Felled by the dreaded lurgy in early January I was sidelined from my usual reading routine. It’s hard to concentrate when little spikes of fever send your mind swimming into the stratosphere. The symptoms weren’t that bad but the fatigue was real and concentration was not at peak performance.
An Agatha Christie re-read was in order. I read seven of the twelve Miss Marples and it was just the ticket. Reliably readable and not taxing.
I had forgotten – or perhaps I hadn’t noticed as a teenager – just how funny they are.
Take, for example, this comic set piece.
A man is dying, contorted in agony after drinking his morning tea that has been delivered by his personal secretary, Miss Grosvenor. But not to worry, he is a thoroughly unpleasant man with a thoroughly unpleasant family and anyway is a foreigner from mittel Europe who anglicized his name to Fortescue.
“Tea – what the hell – you put in the tea – get help – quick get a doctor.”
Miss Grosvenor fled from the room. She was no longer the supercilious blonde secretary — she was a thoroughly frightened woman who had lost her head.
“Mr. Fortescue’s having a fit – he’s dying – we must get a doctor – he looks awful – I’m sure he’s dying.”
Reactions were immediate and varied a good deal.
Miss. Bell, the youngest typist, said, “If it’s epilepsy we ought to put a cork in his mouth. Who’s got a cork?”
Nobody had a cork.
Miss. Somers said, “At his age it’s probably apoplexy.”
Miss. Griffith said, “We must get a doctor at once.”
But she was hampered in her usual efficiency because in all her sixteen years of service it had never been necessary to call a doctor to the city office. There was her own doctor but that was at Streatham Hill. Where was there a doctor near here?
Nobody knew. Miss Bell seized a telephone directory and began looking up Doctors under D. But it was not a classified directory and doctors were not automatically listed like taxi ranks. Someone suggested a hospital — but which hospital? ‘It has to be the right hospital,’ Miss Somers insisted, ‘or else they won’t come. Because of the National Health, I mean. It’s got to be in the area.’
Someone suggested 999 but Miss. Griffith was shocked at that and said it would mean the police and that would never do. For citizens of a country which enjoyed the benefits of Medical Service for all, a group of quite reasonably intelligent women showed incredible ignorance of correct procedure. Miss. Bell started looking up Ambulances under A. Miss. Griffith said, “There’s his own doctor – he must have a doctor.” Someone rushed for the private address book. Miss. Griffith instructed the office boy to go out and find a doctor – somehow, anywhere. In the private address book. Miss. Griffith found Sir Edwin Sandeman with an address in Harley Street. Miss. Grosvenor, collapsed in a chair, wailed in a voice whose accent was noticeably less Mayfair than usual, “I made the tea just as usual – reely I did – there couldn’t have been anything wrong in it.”
“Wrong in it?” Miss. Griffith paused, her hand on the dial of the telephone. “Why do you say that?”
“He said it – Mr. Fortescue – he said it was the tea,”
Miss. Griffith’s hand hovered irresolutely between Welbeck* and 999. Miss. Bell, young and hopeful, said: “We ought to give him some mustard and water – Now. Isn’t there any mustard in the office?”
There was no mustard in the office.
Some short while later Dr. Isaacs of Bethnal Green, and Sir Edwin Sandeman met in the elevator just as two different ambulances drew up in front of the building. The telephone and the office boy had done their work. – A Pocketful of Rye (1953)
Social Change
The post-war world was changing and Agatha Christie takes note. More foreigners about for one thing.
If Letty Blacklock hasn’t seen her for thirty years, she’d probably not recognize her now. One elderly woman is very like another. You remember Mrs Wotherspoon drew her own and Mrs Bartlett’s Old Age Pension although Mrs Bartlett had been dead for years. Anyway, Miss Blacklock’s short- sighted. Haven’t you noticed how she peers at people? And then there’s the father. Apparently he was a real bad lot.’
“Yes, but he’s a foreigner.”
