Biography of the famous writer Agatha Christie. Brief biography of Agatha Christie Other detectives Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie is a famous English writer, prose writer, author of plays and popular detective novels. It was she who wrote the stories about such cult detectives as Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot, who can compete with the fame of the unforgettable Sherlock Holmes (by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle).

Biography and essay on the work of Agatha Christie, no doubt, will be quite useful and interesting for our readers.

short biography

Agatha Mary Clarissa Mallone (before her second marriage - Miller), 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.

The biography of Agatha Christie is poor in events, at least in the early years of the life of the writer. Agatha's father died early, and the family lived in poverty. The girl did not study well and changed several educational institutions, while she was interested in music.

Christy could have become a musician and performed on stage, but, unfortunately, her innate shyness put an end to her youthful dreams. However, this is for the best - who knows, if the girl became a famous pianist, she could write good detective stories?

When the First World War began in the early twentieth century, Agatha went to work in a hospital for the wounded of the military, as a nurse. This gave her invaluable life experience. It is known, by the way, that a young, yet unknown nurse began to write her first novel just while working in a hospital.

When the war ended, the future famous writer trained as a pharmacist. Thanks to this, she, having become the author of detective works, was able to describe poisonings with the help of 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 publishers had rejected it.

The famous English writer was married twice, and if the prose writer divorced one man (his name was Archibald) with a scandal, then with the second - archaeologist Maxis Malone - she lived in a happy marriage for 45 years.

There is also an autobiographical work: “Agatha Christie. Autobiography".

It will be useful for the reader to know 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 - "lady", and her biography invariably diverges in huge numbers.
  • Christie signed some of her works with the pseudonym Mary Westmacott.
  • According to some researchers, the writer suffered from incurable diseases: someone calls Alzheimer's disease, and someone - 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 using highly toxic poisons.
  • The autobiographical story of Agatha Christie ends with the following phrase: “Thank you, Lord, for my wonderful life and for all the love that was given to me.”

The great writer died in the seventies of the twentieth century, when she was 85 years old. The cause of death was a severe cold. Her body was buried in the village of Cholsey, in a small rural cemetery. For more than forty years, the grave of the great writer has become an object of pilgrimage for her many fans.

Even during her lifetime, Agatha Christie received the proud title of "Queen of Detectives" from the British and American press.

Contribution to literature

Peru of this writer owns many literary works. There are two major cycles 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 elderly lady, the prototype of which is called Agatha Christie herself, as well as her elderly, but sharp-witted grandmother.

Such different heroes of Agatha Christa - detectives, spies, priests, criminals and politicians - are united by an extraordinary mind, insight, a desire for justice, and also, which may even seem funny, a complete lack of attention to the opposite sex. Christie's heroes are passionate about their life's work, devoted to duty and ideals, have strong and indestructible principles, but are not at all ambitious.

It should also be mentioned that the literary works of Agatha Christie have been repeatedly filmed. Even the most famous film adaptations will not fit on one page. Here are some of them:

  • "Murder on the Orient Express".
  • Agatha Christie's Poirot.
  • "Ten blacks."
  • "Big Alibi"
  • "Miss Marple".
  • "Mousetrap".

And this is not a complete list of adaptations of her novels.

According to the cycle about Hercule Poirot, a series was even filmed, 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.

In addition to detective stories, Agatha Christie also worked on several screenplays and plays for theaters, and occasionally wrote poetry and stories for children.

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 fiction, were distinguished by a twisted, extraordinary plot and eventful action that kept the reader in suspense right up to the very last page.

In general, the work of the famous Englishwoman was really heterogeneous, rich in new plot denouements, devices and intrigues that had not been previously used by other writers.

Agatha Christie can be called a truly great writer. Her works occupy the third line in the list of the most published books, second only to the Bible and William Shakespeare. The writer wrote more than sixty novels, wrote creepy thrillers under a different 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 has made a truly invaluable contribution to English and, of course, world literature. Author: Irina Shumilova

Agatha Mary Clarissa Mallowan (Eng. Agatha Mary Clarissa, Lady Mallowan), née Miller (Eng. Miller), better known as Agatha Christie, is an English writer. He is one of the most famous authors of detective fiction in the world and is one of the most published writers in the history of mankind (after the Bible and Shakespeare).

