of works in which the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot acts: 33 novels, 1 play and 54 stories.
Continuing the tradition of the English masters of the detective genre, Agatha Christie created a pair of heroes: the intellectual Hercule Poirot and the comical, diligent, but not very smart Captain Hastings. If Poirot and Hastings were largely copied from Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, then the old maid Miss Marple is a collective image reminiscent of the main heroines of the writers M.Z. Braddon and Anna Catherine Green.
Miss Marple appeared in the story 1927 of the year “The Tuesday Night Club”. The prototype of Miss Marple was Agatha Christie’s grandmother, who, according to the writer, “was a good-natured person, but always expected the worst from everyone and everything, and with frightening regularity her expectations were justified.”
Like Arthur Conan Doyle from Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie was tired of her hero Hercule Poirot by the end of the 1930s, but unlike Conan Doyle, she did not decide to “kill” the detective while he was at the peak of his popularity. According to the writer’s grandson, Matthew Pritchard, of the characters she invented, Christie liked Miss Marple more - “an old, smart, traditional English lady.”
During World War II, Christie wrote two Curtain novels ( 1940 ) and "Sleeping Murder", which was intended to end the series of novels about Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple, respectively. However, the books were published only in the 1970s.
Other Agatha Christie detectives:
Colonel Race appears in four Agatha Christie novels. The Colonel is an agent of British intelligence, he travels around the world in search of international criminals. Reis is a member of MI5's spy department. He is a tall, well-built, tanned man.
He first appears in The Man in the Brown Suit, a spy mystery set in South Africa. He also appears in two Hercule Poirot novels, Cards on the Table and Death on the Nile, where he assists Poirot in his investigation. He appears for the last time in the novel 1944 "Shimmering Cyanide", where he investigates the murder of his old friend. In this novel, Reis has already reached old age.
Parker Pyne is the hero of 12 stories included in the collection Parker Pyne Investigates, as well as partially in the collections The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories and Trouble in Pollensa and Other Stories. The Parker Pyne series is not detective fiction in the generally accepted sense. The plot is usually not based on a crime, but on the story of Pine's clients who, for various reasons, are unhappy with their lives. It is these dissatisfaction that brings clients to Pine's agency. In this series of works, Miss Lemon first appears, who leaves her job with Pine to become a secretary to Hercule Poirot.
Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, full names Thomas Beresford and Prudence Cowley, are a young married couple of amateur detectives who first appear in the novel The Mysterious Assailant. 1922 years, not yet married. They begin their lives with blackmail (for money and out of interest), but soon discover that private investigation brings more money and pleasure. In 1929, Tuppence and Tomie appeared in the short story collection Partners in Crime, in 1941 in N or M?, in 1968 in Snap Your Finger Just Once, and most recently in the 1973 novel The Gates of Doom. , which was the last Agatha Christie novel written, although not the last published. Unlike the rest of Agatha Christie's detectives, Tommy and Tuppence age along with the real world and with each subsequent novel. So, by the last novel where they appear, they are nearly seventy.
Agatha Christie is a famous English writer, prose writer, author of plays and popular detective novels. She is the author of stories about such iconic detectives as Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, who can rival the fame of the unforgettable Sherlock Holmes (author - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle).
A biography and essay on Agatha Christie's work will undoubtedly prove quite useful and interesting for our readers.
short biography
Agatha Mary Clarissa Mallone (Miller before her second marriage), who later became famous as the writer Agatha Christie, was born in a small English town. The girl's parents were fairly wealthy emigrants from the United States of America. Three children grew up in the family: Agatha, as well as her brother Louis and sister Margaret.
Agatha Christie's biography is devoid of events, at least in the early years of the writer's life. Agatha's father died early, and the family lived poorly. The girl studied poorly and changed several educational institutions, while she was interested in music.
When World War I began at the beginning of the twentieth century, Agatha went to work in a hospital for wounded soldiers as a nurse. This gave her invaluable life experience. It is known, by the way, that a young, still unknown nurse began writing her first novel while working in a hospital.
When the war ended, the future famous writer studied to become a pharmacist. Thanks to this, she, having become the author of detective works, was able to describe poisoning using various toxic substances quite reliably.
The very first detective novel by this author, who changed his cumbersome name to a euphonious pseudonym, was written in 1915. True, the public was able to get acquainted with this work only in 1920, since until that moment all publishing houses rejected it.
There is also an autobiographical work: “Agatha Christie. Autobiography".
It will be useful for the reader to learn some instructive and funny facts about the famous writer:
- Agatha Christie was honored to be awarded the Order of the British Empire, received the title of noblewoman - “dame”, and her biography invariably sells in huge numbers.
- Christie signed some of her works with the pseudonym Mary Westmacott.
- According to some researchers, the writer suffered from incurable diseases: some call Alzheimer's disease, and others call dysgraphia.
- Agatha Christie happened to disappear, frightening the entire world community: when her husband asked for a divorce, the author of detective stories disappeared for eleven whole days and was even put on the national wanted list.
- In the books of the English writer, exactly 83 murders were committed with the help of highly toxic poisons.
- Agatha Christie's autobiographical story ends with the following phrase: “Thank you, Lord, for my wonderful life and for all the love that was given to me.”
During her lifetime, Agatha Christie received the proud title of “Queen of Detectives” from the British and American press.
Contribution to literature
This writer penned many literary works. There are two major series of her novels about great detectives: the adventures of Hercule Poirot, a funny Belgian eccentric detective; as well as a series of stories about Miss Marple, a sweet and respectable old lady, whose prototype is called Agatha Christie herself, as well as her elderly grandmother, who has not lost her sharp mind.
