Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady Mallowan, (15 September 1890-12 January 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 wrote the world's longest-running play, the murder mystery TheMousetrap, 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 her youth, Christie showed little interest in antiquities. After her marriage to Mallowan in 1930, she accompanied him on annual expeditions, spending three to four months at a time in Syria and Iraq at excavation sites at Ur, Nineveh, Tell Arpachiyah, Chagar Bazar, Tell Brak, and Nimrud. Mallowans also took side trips whilst travelling to and from expedition sites, visiting Italy, Greece, Egypt, Iran, and the Soviet Union, among other places. Their experiences travelling and living abroad are reflected in novels such as Murder on the Orient Express, Death on the Nile, and Appointment with Death.
Death on the Nile is a work of detective fiction by British writer Agatha Christie, published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on 1 November 1937 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence and the US edition at $2.00.
The book features the Belgian detective Hercule Poirot. The action takes place in Egypt, mostly on the River Nile. The novel is unrelated to Christie's earlier short story of the same name, which featured Parker Pyne as the detective.
Contemporary reviews of the book were primarily positive. The Times Literary Supplement's short review concluded by saying Hercule Poirot, as usual, digs out a truth so unforeseen that it would be unfair for a reviewer to hint at it.
The Scotsman review of 11 November 1937 finished by saying that, the author has again constructed the neatest of plots, wrapped it round with distracting circumstances, and presented it to what should be an appreciative public.
E R Punshon of The Guardian in his review of 10 December 1937 began by saying, To decide whether a writer of fiction possesses the true novelist's gift it is often a good plan to consider whether the minor characters in his or her book, those to whose creation the author has probably given little thought, stand out in the narrative in their own right as living personalities. This test is one Mrs Christie always passes successfully, and never more so than in her new book.
In a later review, Robert Barnard wrote that this novel is One of the top ten, in spite of an overcomplex solution. The familiar marital triangle, set on a Nile steamer. The weakness is that there is Comparatively little local colour, but some good grotesques among the passengers – of which the film took advantage. He notes a change in Christie's novels with this plot published in 1937, as Spies and agitators are beginning to invade the pure Christie detective story at this period, as the slide towards war begins.
Today, The Grandma is relaxing at home. She has been watching some films interpreted by PeterUstinov, one of her favourite actors who was born on a day like today in 1921.
TheGrandma admires Ustinov and loves all his roles, especially Hercule Poirot ones.
Peter Alexander von Ustinov (16 April 1921-28 March 2004) was an English actor, writer, and filmmaker.
He was a fixture on television talk shows and lecture circuits for much of his career. An intellectual and diplomat, he held various academic posts and served as a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF and president of the World Federalist Movement.
Ustinov was the winner of numerous awards during his life, including two Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actor, Emmy Awards, Golden Globes, and BAFTA Awards for acting, and a Grammy Award for best recording for children, as well as the recipient of governmental honours from, amongst others, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany.
In 2003, Durham University changed the name of its Graduate Society to Ustinov College in honour of the significant contributions Ustinov had made as chancellor of the university from 1992 until his death.
Peter Alexander Freiherr von Ustinov was born in London, England. His father, Jona Freiherr von Ustinov, was of Russian, Polish Jewish, German, and Ethiopian descent. Peter's paternal grandfather was Baron Plato von Ustinov, a Russian noble, and his grandmother was Magdalena Hall, of mixed German-Ethiopian-Jewish origin.
Ustinov's great-grandfather Moritz Hall, a Jewish refugee from Kraków and later a Christian convert and collaborator of Swiss and German missionaries in Ethiopia, married into a German-Ethiopian family. Peter's paternal great-great-grandparents were the German painter Eduard Zander and the Ethiopian aristocrat Court-Lady Isette-Werq in Gondar.
Ustinov's mother, Nadezhda
Leontievna Benois, known as Nadia, was a painter and ballet designer of
French, German, Italian, and Russian descent. Her father, Leon Benois,
was an Imperial Russian architect and owner of Leonardo da Vinci's
painting Madonna Benois.