Occupation: prose writer, playwright
Years of creativity: 1920 – 1976
Direction: fiction
Genre: detective story, adventure novel, spy novel, autobiography
Debut: The Mysterious Incident at Stiles

Her parents were wealthy immigrants from the United States. She was the youngest daughter in the Miller family. The Miller family had two more children: Margaret Frary (1879-1950) and son Louis Montan "Monty" (1880-1929). Agatha received a good education at home, in particular, musical education, and only stage fright prevented her from becoming a musician.

During World War I, Agatha worked as a nurse in a hospital; she liked this profession and she spoke of it as "one of the most useful professions that a person can engage in." She also worked as a pharmacist in a pharmacy, which later left an imprint on her work: a total of 83 crimes in her works were committed through poisoning.

For the first time, Agatha Christie married on Christmas Day in 1914 to Colonel Archibald Christie, whom she had been in love with for several years - even when he was a lieutenant. They had a daughter, Rosalind. This period was the beginning of the creative path of Agatha Christie. In 1920, Christie's first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, was published. There is speculation that the reason Christie turned to the detective was a dispute with her older sister Madge (who had already shown herself as a writer) that she, too, could create something worthy of publication. Only in the seventh publishing house the manuscript was printed with a circulation of 2000 copies. The aspiring writer received a £25 fee.

Disappearance.

In 1926, Agatha's mother died. At the end of that year, Agatha Christie's husband Archibald confessed to being unfaithful and asked for a divorce because he had fallen in love with fellow golfer Nancy Neal. After an argument in early December 1926, Agatha disappeared from her home, leaving a letter to her secretary in which she claimed to have gone 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, in the cabin of which her fur coat was found. A few days later, the writer herself was discovered. As it turned out, Agatha Christie registered under the name Theresa Neal at the small spa hotel Swan Hydropathic Hotel (now the Old Swan Hotel). Christy gave no explanation for her disappearance, and two doctors diagnosed her with amnesia caused by a head injury. The reasons for the disappearance of Agatha Christie are analyzed by the British psychologist Andrew Norman in his book The Finished Portrait, where he, in particular, argues that the traumatic amnesia hypothesis does not stand up to criticism, since Agatha Christie's behavior indicated the opposite: she registered in a hotel under the name of her husband's mistress, she spent time playing the piano, spa treatments, visiting the library. However, after reviewing all the evidence, Norman came to the conclusion that there was a dissociative fugue caused by a severe mental disorder.

According to another version, the disappearance was conceived by her specifically to take revenge on her husband, whom the police inevitably suspected of the murder of the writer.

The marriage of Archibald and Agatha Christie ended in divorce in 1928.

Second marriage and later years.

In 1930, while traveling in Iraq, she met her future husband, archaeologist Max Mallowan, during the excavations in Ur. 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 of the 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. In this marriage, Agatha Christie lived the rest of her life, until her death in 1976.

Thanks to Christie's travels with her husband to the Middle East, the events of several of her works took place there. Other novels (such as And Then There Were None) were set in or around the city of Torquay, the place where Christie was born. The 1934 novel Murder on the Orient Express was written at the Hotel Pera Palace in Istanbul, Turkey. 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 protected by the National Trust.

Christy often stayed at the Abney Hall mansion in Cheshire, which belonged to her brother-in-law James Watts. The action of at least two of Christie's works took place on this estate: "The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding", a story also included in the collection of the same name, and the novel "After the Burial". “Abney became an inspiration for Agatha; from which were taken descriptions of such places as Stiles, Chimneys, Stonegates and other houses that in one way or another represent Abney.

In 1956, Agatha Christie was awarded the Order of the British Empire, and in 1971, for achievements in the field of literature, Agatha Christie was awarded the title of Cavalierdam (eng. Dame Commander) of the Order of the British Empire, the owners of which also acquire the noble title "lady", used before the 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 achievements in the field of archeology.

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. Specialists at the University of Toronto examined Christie's writing style during these years and put forward the hypothesis that Agatha Christie suffered from Alzheimer's disease.

In 1975, when she was very weak, Christie transferred all rights to her most successful play, The Mousetrap, to her grandson, Mathew Prichard, who also inherited the rights to some of her literary works, and to this day his name is associated with Agatha Christie Limited Foundation.

The last book published during Agatha's lifetime was The Curtain. Christie hesitated to publish it for a long time, as if she had a presentiment that it was a requiem. According to the plot of the story in Stiles, the scene of the first novel, after solving another murder, Hercule Poirot dies. Poirot's game is over, Agatha Christie's life has come to an end. Poirot's farewell letter to Hastings is like Agatha's farewell to her readers. " We will never again set foot on the path of crime together. But it was a wonderful life! Oh what a wonderful life it was!»

