Agatha Christie by Lucy Worsley review | Hacker News Reader

Agatha Christie by Lucy Worsley review

theguardian.com

26 pointslermontov7 comments

Agatha Christie is the best-selling novelist in history. (JK Rowling is behind her by billions of copies and only Shakespeare comes close to her.)

I honestly really love her novels. Sometimes they're a bit contrived, but they're fun and somehow not as dull as other murder mystery novels that I've tried to read. I can zip through one of her books in 4-5 hours.

Here is a great podcast about her: https://podcasts.apple.com/nz/podcast/185-agatha-christie/id...

Enough time has passed that Agatha Christie’s books have started falling into the public domain in the United States. She published a new book (sometimes more) every single year from 1921 until her death, so every January we can look forward to another expired copyright. I’ve read all of the Standard Ebooks editions (https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/agatha-christie) and can recommend them.

She died in 1976, so in life+50 countries, all her works will become public domain in 2027 (84 will still be copyrighted in the US); in life+70 countries, the year will be 2047 (34 will still be copyrighted in the US). The copyrights will continue to expire in the US until 2072, when the the last book published in her lifetime falls into the public domain.

I've never been into mysteries, particularly, but I'm reading "And Then There Were None" right now. Mostly to see how she does it.

Note that this "study guide": https://www.studymode.com/essays/And-Then-There-Were-None-My...

gets the name of the island wrong: it's "Soldier Island."

Well, the book was originally published in England under the name Ten Little N⸺s, and in that edition the location was named “N⸺ Island.”

For obvious reasons, that title was considered unsuitable for sale in America, so American editions were renamed to And Then There Were None, and the island and poem were changed to reference (depending on edition) Indians or soldiers instead. Most editions these days have settled upon soldiers.

Incidentally, Wikipedia mentions one use of the phrase “our black brothers” that only makes sense in the context of the original naming.

Interesting. Was there actually a N__ Island?

Not that Christie was attempting to reference. The title of the children's poem being used was "Ten Little N---", ("And then there were none" is the last line of said poem).

Whilst there are several islands off the coast of Devon, hers was a fanciful creation. The entire story just revolves around poem.

I just reread the "our black brothers" line. It makes sense without knowing the original naming. It's about an Englishman leaving a bunch of African natives to die.

Perhaps they mean "Vera Claythorn becoming semi-hysterical" only makes sense knowing the name, but that's a bit of a stretch.

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