Jona or Iona worked as a press officer at the German Embassy in London in the 1930s and was a reporter for a German news agency. In 1935, two years after Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, Jona von Ustinov began working for the British intelligence service MI5 and became a British citizen, thus avoiding internment during the war. The statutory notice of his application for citizenship was published in a Welsh newspaper so as not to alert the Germans. He was the controller of Wolfgang Gans zu Putlitz, an MI5 spy in the German embassy in London, who furnished information on Hitler's intentions before the Second World War.
Ustinov was educated at Westminster School and had a difficult childhood because of his parents' constant fighting. One of his schoolmates was Rudolf von Ribbentrop, the eldest son of the Nazi Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop. While at school, Ustinov considered anglicizing his name to Peter Austin, but was counselled against it by a fellow pupil who said that he should Drop the 'von' but keep the 'Ustinov'.
In his late teens he trained as an
actor at the London Theatre Studio. While there, on 18 July 1938 he made
his first appearance on the stage at the Barn Theatre, Shere, playing
Waffles in Chekhov’s The Wood Demon, and his London stage début later
that year at the Players' Theatre, becoming quickly established. He
later wrote, I was not irresistibly drawn to the drama. It was an
escape road from the dismal rat race of school.
In 1939, he appeared in White Cargo at the Aylesbury Rep, where he performed in a different accent every night. Ustinov served as a private in the British Army during the Second World War, including time spent as batman to David Niven while writing the Niven film The Way Ahead.
After the war, he began writing; his first major success was with the play The Love of Four Colonels (1951). He starred with Humphrey Bogart and Aldo Ray in We're No Angels (1955).
His career as a dramatist continued, his best-known play being Romanoff and Juliet (1956). His film roles include Roman emperor Nero in Quo Vadis (1951), Lentulus Batiatus in Spartacus (1960), Captain Vere in Billy Budd (1962), Captain Blackbeard in the Disney film Blackbeard’s Ghost (1968), and an old man surviving a totalitarian future in Logan's Run (1976).
Ustinov voiced the anthropomorphic lions Prince John and King Richard in the 1973 Disney animated film Robin Hood. He also worked on several films as writer and occasionally director, including The Way Ahead (1944), School for Secrets (1946), Hot Millions (1968), and Memed, My Hawk (1984).
In half a dozen films, he played Agatha Christie's detective Hercule Poirot, first in Death on the Nile (1978) and then in 1982's Evil Under the Sun, 1985's Thirteen at Dinner (TV film), 1986's Dead Man's Folly (TV film), 1986's Murder in Three Acts (TV film), and 1988's Appointment with Death.
Ustinov won Academy Awards for Best Supporting Actor for his roles in Spartacus (1960) and Topkapi (1964). He also won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor for the film Quo Vadis. Ustinov was also the winner of three Emmys and one Grammy and was nominated for two Tony Awards.
His autobiography, Dear Me (1977), was well-received and had him describe his life (ostensibly his childhood) while being interrogated by his own ego, with forays into philosophy, theatre, fame, and self-realization.
From 1969 until his death, his acting and writing took second place to his work on behalf of UNICEF, for which he was a goodwill ambassador and fundraiser. In this role, he visited some of the neediest children and made use of his ability to make people laugh, including many of the world's most disadvantaged children. Sir Peter could make anyone laugh, UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy is quoted as saying.
Ustinov died on 28 March 2004 of heart failure in a clinic in Genolier, near his home in Bursins, Switzerland, aged 82. UNICEF Executive Director Carol Bellamy spoke at his funeral, representing United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
Ustinov was the president of the World Federalist Movement (WFM) from 1991 to 2004, the time of his death. WFM is a global nongovernmental organization that promotes the concept of global democratic institutions. WFM lobbies those in powerful positions to establish a unified human government based on democracy and civil society. The United Nations and other world agencies would become the institutions of a World Federation. The UN would be the federal government and nation states would become similar to provinces.
Until his death, Ustinov was a member of English PEN, part of the PENInternational network that campaigns for freedom of expression.
With a total length of 6,853 km between the region of Lake Victoria and the Mediterranean Sea, the Nile is the longest river on the African continent. The Nile basin is complex, and because of this, the discharge at any given point along the mainstem depends on many factors including groundwater flow, diversions, weather and evaporation. It covers about 10% of the area of Africa.
Claire Fontaine is reading some information about the ancient ruins and the importance of places like the Valley of the Kings and the Valley of the Queens and The Grandma is studying two new lessons of her Intermediate Language Practice manual (Vocabulary 7 & 8).