Agatha Christie died on January 12, 1976, at her home in Wallingford, Oxfordshire, after a short cold, a year after the triumph of her last book.
The autobiography of Agatha Christie, which the writer graduated in 1965, ends with the words: “ Thank you, Lord, for my good life and for all the love that was bestowed on me.».

Christie's only daughter, Rosalind Margaret Hicks, also lived to 85 and died on October 28, 2004 in Devon.

The works of this writer in terms of the number of publications are second only to the Bible and the works of Shakespeare. The total circulation of her books is over four billion copies! From her pen came detective stories that, being written in the middle of the last century, are relevant and interesting even now.

Agatha Christie is the famous literary "mother" of detective Hercule Poirot and private detective Mrs. Marple. In ordinary life, she had only one daughter - Rosalind.

Agatha Christie (née Miller) was born into a family of wealthy settlers in Devon from the United States. The youngest daughter in the family, she retained a strong attachment to her mother, Clara, for the rest of her life, trying not to disappoint her in anything and never. However, Agatha Christie herself adhered to slightly different views in raising her daughter than her mother, who devoted herself entirely to family and children.

Young Agatha grew up in very difficult years: the beginning of the century in Europe turned out to be difficult and warlike. Having received a good education at home, including music, the girl worked as a nurse in a hospital during the First World War. She liked this profession, and she spoke of it as one of the "most useful professions that a person can engage in."

"There was also a period of work as a pharmacist in her life, which was clearly reflected later in her work: 83 murders in her detective stories are poisonings.

By the way, during a break from work, the girl began to make attempts to write detective stories ...

Clara Miller believed that after the death of her husband (he died of pneumonia when Agatha was only 11 years old), the only way to arrange her daughter's life was a successful marriage, because the inheritance was barely enough to pay her debts. Agatha, unlike her older sister, was considered a girl without special talents, although quite pretty.

“I was never witty,” she confessed many years later. - Often in a conversation I was silent - simply because I did not know what to answer. So I chose the image of a mysterious silent girl and tried to stick to it.

Agata, a girl from a decent family, with a good reputation and a clear look, easily found a groom, also decent, but, unfortunately, very boring ... Everything was already going towards the realization of her mother's dream - a well-groomed house, garden, children. However, a handsome man and womanizer appeared on the way of the future writer. Disaster broke out: Agatha broke off the engagement and rushed to marry the pilot Archibald Christie.


Pictured: with Archibald Christie

"Marriage with Archibald, who was loving to all the women around her, was not particularly happy, but it was he who became for Agatha the beginning of the two main deeds of her life - writing and motherhood. Yes, in that order: on the first - writing, on the second - motherhood.

In 1919, Agatha gave birth to a daughter, Rosalind. She plunged headlong into family life, which, due to the eternal lack of money, was not easy and not very organized. The husband made good money, but spent even more, and when he was tired of his wife's complaints, he, wanting to distract her, asked: "How are your detectives doing?" Remembering the letter from the publisher, where she was offered 25 pounds for the publication of "The Mysterious Crime in Styles", Christy decides to give the manuscript. The book was a success, and the aspiring writer realized that as long as she was paid, she would write. As it is now clear, this decision was absolutely correct.



In the photo: Agatha with her daughter Rosalind

But with the role of mother, everything was not at all so rosy. In her Autobiography, Agatha wrote:
“An honest mother should treat her offspring the way cats do: be satisfied with the fact that she gave birth to them, nursed them, and then return to her own life. Is it really so natural to continue to care for your offspring after they have grown up and went out into the world? Animals don't do that."

Agatha Christie was not ready to become such a mother as, for example, Clara, and put all of herself on the altar of raising her daughter. While Agatha writes novels and travels with her husband, her young daughter Rosalind is raised by her grandmother Clara and Aunt Madge, Agatha's older sister. Meeting her mother from another trip around the world, Rosalind ran to her arms not to her, but to her aunt Madge, and wept bitterly when she handed her over to Agatha. Later, when the grandmother dies, and the aunt has other life circumstances, the girl will end up in a boarding school, because, according to Agatha, "motherhood is ruthless."

"In the first place, as Clara's mother once taught Agatha, she always had a husband. Later, when it turned out that Archie Christie was not able to support a family, Agatha's writing career came first. And the writer's daughter was again in last place .

The relationship of Agatha herself with her mother is called by her biographers ideal - Agatha always devoted Clara to her life. Even when leaving with her husband far from home, she did not break close relations with her mother, wrote her detailed and very warm letters from afar, calling Clara in them "dear, dear mother."


