
Agatha Christie’s life rivaled the mysteries she created - lermontov
https://www.theintelligencer.com/entertainment/article/Book-World-Agatha-Christie-s-life-rivaled-the-12735983.php
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gajjanag
For fans of film, essentially all of Agatha Christie's mysteries featuring the
Belgian detective character Hercule Poirot have been adapted by ITV into a
fantastic TV series:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agatha_Christie's_Poirot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agatha_Christie's_Poirot)

I find it fascinating that they did this series over a span of over 24 years,
with the same lead actor (David Suchet, CBE) as Hercule Poirot throughout!

There is a behind the scenes interview with David Suchet reflecting upon the
24 year experience:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FX3ITew9Mpw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FX3ITew9Mpw)

"And Then There Were None", which is one of Christie's most famous works not
featuring Poirot, has been adapted by the BBC recently:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_Then_There_Were_None_(mini...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_Then_There_Were_None_\(miniseries\)).

~~~
lobster_johnson
I think the Poirot series is superb, but some of them suffer from stretching
the runtime -- the best ones are about 51 minutes long, whereas the longer
ones (which includes all of the last few seasons) click in at 1 hour and 29
minutes, some of which are based on _short stories_ , not novels. As
delightful as Poirot and his mysteries are, these are also admittedly somewhat
shallow, implausible puzzles that rely on acting and cozy English nostalgia to
entertain, not deep characterization or touching character arcs. Stretched to
two hours, there's often not enough meat to hold one's attention.

David Suchet is a national treasure, though. I wish he would be in more movies
and shows.

~~~
thaumasiotes
> the longer ones (which includes all of the last few seasons) click in at 1
> hour and 29 minutes, some of which are based on _short stories_ , not
> novels.

What matters is how much content there is in the episode. People have gotten
the idea from Peter Jackson's awful, awful Hobbit movies that pages of source
material are a restriction on how much movie you can make. But the problem
there was that the movies were terrible, not that _The Hobbit_ was shorter
than a three-book series. _Shrek_ is a 90 minute movie based off of a
children's book of just 1,150 words. Nobody ever complained about the quality
of _Shrek_.

~~~
oldandtired
A personal question to you: Why and in what particular ways do you consider
Peter Jackson's renditions of the The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit to be
so awful, awful?

I have enjoyed by stories since I first came across them 40 years ago. I
thought that Peter Jackson did an excellent job on retelling the story. In
point of fact, retelling it in a way that keeps the essence but is a new
variation.

When I first obtained my copy of Lord of the Rings (which I still have), I
read it 11 times in 8 months. I still read it when I get the urge. I have
found that Peter Jackson has quite a different imaging of the story of the
story compared to my own imagining and no less entertaining.

I have had people complain about the "licence" he took in the retelling, about
not being true to the original writing. However, a good story teller will add
to and change a story to make it more effective for his telling. That is the
essence of good story telling - how you choose to emphasise various elements.

~~~
BerislavLopac
Don't get me started... Ah, too late!

The Fellowship of the Ring is an excellent film, pretty consistently following
the story while removing confusing elements like Tom Bombadil (some scenes,
like the Moria stone troll fight, could have been a bit shorter, but overall
it was really amazing).

The Two Towers started showing the early signs os Jackson's "interventionist"
approach (which later culminated in the Hobbit films) with adding numerous
elements like Aragorn's side trek and Gimli's and Legolas' banter -- but
again, it overall added to the story without removing too much of it.

However, with The Return of the King he completely blew it, changing some
important elements like Ents' motivations and, above all, the role of the Dead
Men of Dunharrow. In the books, they're a formidable but reluctant force which
has a strong but limited impact on the story -- they aid Aragorn's attack on
the ships, scaring most of the Umbar's forces into drowning and allowing him
to increase his army with the captives on the ships, but then he releases them
and they never reach Pelennor.

In the film, they are turned to a deus ex machina which sweeps the battlefield
and the streets of Minas Tirith, killing all the enemies and not touching the
"good guys" (the book shows that the Dead Men scare everyone equally; the
"good guys" survive because they are captive and chained to the ships, which
probably needed a lot of cleaning afterwards). That scene reminded me of those
commercials where a green goo destroys all the toilet bacteria in one powerful
sweep -- in my opinion, that change totally destroyed the premise of the book
and turned it from "The Return of the King" to "The Return of some Guy with
Toilet Cleaner".