The Grandma visited these places some decades ago when she was a teenager and she
wants to keep those memories alive because it was an amazing travel.
Sometimes, visiting places twice can help you to discover little things
that you hadn't seen before but it can be also a way to change some good
memories. The Grandma thinks that you can not return to a place
where you had been happy because, perhaps, this second visit can change
your memories and create new ones.
Travelling along the Nile River is like travelling along the History of Civilizations. Joseph de Ca'th Lon is very interested in visiting Luxor and Karnak Temples witnesses of the most splendorous age of the Ancient Egypt.
Luxoris a city in Upper Egypt and the capital of LuxorGovernorate. As the site of the Ancient Egyptian city of Thebes, Luxor has frequently been characterized as the world's greatest open-air museum, as the ruins of the temple complexes at Karnak and Luxor stand within the modern city.
Joseph de Ca'th Lon with Ramesses II in Luxor
As the site of the AncientEgyptian city of Thebes, Luxor has frequently been characterizedas the world's greatest open-airmuseum, as the ruins of the templecomplexes at Karnak and Luxor stand within the modern city.
Immediately opposite, across the River Nile, lie the monuments, temples and tombs of the West Bank Necropolis, which includes the Valley of the Kings and Valley of the Queens.
The name Luxor comes from the Arabical-ʾuqṣur, the palaces,which may be a loanword from the Latin castrum fortified camp.
Luxor was the ancient city of Thebes, the great capital of Upper Egypt during the New Kingdom, and the glorious city of Amun, later to become the god Amun-Ra. The city was regarded in the Ancient Egyptian texts as Waset, which meant city of the sceptre, and also ta ipet and meaning the shrine, and then, in a later period, the Greeks called it Thebai and the Romans after them Thebae.
Thebes was also known as the city of the 100 gates, sometimes being called southern HeliopolisIunu-shemaa in Ancient Egyptian, to distinguish it from the city of Iunu or Heliopolis, the main place of worship for the god Ra in the north. It was also often referred to as niw.t, which simply means city, and was one of only three cities in Egypt for which this noun was used, the other two were Memphis and Heliopolis; it was also called niw.t rst, southern city, as the southernmost of them.
Tina Picotes in the Luxor Temples
The importance of the city started as early as the 11th Dynasty, when the town grew into a thriving city. Montuhotep II who united Egypt after the troubles of the first intermediate period brought stability to the lands as the city grew in stature.
The Pharaohs of the New Kingdom in their expeditions to Kush, in today's northern Sudan, and to the lands of Canaan, Phoenicia and Syria saw the city accumulate great wealth and rose to prominence, even on a world scale. Thebes played a major role in expelling the invading forces of the Hyksos from Upper Egypt, and from the time of the 18th Dynasty to the 20th Dynasty, the city had risen as the political, religious and military capital of Ancient Egypt.
The city attracted peoples such as the Babylonians, the Mitanni, the Hittites of Anatolia, modern-day Turkey, the Canaanites of Ugarit, the Phoenicians of Byblosand Tyre, the Minoans from the island of Crete. A Hittite prince from Anatolia even came to marry with the widow of Tutankhamun, Ankhesenamun.
The political and military importance of the city, however, faded during the Late Period, with Thebes being replaced as political capital by several cities in Northern Egypt, such as Bubastis, Sais and finally Alexandria.
Claire Fontaine in the Avenue of the Sphinxes, Luxor
However, as the city of the god Amun-Ra, Thebes remained the religious capital of Egypt until the Greek period. The main god of the city was Amun, who was worshipped together with his wife, the Goddess Mut, and their son Khonsu, the God of the moon.
With the rise of Thebes as the foremost city of Egypt, the local god Amon rose in importance as well and became linked to the sun god Ra, thus creating the new king of godsAmon-Ra. His great temple, at Karnak just north of Thebes, was the most important temple of Egypt right until the end of antiquity.
Later, the city was attacked by Assyrian emperor Assurbanipal who installed the Libyan prince on the throne, Psamtik I. The city of Thebes was in ruins and fell in significance.
However, Alexander the Great did arrive at the temple of Amun, where the statue of the god was transferred from Karnak during the Opet Festival, the great religious feast. Thebes remained a site of spirituality up to the Christian era, and attracted numerous Christian monks in the Roman Empire who established monasteries amidst several ancient monuments including the temple of Hatshepsut, now called Deir el-Bahrithe northern monastery.