‘By birth. But there’s no reason to believe he speaks broken English and gesticulates with his hands. I dare say he could play the part of—of an Anglo-Indian Colonel as well as anybody else.’ – A Murder is Announced (!950)
It’s harder than ever to find servants in post-war Britain and sometimes you do have to make do with hysterical, paranoid refugees from mittel Europe and it’s so tiresome to put up with their tantrums and lies even though they provide comic relief when the bodies are piling up.
‘These foreigners certainly understand confectionery, said Miss Hinchcliffe. ‘What they can’t make is a plain boiled pudding.’
Everybody was respectfully silent, though it seemed to be hovering on Patrick’s lips to ask if anyone really wanted a plain boiled pudding. – A Murder is Announced
Of course, Hinch (of Hinch and Murgatroyd) is a lesbian who knows how to feed pigs and how to bargain on the black market with local farmers. She cannot, therefore, be expected to have any sense of humor.
Padding gingerly through the long wet grass, Miss Amy Murgatroyd approached her friend. The latter, attired in corduroy slacks and battledress tunic, was conscientiously stirring in handfuls of balancer meal to a repellently steaming basin full of cooked potato peelings and cabbage stumps.
Medicine is changing too and with the National Health Service is accessible to everyone. An old-fashioned doctor is said to be stuck in his ways, obstinately refusing new ideas and methods.
Miss Marple weighs in:
‘I don’t really know that I blame him there, said Miss Marple. ‘I always feel that the young doctors are only too anxious to experiment. After they’ve whipped out all our teeth, and administered quantities of very peculiar glands, and removed bits of our insides, they then confess that nothing can be done for us. I really prefer the old-fashioned remedy of big black bottles of medicine. After all, one can always pour those down the sink.’ – A Murder is Announced
Christie’s male characters don’t think much of women and nor do the police:
“One of those bossy women?’ suggested Craddock.
“Very possibly,’ said the assistant commissioner. ‘Still in my experience, bossy women seldom get themselves murdered. I can’t think why not. When you come to think of it, it’s rather a pity.” – The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side (1962)
Many of Christie’s books provide a glimpse into a different world but also one of change. It’s not just the difficulty of finding servants but also the food, the drink, social norms and expectations, attitudes, language, houses, habitats, furniture, new housing estates, and who lives where. The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side reads in part like a treatise on social change.
In The Body in the Libary (1942) the dance band at the seaside hotel (Bournemouth?) plays into the small hours. It’s era of parlormaids and cooks In Mirrors, twenty years later St. Mary Mead now has a new housing estate and there’s a supermarket in the high street. It’s world of packets and cereal instead of a proper breakfast.
Miss Marple has a lady’s companion and employs Cherry Baker from the housing estate to help with the housework.
Owing to the insidious snares of Hire Purchase, they were always in need of ready money, though their husbands all earned good wages; and so they came and did housework or cooking. Cherry was a quick and efficient cook, she was an intelligent girl, took telephone calls correctly and was quick to spot inaccuracies in the tradesmen’s books. She was not much given to turning mattresses, and as far as washing up went Miss Marple always now passed the pantry door with her head turned away so as not to observe Cherry’s method which was that of thrusting everything into the sink together and letting loose a snowstorm of detergent on it. Miss Marple had quietly removed her old Worcester teaset from daily circulation and put it in the corner cabinet whence it only emerged on special occasions. Instead she had purchased a modern service with a pattern of pale grey on white and no gilt on it whatsoever to be washed away in the sink.
Detective-Inspector Frank Cornish still feels free to use the word “pansy” and Cherry indulges in some classic stereotyping , warning her friend Gladys of the dangers of italian men:
‘I — and you’d better be careful, my girl. You know what these wops are like! Affiliation orders all over the place. Hot-blooded and passionate, that’s what these Italians are.’
Gladys sighed ecstatically.
The social commentary in Mirror Cracked is heavy handed and extensive. It is, however, an interesting meditation on a rapidly changing country and countryside. It was more interesting that the actual plot which seems almost an afterthought and secondary to the main theme of social change. That’s what gives period pieces their value.
Here are the twelve Miss Marple novels in chronological order. I read numbers 2 through 8. That means – should I get afflicted again (not something i would wish on anyone, relatively mild though it was) – I have five more to go.
