Evil Under the Sun
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| Evil Under the Sun | |
 Dust-jacket illustration of the first UK edition |
|
| Author | Agatha Christie |
|---|---|
| Cover artist | Rose |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Crime novel |
| Publisher | Collins Crime Club |
| Publication date | June 1941 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 256 pp (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN | NA |
| Preceded by | One, Two, Buckle My Shoe |
| Followed by | N or M? |
Evil Under the Sun is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in June 1941[1] and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in October of the same year[2]. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence (7/6)[1] and the US edition at $2.00[2].
Contents |
[edit] Plot introduction
A quiet holiday at a secluded hotel in Cornwall is all that Hercule Poirot wants, but amongst his fellow guests is a beautiful and vain woman who, seemingly oblivious to her own husband’s feelings, revels in the attention of another woman’s husband. The scene is set for murder, but can the field of suspects really be as narrow as it first appears?
[edit] Plot summary
(Although this novel is not counted amongst the novels featuring him, Hastings makes a cameo appearance in about ten lines of chapter 2, discussing the case with Poirot at a later date.)
The beautiful Arlena Stuart Marshall is magnetically attractive to men, and her husband Kenneth reacts with apparent stoicism to the presence at the hotel of Patrick Redfern, her new beau. His wife, Christine, seems less acquiescent, and Arlena is also detested by Rosamund Darnley, an old friend of Kenneth’s who seems to want him for herself.
On the morning of the murder, Arlena goes off on her own for what appears to be a tryst on the side of the island that is comparatively unvisited. Poirot assumes that her assignation is with Patrick, but this seems not to be the case when Patrick arrives shortly afterwards and seems to be looking for her.
Patrick starts to push out a boat to go meet Arlena when another guest, Emily Brewster, asks if she may join him. When they reach the secluded beach, they see Arlena on the sand. Patrick clambers ashore, revealing that Arlena is dead. Emily goes to fetch help while he waits with the dead Arlena.
Found at the crime scene are a pair of scissors and a bottle.
Much attention is paid to the alibi of Kenneth Marshall, who claims to have been typing letters at the time of the murder. He has been heard, but the main corroboration comes from Rosamund Darnley, who claims to have entered the hotel and seen him, although not interrupted his work. When Kenneth confirms that he did see Rosamund enter the room, there is a suspicion that the two may have contrived the alibi. Perhaps the two were working together.
The discovery of a jewel in a cave adjoining the beach draws into the list of suspects a keen yachtsman, Horace Blatt. Meanwhile, Christine Redfern admits to overhearing Arlena talking to a man who was blackmailing her. When it is discovered that much Arlena's enormous fortune has been eaten up in untraceable payments, another potential motive becomes clear. Moreover, Poirot starts to inquire regarding recent cases of strangulation, throwing up suspicions of a serial killer. Is the religiously zealous Reverend Lane secretly a homicidal maniac?
Kenneth’s daughter, Linda, has behaved oddly on the morning of the murder, returning early with a package of candles. Poirot finds remains of wax, hair, and coloured paper in her fireplace. When she attempts to commit suicide, leaving a note that claims responsibility for the murder, it seems that the case is solved.
Linda’s guilt is attached, however, to a little experiment with sympathetic magic and a wax doll. The real nature of the murder is far more complex. For Arlena was not the seductress that she first appeared: she was just a woman of strong superficial attractiveness of whom men quickly tired. She was an obvious victim for a manipulative swindler such as Patrick Redfern.
Christine's body was found, not Arlena's.
Arlena, scared by the approach of Patrick’s wife down the ladder and, following her previous instructions from Patrick, hid in the cave. Christine took her place lying on the beach, wearing the hat, and was “discovered” by Patrick.
Now, Patrick could kill Arlena at his leisure. It was at least the second such murder that he had committed; the pair had been responsible for an earlier murder using a similar trick to establish his alibi. His motive was to kill Arlena before it could be revealed that he had swindled her out of much of her fortune.
The only happy ending is for Kenneth and Rosamund, who plan their eventual wedding while reflecting on the fact that each had provided a fake alibi for the other, believing the other to be the actual murderer.
[edit] Characters in "Evil Under the Sun"
- Hercule Poirot, the Belgian detective
- Colonel Weston, the Chief Constable
- Inspector Colgate, the investigating officer
- Sergeant Phillips, a policeman in the case
- Dr. Neasden, the police surgeon
- Arlena Stuart Marshall, a former actress
- Captain Kenneth Marshall, Arlena’s husband
- Linda Marshall, Kenneth’s daughter, and Arlena’s daughter by marriage
- Patrick Redfern, Arlena’s lover
- Christine Redfern, Patrick’s wife
- Rosamund Darnley, a clothes designer
- Reverend Stephen Lane, a clerical guest who quite openly declares Arlena Marshall the evilest in the land.
- Emily Brewster, a guest who discovers the body of Arlena Marshall.
- Sir Horace Blatt, a yachtsman
- Mrs. Castle, the owner of the Jolly Roger Hotel.
- Major Barry, A retired officer who fought in India
- Mrs. Carrie Gardener- A garrulous American tourist
- Mr. Odell Gardener, The husband of Mrs. Gardener who quite obligingly does whatever she says.
