A 100-year affair

On Agatha Christie’s birth anniversary, a look at the book that started it all, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which was published in October 1920

In Agatha Christie’s The Mysterious Affair at Styles, John Cavendish’s trial for the murder of his stepmother, Emily Inglethorp, starts on September 15, which as Christie-heads know is the Queen of Crime’s birth anniversary — she was born on September 15, 1890. Christie started to write the novel in 1916 as a challenge to create a whodunit where the reader will not be able to guess the murderer even though presented with the same clues as the detective.

All the reviews when the book was published (1920 in the US and in January 1921 in England) lauded Christie for succeeding in keeping the reader guessing till the very end. The novel is narrated by Captain Arthur Hastings. Hastings is wounded in the First World War and comes to Styles Court in Essex to convalesce, on the invitation of his childhood friend, John.

Hastings is surprised to learn of Emily’s marriage to the much-younger Alfred. Also staying at Styles Court are Mary, John’s wife; Lawrence, his brother; Cynthia, Emily’s ward and the brusque Evelyn Howard, Emily’s companion. When Emily is killed by strychnine poisoning (a particularly horrid way to die), Hastings decides to enlist the help of Hercule Poirot, a celebrated Belgian policeman. Poirot and his fellow Belgians are refugees at the village of Styles St Mary. Inspector James Japp from Scotland Yard is the investigating officer. Toxicologist Dr Bauerstein, who was at the scene, first raises suspicions about Emily’s death.

The Mysterious Affair at Styles set the template for the golden age of detective fiction from the large manor house where the crime is committed, the lock-door mystery, the colourful bunch of suspects all of who have something to hide and would gain from the crime, and of course, the eccentric private detective. In Emily, there is also Christie’s archetypal benevolent dictator.

Peter Ustinov, who played Poirot in Death on the Nile, (1978) said in the “making of” the featurette that Christie created Poirot to be as different as possible from Sherlock Holmes. So where Holmes is tall, Poirot is small; Poirot is Belgian to the decidedly English Holmes; and there are the magnificent military moustaches.

In The Mysterious Affair at Styles, Hastings describes Poirot as “an extraordinary looking little man. He was hardly more than five feet, four inches but carried himself with great dignity. His head was exactly the shape of an egg and he always perched it a little on one side. The neatness of his attire was almost incredible.”

Even the detectives’ methods differed — not for Poirot were the rushing about, disguises and identifying the many kinds of cigarette ash. He believed in order and method and employing the little grey cells. When the solution presented itself, his eyes would shine a bright green.

From 1920 till her death in 1976, Christie went on to write 66 novels, 14 collections of short stories, and the longest-running play, The Mousetrap. Her novels have sold more than two billion copies and apart from Poirot, she also introduced the little old lady detective, Miss Marple and intrepid adventurers Tommy and Tuppence.

Christie continues to be a great favourite in all media. There is a new Poirot book out, Sophie Hannah’s The Killings at Kingfisher Hill. Hannah was commissioned by the Christie estate to write the continuation novels. After 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express, Kenneth Branagh’s adaptation of Death on the Nile with Wonder Woman Gal Gadot as heiress Linnet is set to hit the screens (possibly) on October 23. David Suchet and Geraldine McEwan star as Poirot and Miss Marple in the shows streaming on SonyLIV. Obviously, there is no such thing as too much Christie!

Full a circle

Hastings and Poirot return to Styles Court in Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case. Though the novel was published in 1975, Christie wrote the book in the 1940s during the Second World War and kept the manuscript locked in a bank. In the novel, Poirot is in a wheelchair and has a new valet Curtiss. Hastings is recently widowed and his daughter, Judith (the youngest of four children) is also at Styles Court, which is now a hotel. Even though weak and infirm, Poirot’s grey cells are in great form. The ending is markedly poignant but an excellent swansong for the little Belgian detective.