- The Murder at the Vicarage (1930)
- The Body in the Library (1942)
- The Moving Finger (1943)
- A Murder Is Announced (1950)
- They Do It with Mirrors (1952) – also published as Murder With Mirrors
- A Pocket Full of Rye (1953)
- 4.50 from Paddington (1957) – also published as What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw!
- The Mirror Crack’d from Side to Side (1962)
- A Caribbean Mystery (1964)
- At Bertram’s Hotel (1965l)
- Nemesis (1971)
- Sleeping Murder (1976)
*Can anyone explain that ‘Welbeck” reference?
Agatha Christie’s attitude to the ordinary worker made me burn with fury the first time I read her. Nothing’s changed since. She thinks of them a little like she would think of a pet cat or dog – how clever they are for what they are. Comforting is the last thing I would call them when spikes of rage are continually zipping up and down your back. Imagine, Cherry could answer a telephone correctly! Good thing she wasn’t a foreigner, throwing praise like that around.
Sorry you’ve been poorly and glad to hear you are recovering.
The class attitudes are enraging that is for sure. And even in this later book, she has her (always adenoidal) dimwitted servant “girl”. At least this one wasn’t taken from the orphanage to be trained by Miss Marple.
I love Agatha Christie and collect her books, they are comfortable reading. I also enjoy the audio dramas, with John Moffat as Hercule Poirot. There is something about Agatha Christie that never dies, her work is as thrilling today as it was during her lifetime. I think my favorites would be A Murder is Announced and Murder on the Orient Express, though the recent movie of the latter was ghastly. And then there were None absolutely terrified me as a child and it is the only one I still can’t read unless the room is well lit. Brilliant.
Christie had so many clever and original plots. She really was the queen of crime. “And then there were one” is a stand-alone. But – so is “Orient Express”.
From my recent reading burst I would say that “A Murder is Announced was my favorite. I liked the post-war period feel. The thirties world was over, the war had ended. Change is in the air but the past still lingers.
Though I read all these chronologically a few years ago, I didn’t consciously take in the humour. The social commentary though, especially as you point out in The Mirrir Crac’d was something I did notice and comes through to different degrees in each of the books. Hope you do get to read the others without another bout of illness.
Thanks. Yes, it’s interesting how differently one reads over time. Some books you read again and wonder why you ever bothered and how could you have possibly liked them. And others grow on you and reveal their depths and secrets upon your return.
Isn’t Miss Marple fantastic! I recently read The Body in the Library and was surprised at the humour and sauciness, pink knickers showing and everything!
Christie seems to use her as a vehicle for her personal commentary and observations on social change.
I love all the little asides and the reprehensible prejudices and stereotypes as well. Example: the way the police know that a character is reliable because she lives in Muswell Hill!
Miss Marple herself has a more generous spirit than many of the other characters.
Fascinating blog – I can’t remember reading Agatha Christie but this sheds a new light on why I should now!
What a great idea to reread her. Since I read her when I was in high school(60 years ago now) I have no chance to remembering the plot! My granddaughter(15) has been reading her. I will have to borrow her copies.
Sounds like a plan! (You can also read them free online via the Open Library. )
Welbeck could refer to the Welbeck Hospital, founded in the early C20th near the medical centre of Harley Street. A private health care clinic of that name still exists, owned by an American health care company, I believe.
Thanks Michael
Thank you for reminding me of why I love Agatha and Miss Marple!
But sorry you had to experience an illness to “re-discover” this wonderful writer – if nasty health strikes again (God forbid) I can recommend the 1980 British film The Mirror Crack’d with Angela Lansbury as the intrepid Miss Marple. Also Golden Age actors Rock Hudson, Elizabeth Taylor, Tony Curtis, Kim Novak.
But, just stay healthy! You can catch up on Agatha later!!
I just bought a couple of Agatha Christie books from my second hand bookshop this week. One is a Poirot, Cards on the Table and I found it followed a pattern I have noticed in other Christie books. Starts well with interesting characters and back story ; murder happens , story degenerates into ‘ Where were you at 10.15?’