It is also necessary to mention that Agatha Christie's literary works have been filmed several times. Even the most famous film adaptations cannot fit on one page. Here are some of them:
- "Murder on the Orient Express".
- "Agatha Christie's Poirot."
- "Ten Little Indians."
- "The Big Alibi"
- "Miss Marple".
- "Mousetrap".
And this is not a complete list of film adaptations of her novels.
A TV series was even made based on the cycle about Hercule Poirot, which is now quite popular, including several well-developed seasons. But Miss Marple was not left without her own series: a feature film was made, consisting of many parts, in which the main roles were played by wonderful English, as well as American theater and film actors.
Under another pseudonym, the English writer also published psychological novels - thrillers, as they would be called today. These psychological novels, like, in principle, her detective prose, were distinguished by a twisted, extraordinary plot and eventful action that kept the reader in suspense until the very last page.
In general, the work of the famous Englishwoman was truly heterogeneous, rich in new plot solutions, techniques and intrigues that had not previously been used by other writers.
Agatha Christie can be called a truly great writer. Her works occupy third place in the list of most published books, second only to the Bible and William Shakespeare. The writer created more than sixty novels, wrote creepy thrillers under another pseudonym, and was also the author of several plays that immediately appeared in the repertoires of the most famous London theaters. Her best books have been filmed.
So, there is no doubt that Agatha Christie made a truly invaluable contribution to English and, of course, world literature. Author: Irina Shumilova
The creator of the best detective stories, Agatha Christie is still considered an unsurpassed writer in the detective genre. Over her long life, she managed to write a huge number of works that have become classics of English literature.
Childhood and youth of Agatha Christie
Agatha Mary Miller was born in the fall of 1890. Her father died early. Besides her, Agatha’s mother raised two more children: the brother and sister of the future writer.
Coming from America, Agatha's relatives settled in England as the first generation of immigrants. The girl received her education from her mother; she taught all her children at home.
As a child, Agata played music well, but could not overcome stage fright, so she left her musical career.
Agatha Miller's youth came at a difficult time. The cannonades of the First World War thundered throughout the world. As a girl, Agatha worked as a nurse in a hospital for soldiers. The girl was very proud of her work and considered it the best in the world.
Agata wrote her first stories at the age of 18. Her love of literature, of course, came from her childhood. Agatha's mother often told her entertaining stories and instilled in her an interest in reading.
The writer's adult years
In 1914, Agatha received a marriage proposal from her lover, whose name was Archibald Christie. In this marriage, the already famous writer had a daughter, who was named Rosalind.
After living with her husband for several years, Agatha Christie (took her husband's last name) learned that her husband had a mistress. Archibald told his wife that he was leaving for a certain Nancy Neal.
The news came as a blow to Christie. After she learned of the separation from her husband, Agatha suddenly disappeared for 11 days. They searched for her, but found only a car. Agatha herself showed up a little later at one of the local hotels. It turned out that the woman had a memory loss due to nervousness. She barely remembered what she had been doing all these days. Hotel employees reported that Agatha checked in with them under the name Neil. The woman visited the spa and library at the hotel for 11 days. Why the writer chose the surname of the homewrecker to register at the hotel, she could not explain.
The official divorce of the spouses took place only in 1928.
After the divorce, Christy traveled a lot. She visited Iraq, where she met her second husband, who worked there as an archaeologist. Despite the fact that the man was fifteen years younger than the writer, their marriage turned out to be very strong and lasted a lifetime.
Creativity of the Queen of Detectives
At the beginning of her career, the future celebrity was thinking about writing under a male pseudonym, but the publisher dissuaded her from a rash step, because there was a certain novelty in a woman writing in the detective genre.
Then in 1920, Christie published her “The Mysterious Affair at Styles.” Two years later, the writer went on a small tour around the world, visiting Africa, as well as Australia, New Zealand, the Hawaiian Islands, the States and Canada.
“The Mystery of the Blue Train” is a work that Christie completed in the Canaries, having escaped there from the bustle and her ex-husband with her daughter.
In 1934, the writer published a novel based on the event of her disappearance. The novel was published under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott. Agatha called it “Unfinished Portrait”.
After her second marriage, Agatha wrote the work “Tell me how you live.” In part, it became the autobiography of the writer.
The literary hit Ten Little Indians is a novel set in Agatha Christie's hometown of Torquay. Agatha herself considered the work the best among her novels.
For reasons of political correctness, today this work is published under the title “And There Were None.”
Agatha created the cycle about Hercule Poirot very detailed and exciting. So in this detective series there are 33 full-length novels and 1 play. It also includes 54 stories about the noble detective.
In 1927, Christie's second most important character, Mrs. Marple, was born. The cycle of stories began with the work “Tuesday Evening Club”. The unusual image of the old detective immediately won the hearts of readers.
Later in the writer’s work there were other detectives, but Poirot and Marple could not be overshadowed by any other character. In addition to books, Agatha Christie was fond of writing plays, and was known as an excellent playwright.
It is Christie who is the most published author of humanity, after Shakespeare. The number of plays staged based on her literary works also breaks all imaginable records..
The writer's main novels have now been translated into 100 languages and dialects around the world.
Agatha Christie: the end of the road
Having reached the age of 85, Agatha Christie died after suffering from a serious cold. The detective queen was buried in the village of Cholsi, near the place where she lived in recent years.
A monument was erected in honor of the writer in London. A crater on the planet Venus was named after her. A rock group of Russian performers took her name as their name, and for many years successfully performed under the name “Agatha Christie”.
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