In the photo: Agatha with her mother, Clara Miller

Relations with her daughter Rosalind were a mixture of love, remorse, disappointment and jealousy. Sadly, even her daughter's dog, Peter, Agatha considered more her child than her own daughter. In one of her letters to her second husband, she reports this as follows: “Peter is my child, you know!”.

" Agatha Christie held such views on motherhood: do not let love for children blind you; do not give them all of yourself without a trace; look at them objectively.

But who knows, maybe it was thanks to them that a relationship developed between mother and daughter, more like the relationship of two partners and even friends? After all, it is Rosalind that Agatha Christie asks for advice when a new man appears in her life (the marriage with Archibald was annulled in 1926 when he fell in love with another woman and demanded a divorce). In 1930, the writer met Max Mallowan, an archaeologist who is 14 years younger than her. And some time later, after a marriage proposal, it was the twelve-year-old daughter who stopped her mother's hesitation.

When asked if she would mind if a man appeared in their house again, the girl replied: “I just would not want you to marry the colonel. And Max ... In my opinion, this is the best. We could start our own boat. He plays tennis well. And it can be very helpful."


Pictured: with Max Mallone

And it was Rosalind who was the only person who knew the secret of Mary Westmacott ... Miss Mary Westmacott appeared in the life of Agatha Christie in 1926: a charming blonde, very similar to Agatha in her youth. “A girl from a very good family, it seems, is a distant relative of the famous sculptor Richard Westmacott, the author of the Wellington monument in Hyde Park,” Agatha said about her. - Well brought up - a real lady! He writes quite well, and, thank God, not detectives.

"Christy came up with this girl, hid behind her to write books in a different, non-detective genre. The only one Agatha initiated into the secret of Mary Westmacott was her daughter Rosalind.

She collected clippings about the “young writer”, rules and sent manuscripts to the publisher and did not tell a single living soul about it. And Agatha Christie herself, having revealed Miss Westmacott's incognito, was in no hurry to tell how and why she came up with it.

Mother Agatha and daughter Rosalind went hand in hand until the end of the life of the writer. Agatha Christie adored her grandson Matthew, born in 1943. “He has a special gift - to feel happy,” Agatha said about him.



In the photo: Agatha Christie with her daughter, grandson and husband

Rosalind, until her last days, with fury and activity, which could hardly be expected from her, defended her mother's memory from any attacks, whether it was about her life or work. She wrote articles in newspapers, tried to control the activities of the Agatha Christie Limited company. She would not allow anyone to read her mother's letters or notebooks if they contained any hint of anything personal.



In the photo: Agatha and Rosalind

Rosalind Hicks died in 2004, and her son Matthew Pritchard became CEO of Agatha Christie Limited. Immediately after her death, he said in an interview with journalist Laura Thompson that "she was not proud of her mother and what she did."
But Rosalind herself never said anything of the sort.

Biography and episodes of life Agatha Christie. When born and died Agatha Christie, memorable places and dates of important events in her life. writer quotes, Photo and video.

Years of life of Agatha Christie:

born September 15, 1890, died January 12, 1976

Epitaph

We wish you good luck
In that unknown and new world,
So that you don't get lonely
To keep the angels away.

Biography

The biography of Agatha Christie is an inspiring example of a woman who was able to live a happy and fulfilling life. During her life, Agatha Christie published more than 60 detective stories, 6 novels and several collections of short stories. To this day, she remains one of the most published authors in the world, second only to the Bible itself and the works of Shakespeare.

Agatha Christie was born in Torquay to a respectable English family. The origin of Agatha Christie greatly affected her appearance, because from childhood the girl was brought up as a real English lady. Once, when she was given a dog, the girl locked herself in the toilet, where she said out loud several times: “I have a dog!” It seemed to her that a lady should be able to restrain her emotions in public. She always dreamed of a family and her own home. Therefore, probably, it was so difficult for her to break up with her first husband, who left her for another woman. However, then she remarried, and this marriage became happy for her, despite the fact that Agatha Christie's second husband, an archaeologist, was 15 years younger than her.


Agatha Christie in childhood and youth

Agatha Christie has always been shy and modest. Even when she became a world famous writer, Agatha Christie never delivered solemn speeches. Yes, and she began to write simply because she argued with her older sister, who at that time was already a published writer. Her first story was published by the publishing house after the seventh tryout, but this is what inspired her to further exploits.

