Agatha Christie: An Autobiography

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Crime Writer Rich List". Alibi. 2011. Archived from the original on 19 September 2020 . Retrieved 22 September 2020.

People never stop writing to me nowadays to suggest that Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot should meet – but why should they? I am sure they would not enjoy it at all. Hercule Poirot, the complete egoist, would not like being taught his business by an elderly spinster lady."

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Many of the settings for Christie's books were inspired by her archaeological fieldwork in the Middle East; this is reflected in the detail with which she describes them–for instance, the temple of Abu Simbel as depicted in Death on the Nile–while the settings for They Came to Baghdad were places she and Mallowan had recently stayed. [4] :212,283–84 Similarly, she drew upon her knowledge of daily life on a dig throughout Murder in Mesopotamia. [123] :269 Archaeologists and experts in Middle Eastern cultures and artefacts featured in her works include Dr Eric Leidner in Murder in Mesopotamia and Signor Richetti in Death on the Nile. [198] :187,226–27 Christie never wrote a novel or short story featuring both Poirot and Miss Marple. [30] :375 In a recording discovered and released in 2008, Christie revealed the reason for this: "Hercule Poirot, a complete egoist, would not like being taught his business or having suggestions made to him by an elderly spinster lady. Hercule Poirot–a professional sleuth–would not be at home at all in Miss Marple's world." [112] Collins, Max Allan (2004). The London Blitz Murders. New York City: Berkley Prime Crime. ISBN 978-0-425-19805-6. Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, DBE ( née Miller; 15September 1890– 12January 1976) was an English writer known for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections, particularly those revolving around fictional detectives Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. She also wrote the world's longest-running play, the murder mystery The Mousetrap, which has been performed in the West End since 1952. A writer during the " Golden Age of Detective Fiction", Christie has been called the "Queen of Crime". She also wrote six novels under the pseudonym Mary Westmacott. In 1971, she was made a Dame (DBE) by Queen Elizabeth II for her contributions to literature. Guinness World Records lists Christie as the best-selling fiction writer of all time, her novels having sold more than two billion copies. In the 1950s, "the theatre... engaged much of Agatha's attention." [138] She next adapted her short radio play into The Mousetrap, which premiered in the West End in 1952, produced by Peter Saunders and starring Richard Attenborough as the original Detective Sergeant Trotter. [136] Her expectations for the play were not high; she believed it would run no more than eight months. [12] :500 The Mousetrap has long since made theatrical history as the world's longest-running play, staging its 27,500th performance in September 2018. [136] [139] [140] [141] The play temporarily closed in March 2020, when all UK theatres shut due to the coronavirus pandemic, [142] [143] before it re-opened on 17 May 2021. [144]

Knights Bachelor". The London Gazette. No.Supplement: 44600. 31 May 1968. p.6300. Archived from the original on 1 February 2020 . Retrieved 18 April 2020. Who is the world's most translated author?". thewordpoint.com. 23 May 2015. Archived from the original on 10 June 2020 . Retrieved 10 June 2020.Christie used inspiration from her stay at the Old Cataract Hotel on the banks of the River Nile in Aswan, Egypt for her 1937 novel Death on the Nile

Brantley, Ben (26 January 2012). "London Theater Journal: Comfortably Mousetrapped". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 30 September 2019 . Retrieved 26 January 2012. The Witness for the Prosecution". BBC One. Archived from the original on 12 September 2020 . Retrieved 18 April 2020. Years of Agatha Christie". The Home of Agatha Christie. Archived from the original on 27 January 2021 . Retrieved 3 May 2020. Some of Christie's fictional portrayals have explored and offered accounts of her disappearance in 1926. The film Agatha (1979), with Vanessa Redgrave, has Christie sneaking away to plan revenge against her husband; Christie's heirs sued unsuccessfully to prevent the film's distribution. [201] The Doctor Who episode " The Unicorn and the Wasp" (17 May 2008) stars Fenella Woolgar as Christie, and explains her disappearance as being connected to aliens. The film Agatha and the Truth of Murder (2018) sends her undercover to solve the murder of Florence Nightingale's goddaughter, Florence Nightingale Shore. A fictionalised account of Christie's disappearance is also the central theme of a Korean musical, Agatha. [202] The Christie Affair, a Christie-like mystery story of love and revenge by author Nina de Gramont, was a 2022 novel loosely based on Christie's disappearance. [203]I like this woman. I like her attitude toward life. Agatha Christie's personality comes through loud and clear. At 18, Christie wrote her first short story, "The House of Beauty", while recovering in bed from an illness. It consisted of about 6,000 words about "madness and dreams", subjects of fascination for her. Her biographer Janet Morgan has commented that, despite "infelicities of style", the story was "compelling". [4] :48–49 (The story became an early version of her story "The House of Dreams".) [24] Other stories followed, most of them illustrating her interest in spiritualism and the paranormal. These included " The Call of Wings" and "The Little Lonely God". Magazines rejected all her early submissions, made under pseudonyms (including Mac Miller, Nathaniel Miller, and Sydney West); some submissions were later revised and published under her real name, often with new titles. [4] :49–50 Christie as a young woman, 1910s