Joseph in King Seti I Burial Chamber, Luxor
Luxor Temple is a large AncientEgyptian temple complex located on the east bank of the Nile River in the city today known as Luxor, ancient Thebes, and was constructed approximately 1400 BCE. In the Egyptian language it is known as ipet resyt, the southern sanctuary.
In Luxor there are several great temples on the east and west banks. Four of the major mortuary temples visited by early travelers and tourists include the Temple of Seti I at Gurnah, the Temple of Hatshepsut at Deir el Bahri, the Temple of Ramesses II, aka Ramesseum, and the Temple of Ramesses III at Medinet Habu; and the two primary cults temples on the east bank are known as the Karnak and Luxor. Unlike the other temples in Thebes, Luxor temple is not dedicated to a cult god or a deified version of the king in death.
Instead Luxor temple is dedicated to the rejuvenation of kingship; it may have been where many of the kings of Egypt were crowned in reality or conceptually, as in the case of Alexander the Great who claimed he was crowned at Luxor but may never have traveled south of Memphis, near modern Cairo.
To the rear of the temple are chapels built by Amenhotep III of the 18th Dynasty, and Alexander. Other parts of the temple were built by Tutankhamun and Ramesses II. During the Roman era, the temple and its surroundings were a legionary fortress and the home of the Roman government in the area.
The Grandma with Ramesses II, Luxor
The Karnak Temple Complex, commonly known as Karnak, from Arabic Khurnak meaning fortified village, comprises a vast mix of decayed temples, chapels, pylons, and other buildings. Construction at the complex began during the reign of Senusret I in the MiddleKingdom and continued into the Ptolemaic period, although most of the extant buildings date from the NewKingdom. The area around Karnak was the ancient Egyptian Ipet-isut, The Most Selected of Places and the main place of worship of the 18th DynastyTheban Triad with the god Amun as its head.
It is part of the monumental city of Thebes. The Karnak complex gives its name to the nearby, and partly surrounded, modern village of El-Karnak, 2.5 kilometres north of Luxor.
The Valley of the Kings also known as the Valley of the Gates of the Kings is a valley in Egypt where, for a period of nearly 500 years from the 16th to 11th century BC, rock cut tombs were excavated for the Pharaohs and powerful nobles of the New Kingdom, the 18th to the 20th Dynasties of Ancient Egypt.
The valley stands on the west bank of the Nile, opposite Thebes, modern Luxor, within the heart of the Theban Necropolis. The wadi consists of two valleys, East Valley, where the majority of the royal tombs are situated, and West Valley.
Visiting the Valley of the Kings, Egypt
This area has been a focus of archaeological and egyptological exploration since the end of the eighteenth century, and its tombs and burials continue to stimulate research and interest.
In modern times the valley has become famous for the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun, with its rumours of the Curse of the Pharaohs, and is one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world. In 1979, it became a UNESCO World Heritage Site, along with the rest of the Theban Necropolis. Exploration, excavation and conservation continues in the valley, and a new tourist centre has recently been opened.
The Valley of the Queens is a site in Egypt, where wives of Pharaohs were buried in ancient times. In ancient times, it was known as Ta-Set-Neferu, meaning the place of beauty.
Using the limits as described by Christian Leblanc, the Valley of the Queens consists of the main wadi which contains most of the tombs, as well as the Valley of Prince Ahmose, the Valley of the Rope, the Valley of the Three Pits, and the Valley of the Dolmen. The main wadi contains 91 tombs and the subsidiary valleys add another 19 tombs. The burials in the subsidiary valleys all date to the 18th Dynasty.
The Grandma & Claire visit the Luxor Temples
The reason for choosing the Valley of the Queens as a burial site is not known. The location in close proximity to the worker's village in Deir el-Medina and the Valley of the Kings may have been a factor.
Another consideration may be the existence of a sacred grotto dedicated to Hathor at the entrance of the Valley. This grotto may be associated with rejuvenation for the dead.
The Mortuary Temple of Ramesses III at Medinet Habu is an important New Kingdom period structure in the West Bank of Luxor in Egypt. Aside from its size and architectural and artistic importance, the temple is probably best known as the source of inscribed reliefs depicting the advent and defeat of the Sea Peoples during the reign of Ramesses III.