Already at an advanced age, Agatha Christie admitted that she had lived a happy, vibrant life. According to her, her two most important dreams came true - she bought a car and attended a reception at the Queen of England herself. A cozy home, a favorite thing, a caring husband - everything she needed for happiness. Even when her health failed, she continued to write. Later, experts who studied her later work came to the conclusion that the writer had Alzheimer's disease. Agatha Christie ended her autobiography with the words: “Thank you, Lord, for my good life and for all the love that was bestowed on me.”

The death of Agatha Christie came on January 12, 1976, she died in her own house in the village of Cholsey. The cause of death of Agatha Christie was a short cold, which caused complications. The funeral of Agatha Christie took place nearby, in the church of St. Mary. The grave of Agatha Christie is located in the cemetery belonging to this church. The detective club, which Agatha Christie headed 18 years before her death, still exists today. The memory of Agatha Christie does not fade to this day.


Agatha Christie with her daughter Rosalind and her grandson Matthew Prichard

life line

September 15, 1890 Date of birth of Agatha Christie (Agatha Mary Clarissa Mallowan, née Miller).
1914 Marriage to Archibald Christie.
1920 Publication of Agatha Christie's first novel, The Secret Affair at Styles.
1928 Divorce from Archibald Christie.
1930 Marriage to Max Mallowan.
1956 Agatha Christie is awarded the Order of the British Empire.
1958 Heading by Agatha Christie of the English Detective Club.
1971 Awarding Agatha Christie the title of chevalier lady.
January 12, 1976 Date of death of Agatha Christie.

Memorable places

1. Torquay, UK, where Agatha Christie was born.
2. The Old Swan Hotel, where Agatha Christie stayed when she disappeared in 1926.
3. Mansion Abney Hall in Cheshire, home of Agatha Christie, where she often stayed.
4. Wallingford, UK, where Agatha Christie's home was located and where she died.
5. Office of the Agatha Christie Limited foundation in London.
6. Greenway Manor, home of Agatha Christie, where the Agatha Christie Museum is today.
7. Winterbrook, Agatha Christie's home in Cholsey, where she died.
8. Cemetery of the church of St. Mary in Cholsey, where Agatha Christie is buried.

Episodes of life

Shortly after the death of Agatha Christie's mother, her husband asked for a divorce, it turned out that he fell in love with his golf colleague. Agatha refused to give a divorce, and soon simply disappeared from the house. At that time, the writer already had many fans, so her loss caused a public outcry. Agatha Christie was searched for 11 days until she was discovered in a spa hotel, where she calmly took baths and played the piano all day. The doctors attributed her disappearance to amnesia. And years later, psychologist Andrew Norman came to the conclusion that there really could be a dissociative fugue, which was caused by a mental disorder or severe shock due to the stress in Christie's life: the death of her mother and her husband's infidelity.

Agatha Christie once jokingly admitted that she invents plots for her books while washing dishes. According to her, this is such a stupid and boring activity that the thought of killing itself comes to mind. Relatives said that the process of writing a book, as a rule, went like this: Agatha Christie pondered everything in her head, simultaneously entering some thoughts into her notebook, and then one day, when the novel was fully ripening in her head, she closed in office and wrote it from start to finish. One of the writer's acquaintances claimed that Christie did not always know who the killer would be in her novel, she first wrote it, then, at the very end, she chose the suspect, and then she went through the book again and added the details necessary to confirm the hero's guilt.

Agatha Christie preferred to write by hand; secretaries and assistants typed her texts on a typewriter. Most of all, she loved to write books while lying in the bathroom - Agatha Christie took a warm bath, put a board with apples on it and wrote page after page. But since the writer was a real Englishwoman, she could not always afford it in the presence of the servants, so when there was one of the servants in the house, she sat down at the desk so as not to embarrass them.


Agatha Christie with her second husband Max Mallowan, headstone on the grave of Agatha Christie

Covenant

"Freedom is worth fighting for."

"One of the greatest secrets of existence is to be able to enjoy the gift of life that is given to you."


Transfer from the cycle "Top Secret" - "Agatha Christie. Queen of Detectives"

condolences

“She is like a literary conjurer who puts the cards face down, shuffles them with her cunning fingers and invites us to guess them again and again in order to deceive once again. It is highly doubtful that any of her methods of killing the characters in her books could be successfully implemented in ordinary life. But although some moments seemed incredible, the readers of her books gladly refused to disbelieve, because this is Christiland, and millions of people around the world were happy to be distracted, entertained and bewildered by her books.
Phyllis Dorothy James, writer

Childhood of Agatha Christie

The famous writer was born into a family of wealthy immigrants from America. She was the youngest, in their family there were two more children - a girl and a boy. The family lost their father early, and the mother was engaged in raising the children. Young Agatha was educated at home. Much attention was paid to music, in which she excelled. Most likely, the girl would become a good musician if it were not for stage fright.

