“The truth, however ugly in itself, is always curious and beautiful to seekers after it.”

― Agatha Christie, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Agatha Mary Clarissa Christie (née Miller) was born on September 15^th, 1890 in Torquay, Devon, South Wales into a middle-class family. Agatha’s mother, Clara, did not want her to learn to read until she was eight, but she taught herself by age five and was eventually homeschooled by her American father. When Agatha was eleven, however, her father died and she became her mother’s closest companion. By age fifteen, Agatha was taking piano and singing lessons and could have been a professional pianist, if she had not been shy playing for people she did not know. At eighteen, she was writing short stories—some of which were published in a revised form in the 1930s.

In 1910, the Christie family moved to Cairo, where Agatha enjoyed parties and received many marriage proposals. She eventually married Archie Christie, a qualified aviator whom she met in 1912, on Christmas Eve 1914. On December 27^th of that year, after a short honeymoon, Archie returned to France and he and Agatha met infrequently during the War Years until Archie was posted to the War Office in London in January 1918. During this time, Agatha began writing detective stories, and her debut novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, took a long time to finish, and even longer to find a publisher.

Agatha began writing detective stories partly because of a bet with her sister that she couldn’t write a good one, and partly to relieve the monotony of the dispensing work she was doing at the time. For this job, Agatha had to complete the examination of the Society of Apothecaries, and the expertise of poisons this examination gave her was put to good use. In The Mysterious Affair at Styles, the murderer’s use of poison was so well described that, when the book was eventually published, she received an unprecedented honor for a writer of fiction— a review in the Pharmaceutical Journal.

On August 5^th, 1919, Agatha gave birth to her only daughter, Rosalind, and, that same year, The Mysterious Affair at Styles was accepted for publication and Agatha was contracted to write five more books, which she did, and, after the war, she began experimenting with different types of thriller and murder mystery stories, creating Tommy and Tuppence as well as Miss Marple in quick succession.

Leaving Rosalind with her nurse, Agatha and Archie traveled across the British Empire, and, after their return, the family was reunited, but Agatha, however, was having a difficult time. Her mother had died and her marriage was strained by the sadness in her life, and it eventually broke down when Archie fell in love with fellow golfer and family friend, Nancy Neale.

On December 3^rd, 1926, Agatha left her house and daughter to the care of the maids and left without saying where she was going, and her car was found abandoned the next morning, leading to a nationwide search and much speculation. It eventually transpired that Agatha had traveled to King’s Cross station where she took a train to Harrogate and checked into the Harrogate Spa Hotel under the name Therese Neale and was recognized by hotel staff. At that point, Agatha was possibly concussed and suffering from amnesia; she couldn’t remember who she was and did not recognize her husband when he arrived. She and Archie then lived separately and they divorced in 1928, after which Agatha and Rosalind left England for the Canary Islands. Later that year, Agatha wrote her first Mary Westmacott novel, Mary Westmacott being an alias for her book that were not mystery novels.

In autumn of 1928, Agatha traveled on the Orient Express to Baghdad and met twenty-five-year-old archaeologist-in-training, Max Mallowan, who she married on September 11^th, 1930. During World War II, Max got a wartime job in Cairo while Agatha remained in England, writing and volunteering at a dispensary, and, in 1943, Rosalind, married to Hubert Prichard, gave birth to her son Matthew on September 21^st, 1943 and Agatha often went to help look after the baby.

By 1945, the war had ended, Max had returned, and Agatha had realized the tax implications of writing so much. She began to write less and enjoyed a slower-paced life in her mid-50s. At the end of 1946, Agatha’s alias of Mary Westmacott was exposed by an American reviewer.

Opening night of the 1974 Murder on the Orient Express film was Agatha Christie’s last public appearance, where she remarked that Poirot’s mustache was not luxurious enough. Agatha died on January 12^th, 1976, and was buried in the churchyard of St. Mary’s, Cholsey, near Wallingford.

Book Recommendations: Peril at End House (1932), And Then There Were None (1939)

Source: The Home of Agatha Christie