The Ramesseum is the memorial temple, or mortuary temple, of Pharaoh Ramesses II, Ramesses the Great, also spelled Ramses and Rameses. It is located in the Theban necropolis in Upper Egypt, across the River Nile from the modern city of Luxor.
Deir el-Medina is an ancient Egyptian village which was home to the artisans who worked on the tombs in the Valley of the Kings during the 18th to 20th Dynasties of the New Kingdom of Egypt, ca. 1550–1080 BCE.
The settlement's ancient name was Set maatThe Place of Truth, and the workmen who lived there were called Servants in the Place of Truth. During the Christian era, the temple of Hathor was converted into a church from which the Arabic name Deir el-Medina, the monastery of the town, is derived.
The Grandma & the Colossi of Memnon years ago
The Theban Necropolis is located on the west bank of the Nile, opposite Luxor. As well as the more famous royal tombs located in the Valley of the Kings and Queens, there are numerous other tombs, more commonly referred to as Tombs of the Nobles, the burial places of some of the powerful courtiers and persons of the ancient city.
There are at least 415 cataloged tombs, designated TT for Theban Tomb. There are other tombs whose position has been lost, or for some other reason do not conform to this classification. Theban tombs tended to have clay Funerary cones placed over the entrance of the tomb chapels. During the New Kingdom they were inscribed with the title and name of the tomb owner, sometimes with short prayers. Of the 400 recorded sets of cones, only about 80 come from cataloged tombs.
Deir el-Bahari or Dayr al-Bahri or the Monastery of the Sea is a complex of mortuary temples and tombs located on the west bank of the Nile, opposite the city of Luxor. This is a part of the Theban Necropolis. The first monument built at the site was the mortuary temple of Mentuhotep II of the 11th Dynasty. It was constructed during the 15th century BCE. During the 18th Dynasty, Amenhotep I and Hatshepsut also built extensively at the site.
Malkata or Malqata, meaning the place where things are picked up in Arabic, is the site of an Ancient Egyptian palace complex built during the New Kingdom, by the 18th Dynasty Pharaoh Amenhotep III.
It is located on the West Bank of the Nile at Thebes, Upper Egypt, in the desert to the south of Medinet Habu. The site also included a temple dedicated to Amenhotep III's Great Royal Wife, Tiy, and honors Sobek, the crocodile deity.
Tina Picotes visits the Colossi of Memnon
The Colossi of Memnon are two massive stone statues of the Pharaoh Amenhotep III, who reigned in Egypt during the 18th Dynasty. For the past 3,400 years, since 1350 BC, they have stood in the Theban Necropolis, located west of the River Nile from the modern city of Luxor.
Memnon was a hero of the Trojan War, a King of Ethiopia who led his armies from Africa into Asia Minor to help defend the beleaguered city but was ultimately slain by Achilles.
Memnon, whose name means the Steadfast or Resolute was said to be the son of Eos, the goddess of dawn. He was associated with colossi built several centuries earlier, because of the reported cry at dawn of the northern statue, which became known as the Colossus of Memnon. Eventually, the entire Theban Necropolis became generally referred to as the Memnonium making him Ruler of the west as in the case of the god Osiris who was called chief of the west.
Autumn is here and The Grandma has decided to go on holiday. As you know, she doesn't like crowds and this is the main reason because of she prefers travelling in this season.
She wants to stay some months travelling around Europe and Asia and she has chosen The Orient Express, the famous train.
First of all, The Grandma has arrived to Milan where she's going to take this historic train accompanied by an old friend Hercule Poirot, a Belgian detective.
Let's go to join them in this unforgettable experience...
The Orient Express was the name of a long-distance passenger train service created in 1883 by Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits (CIWL).
The original route, which first ran on October 4, 1883, was from Paris, Gare de l'Est, to Giurgiu in Romania via Munich and Vienna. At Giurgiu, passengers were ferried across the Danube to Ruse, Bulgaria, to pick up another train to Varna. They then completed their journey to Constantinople by ferry.