/rant

~~~
naeemtee
The return of the King is one of the best movies of the last 20+ years. Whine
about the Hobbit all you want, but LOTR is the greatest trilogy ever made and
Peter Jackson is a legend.

------
epberry
Love seeing this stuff on here. Maybe this reflects poorly on my schooling but
I've learned more about literature and philosophy from HN than from anywhere
else.

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jacobkg
I first discovered Agatha Christie in middle school at a book fair. "The
Alphabet Murders". The story twisted in such a way I had never experienced
before. I was used to being "smarter than the author" and being able to guess
where a story was headed. That experience prompted me to at least 30 of her
other books and several collections of short stories. Highly Recommended!

------
briandear
What a terribly written, yet interesting article. Have a look at this torture
mascarading as a paragraph:

“But derivative works and adaptations can't fully explain why Christie's work
endures. A splendid biography by Laura Thompson, however, does. "Agatha
Christie: A Mysterious Life" was published in Britain over a decade ago and
took an inexplicable amount of time to cross the pond. Yet the timing is
perfect because Thompson's thorough yet readable treatment of Christie's life,
in combination with artful critical context on her work, arrives at the reason
for her endurance..”

For a writer writing about a writer, in the Washington Post no less, one might
expect quality beyond that of a high school essay. It’s just ironic because
Christie was a great writer. I have yet to find literary criticism that’s
actually well written. Perhaps it’s a theory, but it always seems that
literary critics are really just failed real writers.

~~~
bshimmin
I'm glad I wasn't the only person who thought this. The worst bit for me was
"Christie, as Thompson details, came by such understanding through the
traditional means of early hardship"... but the "hardship" then isn't
explained for another three paragraphs!

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lisper
The essential Agatha (IMHO):

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Murder on the Orient Express

Curtain

Can't tell you why without spoiling it though. You have to read them.

~~~
jacobkg
I would add "And Then There Were None"

Haven't actually read Curtain, I will now immediately go buy it!

~~~
jjess
Actually, original title by Agatha Christie was "Ten Little Niggers" [1]. I
didn't read the book, but I really liked the movie [2] (there is eng subs).
People in reviews say it's closest and probably best adaptation. IMO, it's
excellent.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_Then_There_Were_None](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/And_Then_There_Were_None)

[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoTDsuSgPBw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoTDsuSgPBw)

~~~
armandososa
Why the downvotes? Is this an automated flagging system for the n-word?

~~~
dang
No. Please don't break the site guidelines by commenting about downvotes. If
you feel like a comment has been unfairly downvoted, give it a corrective
upvote and move on. That's what others did in this case, and the comment now
has a positive score.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

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ilyagr
I highly recommend Agatha Christie's autobiography. Reading in was a happy
experience for me. The descriptions of the Middle East in the early 20th
century are also interesting.

[https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=9dQq-
oVJFaUC](https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=9dQq-oVJFaUC)

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js2
NYT did an article last year summarizing what's been adapted to screen and
where to find it:

[https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/10/watching/agatha-
christie-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/10/watching/agatha-christie-
adaptations-where-to-stream.html)

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billfruit
I do wish though that there was greater space in public imagination for works
of Hammett and Chandler, and writers of their ilk. I find hardly any new
adaptations of their works being made these days.

~~~
briandear
Read the Yiddish Policeman’s Union by Michael Chabon; heavily influenced by
Chandler and one of the most spectacular detective stories ever.

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nunodonato
I grew up with Poirot books (thanks dad!), and have always been delighted with
the movies and series featuring David Suchet. He is such a great actor, there
is no one else that can impersonate Poirot like he does.

The new movie is just.... meh. Poirot(the character) has been holywood-ized
for the masses... lost all the charm for me.

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wand3r
unpaywalled
[https://www.theintelligencer.com/entertainment/article/Book-...](https://www.theintelligencer.com/entertainment/article/Book-
World-Agatha-Christie-s-life-rivaled-the-12735983.php)

~~~
dang
Thanks! We've changed to that from
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/the-
great...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/the-greatest-
mystery-that-agatha-christie-ever-created-was-her-own-
life/2018/03/07/c856a07a-01fd-11e8-bb03-722769454f82_story.html).

