The Sporadic Interview with a Dead Author Blog

Dame Agatha Christie, Lady Mallowan

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Pennymaker: *smiling broadly, turning to face the camera* Hello, and welcome to the Sporadic Interview with a Dead Author Blog. That's right. Everyone on the other side of the table has pegged it, and that is indeed part of the selection process, so please, let's stop whining about discrimination against the living, accept that sometimes a line is drawn, and move on like adults, shall we? Yes? Yes. *clears throat* *touches hair*

*turns to face second camera* *smiling broadly again*

Last time, we had the rare pleasure of interviewing Edgar Allan Poe, whose writing has sparked the imaginations of countless readers across the world and spawned an award in his name, the Edgar Award. As you may know, this award is given to authors who have made great literary contributions, specifically to the Mystery genre. Our next interviewee took home that award for her play, Witness for the Prosecution in 1955. She was awarded the Mystery Writers of America's Grand Master award that year as well, and she also holds the Guinness World Record for the best-selling fiction writer of all time, her novels having sold more than two billion copies. I mean... talk about longevity, she also wrote the world's longest-running play, The Mousetrap, which has been performed in the West End from 1952 until Covid-19 cut it off. With sixty-six novels, fourteen short story collections, and multiple stage, radio, TV, even graphic novel adaptations of her books and short stories out there, she is easily one of the most widely read authors in history. I give you, the one and only Queen of Crime, the Duchess of Death, Dame Agatha Christie, Lady Mallowan, lately of Oxfordshire, England!

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Christie: *smiling* Oh, what a lot of bother, to say all of that.

Pennymaker: It's true, though. You've certainly put my own career into perspective. I stand in awe. It is because of you and women like you that women like me don't have to come up with masculine sounding pen-names... unless we want to. But that's beside the point. What I really want to know is, what got you started writing? That's always intrigued me, that moment when someone picks up a pen and the lightbulb turns on.

Christie: *laughing a little* Well, I'm not so sure about lightbulbs. I was homeschooled, as you might call it. I hadn't very much formal education, but did have a very wise and patient nanny, and quite a bit of time on my hands. My brother and sister were much older, so I was left almost entirely to my own devices. I found myself making up stories and acting the different parts. As I told that chap from the BBC in 1955, there's nothing like boredom to make you write. So by the time I was 16 or 17, I'd written quite a number of short stories and one long, dreary novel. By the time I was 21, I had finished the first book of mine ever to be published, the Mysterious Affair at Styles. That's how it began, really. I fell into the habit of using my imagination to fill in the gaps, as it were.

Pennymaker: *gives body of work the side-eye* *coughs lightly* Well, you managed to fill quite a few gaps, I'd say. So. With so many books under your belt, you must have spent quite a lot of time writing. When you were not writing, how did you pass the time?

Christie: For fun?

Pennymaker: For fun. Yes.

Christie: *leaning forward with a mysterious smirk* I went to the sea. There's a place I liked especially, called Blackpool Sounds. Right down on the cove in Devon. The bathing there is just the thing. And then there was my gardening. I also traveled, you know, quite a bit. Egypt, Iraq, that sort of thing. I may have been a quiet, peaceful English woman, but I got around.

Pennymaker: You certainly did. Did you know that all of the places you lived now have these little blue plaques, 'Dame Agatha Christie detective novelist and play wright lived here?'

Christie: *eyes widening* The things that fascinate the modern mind are really quite puzzling to me. Did you know I was criticized after I wrote my autobiography for not having a private life that played out like one of my stories? Can you imagine, always stumbling over a dead body, murderers lurking in every drapery, mysteries around every corner... It would have all been quite exhausting, although, I will admit it would have been much more interesting if I had somehow died in all those places... *squints slightly and focuses on a point somewhat above Pennymaker's head* *gets out small black notebook and a pencil* *sound of scribbling*

Pennymaker: Agatha, while I've got you here, I was hoping you could tell me how you came up with sixty different novels and so many short ... stories... Um... *purses lips* Dame Christie?

Christie: *distracted* One moment. *more scribbling*

Pennymaker: Did you, right now, started plotting a new —

Christie: Just one... more... moment... *scribbling*

Pennymaker: *turns to camera* *dazzling smile* I would like to thank the ITV Perspectives, "The Mystery of Agatha Christie" (2013) hosted by David Suchet for providing content and insight for today's blog post, as well as Agatha Christie's own An Autobiography, and Come, Tell Me How You Live. *more scribbling in background* Apparently that will be all for today. Until next time, this is Anna Pennymaker with another Sporadic Interview with a Dead Author.  

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