I also have a Marple omnibus, which judging by your reviews, will be more fun.
When I had the ‘thing’ I read 6 books by Caroline Graham, the original Midsomer Murders books. Much more racy than the series, with Sergeant Troy a thoroughly pleasant racist chap with a roving eye.
I found The ABC Murders on the bookshelf in a seaside guesthouse when I was about 12.
I was entranced and read it in a day. I later read some of the other Poirot novels but avoided Miss Marple (I probably thought a woman investigator wouldn’t be quite up to it). Your account brings out so well the way Christie satirises the sheltered and unworldly monied middle-class while making the reader feel comfortable to be one of them. I’ll get back to the privet hedges.
John Hodgson´s last blog post ..What light from yonder window breaks?
The references to change – especially in “A Murder is Announced” and “Mirror Cracked” were really quite interesting. The changing world of the fading gentlewoman. The former is still in the era of rationing so there’s tinned butter from America and all kind of black market bartering going on. And “Mirror” is stuffed with social changes from dresses made of terylene to everything coming in packets.
Reminds me of the newspaper appeals for The Distressed Gentlefolk’s Aid Association. I think it’s now changed its name to something less class-bound.
Welbeck was a telephone exchange and it was the way we referred to what we know call telephone numbers..dont u recall..or perhaps u did not have atelephone as many still did not…can u now imagine. Ours was HAR …. denoting Harrow. Wonder what area was covered by Welbeck.
I reading Agatha Christie’s in my teeenage years….especially The Moving Finger…i fell in love with the main character…secretly of course.
Your blog shows me how to start my recovery…reading Agatha again..on my first determined step to create my own cabinet of curiosities and liberate a free roaming hurricane spitfire (sans propellor). Yes i was engrossed then by my Airfix kits too. Life seems to show us a new path if we look and are open to seeing and have a thoughtful friend who leads by example (and blog). There’s no need now to stand outside the red box in the rain and cold waiting for the occupant to finish their call…clutching the large cold pennies that will connect us if we are fortunate enough to press button A….or was it B?
Life swiftly moves on whilst we are immersed in our everday so a novel from the past can take us right back there in a way non fiction coldly cannot. Thanks for it all, as ever.
Thanks Jackie Dierdre – all comments and help appreciated.
Sorry to hear the dreaded lurgy got you, may it stay away in future! It’a odd how comforting Christie’s books can be, I listen to audio versions of them (Joan Hickson and Hugh Fraser only), when I have problems falling asleep, such a pleasure to listen to.
P.S. – I’m going to add Mrs. Dane Calthorp in The Moving Finger and The Pale Horse to my collection of dotty, older women, she’s a wonderful character.
Good plan!
My introduction to Agatha Christie came as a teenager in the 1950s when I saw AND THEN THERE WERE NONE (a 1945 film based on her novel). The film is so good that the name Agatha Christie deposited itself permanently into my memory bank, though I admit to having subsequently viewed more movies based on her novels than the novels themselves.
bringing back memories of my teenage years, those were the first crime novels I read
I haven’ t read Agatha for many years, but now you’ve fired me up for a couple of them! I assume they are all available on Kindle. So glad to hear you’ve recovered and that you spent your down time doing something you love to do. Carol
More than available on Kindle they are all available free via the Open library which is how I read them.
https://openlibrary.org/
Hi Jose: Sorry to hear about being ill but what a great excuse to read. I love Agatha Christie and Miss Marple and read them all many eons ago and now I’m intrigued to read them again. Wellbeck was a telephone exchange.. so I guess the choice was Wellbeck or 999.
Cheers
Shirley
Wow! How do you know that? Fantastic. And thanks so much!
And would absolutely love to find a way to catch up in person.
I don’t remember when I last read an Agatha Christie novel. I rather think it was before I came to the States, so pre-1964! But yes, I can see that there is humour in them and just the sort of thing for lying in bed with a dratted bug. I do hope you have thrown it off completely!
“Covid begone,” she said. And so it was (after a bit.)
(Cheers Carolyn.)