Third girl - Agatha Christie [108]
The previous year, The Mousetrap had celebrated its 5,000th performance, and in 1966 at the August meeting of the Devon and Exeter Steeplechases and Hurdle Races, the ‘Mousetrap’ Challenge Cup Handicap Steeple Chase was inaugurated, with a prize of £350. This subsequently became an annual event, with a cup donated by Agatha Christie and competed for yearly.
In the autumn, a collection of Jane Marple stories, all of which had previously appeared in other volumes, was published in the United States under the title, Thirteen Clues for Miss Marple.
Most published interviews with Agatha Christie are disappointing; she was rarely at ease talking to strangers. She must, however, have enjoyed her conversation with Francis Wyndham, who had visited her at Wallingford in the autumn of 1965, for the long article, ‘The Algebra of Agatha Christie’, which Wyndham published in the London Sunday Times on 27 February 1966, is enlivened by a number of fascinating observations by Mrs Christie, in addition to those which have already been mentioned:
‘Modern taste has changed very largely from detective stories to crime stories. What are known in American as “gabblers” — just a series of violent episodes succeeding each other. I find these very boring.’
‘If I’d known it was for life, I’d have chosen some rather younger detectives: God knows how old they must be by now! I’m afraid Poirot gets more and more unreal as time goes by. A private detective who takes cases just doesn’t exist these days, so it becomes more difficult to involve him and make him convincing in so doing. The problem doesn’t arise with Miss Marple: there are still plenty of them drifting about.’
‘Oh, I’m an incredible sausage machine, a perfect sausage machine! I always think it must end soon. Then I’m so glad when the next one comes along and it’s not so difficult to think of something new after all. And, of course, as you get older you change, you see things from another angle. But probably I could write the same book again and again, and nobody would notice. Perhaps I’d better keep that up my sleeve, in case I ever run completely out of ideas!’
‘A terrible lot of girls write fan letters from America. They’re always so earnest! And Indians are worse. “I have loved all your books and think you must be a very noble woman”. Now what on earth is there in my books to make anybody think I’m noble? I’m afraid the fans are sometimes disappointed in my photographs — they write “I had no idea you were so old.” I get a good many asking curious questions: “What emotions do you experience when you write?” All a great deal too sincere. What I’m writing is meant to be entertainment. I got one rather upsetting letter from a West African: “I’m filled with enthusiasm for you and want you to be my mother. I’m arriving in England next month…” I had to write back that I was going abroad indefinitely.’
‘Usually you think of the basic design — you know, “That would be an awfully good double-cross or trick.” You start with the wish to deceive, and then work backwards. I begin with a fairly complete diagram, though small things may be changed in the writing, of course. One’s always a little self-conscious over the murderer’s first appearance. He must never come in too late; that’s uninteresting for the reader at the end of the book. And the de´nouement has to be worked out frightfully carefully. The further it comes towards the end, the better. That’s even more important in a play, where an anti-climax ruins everything.’
‘I was brought up on Dickens. Always loved him and hated Thackeray. I love Jane Austen, too — who doesn’t?’
‘One is very lucky to have writing as a trade. One can work hard at it but also have delicious days of leisure and idleness. Young people nowadays have no time at all for what I call leisure, thinking, and all that. They’re overshadowed by education. They’re so desperate