When the First World War began, she helped in the hospital, working there as a nurse. Agatha really liked this job, she considered it the most necessary and noble among all existing professions. For a while she worked as a pharmacist in one of the pharmacies.

The first books of Agatha Christie

Even in the hospital, the girl began to write her first stories. She wanted to try herself in this, like her older sister, who at that time already had several published works. According to one of the assumptions, the sisters argued about whether Agatha could also write something that would be worthy of attention and that they would print. But this is only an assumption.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles is the title of a novel that was first published in 1920. It should be noted that the novel was not immediately accepted for publication. The aspiring writer had to make a lot of effort to make the novel see the light of day.

It was taken to print only in the seventh publishing house. The first print run was two thousand copies, and the author's fee was twenty-five pounds. However, a start had been made. At first, Christie planned to publish under a male pseudonym, believing that the reader would be wary of a female writer working in the detective genre. The publisher dissuaded Agatha, convincing her that with such a rare name she would be immediately remembered.

Since then, all detective novels have been published under the name of Agatha Christie, and those that were not related to the detective have been published under the pseudonym of Mary Westmaccott.

The best detectives of Agatha Christie

Christy began to write a lot. She said that she came up with stories while knitting, when friends came to them or in the company of her family. Sometimes she made important notes in a notebook, which she later used in one or another of her works. By the time the new novel was written, the plot in Christie's head was already completely ready.

More than love. Agatha Christie

She became famous in 1926, which was facilitated by the fact that she was published in magazines. Some of the characters invented by her were present in several novels, combined into a series. These were Hercule Poirot - a detective and an elderly woman - Miss Marple. In contrast to the clever Hercule, there is another hero in the novels about him - the less intelligent and slightly comical Hastings. Miss Marple, the writer associated with her grandmother, who, as Christie said, was always expecting the worst, and the worst, most often, happened. By the end of the thirties, the hero Poirot was tired of the writer, and in 1940 she wrote the final work about him, but it was published only in the seventies. Miss Marple was closer to Christie, she was impressed by the "traditional English lady."

Many periods of the writer's life were reflected in one or another of her works. So, often the heroes died from poisoning with poisons, knowledge of which Christie received while working in a pharmacy. After trips to the Middle East, it was he who became the scene of several works at once. Christie's hometown of Torquay served as a prototype for the places described in her favorite novel, And Then There Were None. While in Istanbul, the writer lived in the Hotel Pera Palace, which she later described in the world-famous novel Murder on the Orient Express. The events of the detective novel The Adventure of the Christmas Pudding take place at her brother-in-law's mansion, where she often visited.

Personal life of Agatha Christie

Agatha Christie. Detective Queen. Opinion of contemporaries

Agatha married in 1914 for a man whom she had loved for several years. It was the pilot Archibald Christie - Colonel. Rosalind is their only daughter. They lived together until 1926, until her husband somehow announced to Agatha that he wanted to divorce because he fell in love with Nancy Neil, a golf colleague. The couple had a big fight, and in the morning Agatha Christie disappeared. The disappearance was mysterious and unexpected.

At that time, she was already quite famous, so such an incident did not go unnoticed. Eleven days they searched for her, but they found only a car and the writer's fur coat left in it. Later it turned out that she checked into one of the hotels, calling herself Teresa Neal, all this time she went to the library, attended spa treatments, played the piano.

Christie herself, even after many years, could not explain this act. It was all very strange, and some doctors spoke of temporary amnesia due to nerves. Coincidentally, in addition to the betrayal of her husband, Agatha was shocked by the death of her mother, who died shortly before the fatal quarrel with Archibald. Most likely, these events together caused a temporary mental breakdown. Two years later, in 1928, the couple officially broke up.


Christie's second husband was Max Mallowan, an archaeologist she met while traveling in Iraq. The marriage was the second and last. The writer lived with this husband until her death.

Starting in 1971, the famous writer began to feel ill, but still continued to work. And in 1975, being already quite weak, she transferred all the rights to the play "The Mousetrap", which was considered the most successful, to her grandson Matthew Prichard.

Death of Agatha Christie

The life of the brilliant English writer ended at her home in Wallingfort on 01/12/76 after suffering a cold. She was buried in the village of Cholsey.