[edit] Literary significance and reception
The verdict by Maurice Willson Disher in The Times Literary Supplement of June 14, 1941 was positive: "To maintain a place at the head of detective-writers would be difficult enough without the ever increasing rivalry. Even Miss Christie cannot stay there unchallenged though she has a following which will swear her books are best without reading the others. Unbiased opinion may have given the verdict against her last season when new arrivals set a very hot pace; but Evil Under the Sun will take a lot of beating now". After summarising the plot, the Mr. Disher concluded: "Miss Christie casts the shadow of guilt upon first one and then another with such casual ease that it is difficult for the reader not to be led by the nose. Everybody is well aware that any character most strongly indicated is not a likely criminal; yet this guiding principle is forgotten when Miss Christie persuades you that you are more discerning than you really are. Then she springs her secret like a land-mine."[3]
Maurice Richardson in a short review in the June 8, 1941 issue of The Observer said, "Best Agatha Christie since Ten Little Niggers – and one can't say much more than that – Evil Under the Sun has luxury summer hotel, closed-circle setting, Poirot in white trousers. Victim: redhead actress man-mad. Smashing solution, after clouds of dust thrown in your eyes, ought to catch you right out. Light as a soufflé."[4]
The Scotsman of July 3, 1941 spoke of the several "surprising discoveries" in the book's solution and said, "All of these the reader may best be left to encounter for himself in the assurance that the quest will prove as piquant as any this skilful writer has offered."[5]
E.R. Punshon in The Guardian of August 26, 1941 briefly summed up the plot in a eulogistic piece which began, "Is it going too far to call Mrs. Agatha Christie one of the most remarkable writers of the day?" [6]
Robert Barnard: "The classic Christie marital triangle plot set in West Country seaside resort, with particular play on the alikeness of sunbathing bodies, and dead ones. Possibly overingenious and slightly uncharacterised."[7]
[edit] References to other works
The plot has some similarities to the Christie short story Triangle at Rhodes, which was first published in the US in This Week magazine in February 1936 and in the UK in issue 545 of the Strand Magazine in May 1936 and included in the collection Murder in the Mews (US title: Dead Man's Mirror) one year later.
In Triangle at Rhodes, Poirot again witnesses an apparent liaison between two married people. Again everyone believes that the responsible party is a beautiful and magnetic woman, Valentine Chantry, who is murdered. In Triangle at Rhodes the murder is by poison and it is thought that she and her lover have attempted to murder her husband and that the plot has gone wrong, but Poirot reveals that the murder was committed by her husband in cahoots with her apparent lover’s wife, Mrs. Gold.
In both stories, the key twist is that the appearance of the seductress’s power deflects attention from the reality of the situation. In Triangle at Rhodes, Mrs. Gold says of Valentine Chantry “in spite of her money and her good looks and all […] she’s not the sort of woman men really stick to. She’s the sort of woman, I think, that men would get tired of very easily.” In Evil under the Sun, Poirot says of Arlena Marshall “She was the type of woman whom men care for easily and of whom they easily tire.”
The character of Colonel Weston had originally appeared in Peril at End House and makes reference to that case upon his first appearance, in Chapter 5.
Minor character Mrs. Gardener is herself an admirer of Poirot's exploits and refers to the case of Death on the Nile in Chapter 1 of this novel.
[edit] Film, TV or theatrical adaptations
- Evil Under the Sun was the second film to be made with Peter Ustinov in the role of Poirot after his debut in the part in the 1978 film Death on the Nile. The setting was moved to a secluded resort frequented by the rich and famous in the Adriatic Sea whilst the action was, in fact, filmed in Mallorca, Spain.
- The novel was adapated as an episode in the series Agatha Christie's Poirot in 2001 starring David Suchet.
- On October 17, 2007, The Adventure Company released a PC adaptation of the book. The game starred Kevin Delaney as the voice of Hercule Poirot. This version includes the character of Captain Hastings who does not appear in the book.
[edit] Publication history
- 1939, Collins Crime Club (London), June 1941, Hardback, 256 pp
- 1941, Dodd Mead and Company (New York), October 1941, Hardback, 260 pp
- 1945, Pocket Books (New York), Paperback, 183 pp (Pocket number 285)
- 1957, Fontana Books (Imprint of HarperCollins), Paperback, 189 pp
- 1963, Pan Books, Paperback, 217 pp
- 1971, Ulverscroft Large-print Edition, Hardcover, 362 pp
- 2008, Poirot Facsimile Edition (Facsimile of 1941 UK First Edition), HarperCollins, April 1, 2008, Hardback, ISBN 0-00-727455-6
The book was first serialised in the US in Collier's Weekly in eleven parts from December 14, 1940 (Volume 106, Number 24) to February 22, 1941 (Volume 107, Number 8) with illustrations by Mario Cooper.
[edit] References
- ^ a b Chris Peers, Ralph Spurrier and Jamie Sturgeon. Collins Crime Club – A checklist of First Editions. Dragonby Press (Second Edition) March 1999 (Page 15)
- ^ a b American Tribute to Agatha Christie
- ^ The Times Literary Supplement June 14, 1941 (Page 285)
- ^ The Observer June 8, 1941 (Page 3)
- ^ The Scotsman July 3, 1941 (Page 7)
- ^ The Guardian August 26, 1941 (Page 3)
- ^ Barnard, Robert. A Talent to Deceive – an appreciation of Agatha Christie - Revised edition (Page 204). Fontana Books, 1990. ISBN 0006374743
[edit] External links
- Evil Under the Sun at the official Agatha Christie website
- Evil Under the Sun (1982) at the Internet Movie Database
- Evil Under the Sun (2002) at the Internet Movie Database
- Web page for Burgh Island, the setting of which is used in Evil Under The Sun and And Then There Were None.