The route and rolling stock of The Orient Express changed many times. Several routes in the past concurrently used The Orient Express name, or slight variants thereof. Although the original Orient Express was simply a normal international railway service, the name has become synonymous with intrigue and luxury travel. The two city names most prominently associated with the Orient Express are Paris and Constantinople (Istanbul), the original endpoints of the timetabled service.
The Orient Express was a showcase of luxury and comfort at a time when travelling was still rough and dangerous. CIWL soon developed a dense network of luxury trains all over Europe, whose names are still remembered today and associated with the art of luxury travel – The Blue Train, The Golden Arrow, North Express and many more.
Schedule of The Orient Express
In 1977, The Orient Express stopped serving Istanbul. Its immediate successor, a through overnight service from Paris to Vienna, ran for the last time from Paris on Friday, June 8, 2007.
After this, the route, still called The Orient Express, was shortened to start from Strasbourg instead, occasioned by the inauguration of the LGV Est which affords much shorter travel times from Paris to Strasbourg. The new curtailed service left Strasbourg at 22:20 daily, shortly after the arrival of a TGV from Paris, and was attached at Karlsruhe to the overnight sleeper service from Amsterdam to Vienna.
On 14 December 2009, The Orient Express ceased to operate and the route disappeared from European railway timetables, reportedly a victim of high-speed trains and cut-rate airlines. The Venice-Simplon Orient Express train, a private venture by Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. using original CIWL carriages from the 1920s and 1930s, continues to run from London to Venice and to other destinations in Europe, including the original route from Paris to Istanbul.
In March 2014 Orient-Express Hotels Ltd. was renamed Belmond.
Who knows who will be on board? A couple of spies, for sure. At least one grand duke; a few beautiful woman, no doubt very rich and very troubled. Anything can happen and usually does on the Orient Express.
Dame Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie, Lady
Mallowan, DBE (née Miller; 15 September 1890 – 12 January 1976) was an English
crime novelist, short story writer and playwright. She also wrote six romances
under the name Mary Westmacott including Giant's Bread, but she is best known
for the 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections that she wrote under
her own name, most of which revolve around the investigative work of such
characters as Hercule Poirot, Jane Marple, Parker Pyne, Ariadne Oliver,
Harley Quin/Mr Satterthwaite and Tommy
and Tuppence Beresford.
She wrote
the world's longest-running play, a murder mystery, The Mousetrap. In 1971 she
was made a Dame for her contribution to literature. Christie was born into a
wealthy upper-middle-class family in Torquay, Devon. She served in a hospital
during the First World War before marrying and starting a family in London. She
was initially unsuccessful at getting her work published, but in 1920 The
Bodley Head press published her novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles,
featuring the character of Hercule Poirot.
This launched her literary career. The
Guinness Book of World Records lists Christie as the best-selling novelist of
all time. Her novels have sold roughly 2 billion copies, and her estate claims
that her works come third in the rankings of the world's most-widely published
books, behind only William Shakespeare's works and the Bible.
It
has been an honor, and I do not want to miss every single moment of it. But the
clock, it ticks. Such is the will of God.
Hercule Poirot, Curtain
Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective, created by Agatha Christie. Poirot is one of
Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels, one
play (Black Coffee), and more than 50 short stories published between 1920 and
1975.
Poirot's name was derived
from two other fictional detectives of the time: Marie Belloc Lowndes' Hercule
Popeau and Frank Howel Evans' Monsieur Poiret, a retired Belgian police officer
living in London.
Poirot first appeared in The
Mysterious Affair at Styles (published in 1920) and exited in Curtain
(published in 1975). Following the latter, Poirot was the only fictional
character to receive an obituary on the front page of The New York Times.
By 1930, Agatha Christie
found Poirot "insufferable", and by 1960 she felt that he was a
"detestable, bombastic, tiresome, ego-centric little creep". Yet the
public loved him and Christie refused to kill him off, claiming that it was her
duty to produce what the public liked.
Poirot passes away from
complications of a heart condition at the end of Curtain: Poirot's Last Case. He had moved his amyl nitrite pills
out of his own reach, possibly because of guilt. He thereby became the murderer
in Curtain, although it was for the
benefit of others. Poirot himself noted that he wanted to kill his victim
shortly before his own death so that he could avoid succumbing to the arrogance
of the murderer, concerned that he might come to view himself as entitled to
kill those whom he deemed necessary to eliminate.
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