While I don't think, that Christie had a memory loss, I do believe she had some kind of nervous breakdown. One has to take into account, that her mother died weeks earlier. That alone takes some emotional toll. And on top of that, while she was still grieving, Archie told her, that he loves another woman and wants a divorce. It was probably to much for her and she sort of snapped.
Great video! Very informative and fun! I agree with you on your theory about Mrs. Christie's disappearance, in that I think that she deliberately staged the whole thing. I believe she was really angry, and overwhelmed emotionally by everything happening and wanted to get some revenge on her husband and Nancy, and she also wanted to take a break from her life. By disappearing like she did, Archie's affair comes out, everyone knows that he and Nancy are the "bad guys" and she is the victim. And she had some time to not deal with any of it. I don't think she suspected that the disappearance would become the national event it was, and she probably felt guilty about that, and so would never admit what really happened. I know I wouldn't, if I were her. 🙄
As someone else pointed out, Christie hated publicity and that is a point against this theory. But the thing is, Archie's affair had to come out publicly because of divorce laws at the time. There were no no-fault divorces so couples would often feign infidelity by being "caught" in a public place with someone not their spouse. Archie even proposed this at one point but he refused to do it with Nancy Neele because he wanted to protect her reputation.
It's funny that Christie was so anti-divorce and "dance with the one that brung ya" with her love triangles. On the one hand, the sort of Victorian/Edwardian middle class milieu in which she was raised would have very much ground that opinion into her. On the other, she hated Archie and loved, and was much more successfully married to, Max Malloran. We all contain multitudes. As for Nemesis, I think one reason why so many people read lesbian subtext into Clothilde is that the Hickson version, at least, practically makes it text that she is, with a very nasty remark from her one sister (whose name I don't recall). But I think you're right that it can be read either way legitimately, and, indeed, it could very well be a combination. There's absolutely no reason a lesbian mother can't over-love their child without any sort of romantic undertone.
Christie loved Max but it seemed she never got over the bitterness of Archie, understandable. There is more evidence for Clotilde that I didn't include in the video because it doesn't make my point but at point Miss Marple thinks Clotilde would absolutely kill her husband but then rejects it because she doesn't think Clotilde would ever have a husband which can be interpreted different ways as well.
@@summationgathering Oh, I get being a petty bitch. It's just that in her writing she usually advocates for the opposite of the course that ended up making her happy and a successful marriage. I find that funny. I'm pretty sure Clotilde is a lesbian. It just doesn't mean that her suffocating love for Verity was sexual. In a way, I read it more as a mother who overidentifies with her daughter, and when the daughter doesn't
Re: The disappearance... I really dislike any theory that would imply Christie was lying about her amnesia story. I really don't think she was. I think she had totally snapped. We didn't look at or understand mental health hardly at all back then, so it was easy to make accusations that it was a publicity stunt or an act for attention or a way of getting revenge on Archie. But Christie *loathed* attention and I am not convinced she would want the fact that she was being cheated on to be revealed publicly, nor would she want to attract a nation of mostly-negative attention. I think she was so miserable in her own life that she suddenly had to escape, and she became Tressa Neal for awhile.
I apologize for any insensitivity I may have shown with that theory. There are certainly multiple explanations for her disappearance. And you are correct. Christie hated public attention so that is certainly something she wished to avoid. Another comment mentioned that Christie may not have realized how infamous her disappearance would become had she done it intentionally. It is hard for me to wrap my mind around Christie not having full control of herself. She absolutely may have snapped. Christie was also dealing with other things during this time including the death of her mother.
@@summationgatheringWhat in later times received little publicity was that Christie actually gave a detailed account of what had happened to a newspaper - I think The Daily Mail - explaining that she had suffered a total loss of memory and had no recollection of anything that had happened - a real breakdown in fact. She made no reference at that time to her husband having asked her to divorce him, but certainly to the awful loss of her mother (she was clearing her childhood home when her husband told her he wanted her to divorce him) and subsequently there is evidence that she saw a specialist about having had some kind of breakdown. She was so shy that she'd never intentionally have courted such nationwide publicity.
@@alidabaxter5849 I probably should have brought that up in the video that Christie being very shy is a point against her disappearance being intentional.
Re. Sad Cypress, As you say, Mary Gerard would not have inherited if she were not named specifically in the will. The Willkie Collins novel No Name hinged on this same point of law, in great detail.
@@summationgathering I know they're outside your focus, but one day, it would be interesting to hear your takes on classic early mystery/thrillers, like The Moonstone, The Woman In White and No Name.
@@floraposteschild4184 Willkie Collins is outside the Golden Age but I'm not locked in to that. I'm very open to covering him at some point. I'll probably add him to the poll next time around.
You've mentioned Ellery Queen and his book about same-sex relationships. I haven't read a lot of his novels, but this one I believe I've read. It was many years ago and it was a translation into Russian. I remember liking it, and also I remember a very weird thing about my edition of the novel. In the book, there were mentions of famous gay people (including Tchaikovsky). And THERE WAS A FOOTNOTE from the editor or probably from the translator, in which this person very strongly rejects the idea that those people mentioned in the novel were gay. Sometimes I think about it and still can't believe that this was real.
Oh that's interesting. I checked my edition of the book (it's been a while since I read it) and there is no footnote. But then Ellery goes on to say that there is no definitive proof about any of the men mentioned but someone wrote a book speculating about them with the implication that the suspicions are true or at least Ellery considers it a fact.
One theory I'd like to see investigated is whether Adrian's car crash was actually murder or not in Towards Zero. Battle drops a line that it might be, but is there any evidence?
This is a good suggestion! Towards Zero is coming up on my reread list for reviews later this year so I'll pay special attention to this for the next theory video.
❤ Love your channel. I really appreciated the Amyas and Philip connection in Poirot adaptation. I think it enriches the story and Amyas' self absorption. ❤
Oh, and I think that Agatha blamed Nancy for the affair and the end of her marriage just as much, or more, as she blamed Archie. My theory is that while Agatha wanted to portray herself as the sad but civilized wronged wife, she really hated Archie and Nancy. And in "Death on the Nile," she could, via fiction, stalk and harass a hussy who took another woman's man, and then murder her, even if the husband was a scoundral who conned the hussy with the help of the dumped fiancee. And the "wronged woman" got to kill him too. So it was all good.
Christie's love triangles are almost exclusively (but not entirely) woman-woman-man in which the original man-woman couple was the true couple with the other woman being the interloper or distraction. It can't be a coincidence but at the same time, one does have to be careful of reading too much into things. We should not assume that because an author writes something that it is reflective of his or her personal experience. It's a very easy trap to fall into. I do it all the time.
You’re not alone on noting the tentative link between Bertram’s Hotel and By the Pricking of My Thumbs. At the very least they’re both inspired by a real train robbery in the 1960’s which captured the public’s fascination.
It was certainly on Christie's mind during the 1960s. It would have been fun to see her go all out on the train robbery instead of using it as a side plot.
While I don't think, that Christie had a memory loss, I do believe she had some kind of nervous breakdown. One has to take into account, that her mother died weeks earlier. That alone takes some emotional toll. And on top of that, while she was still grieving, Archie told her, that he loves another woman and wants a divorce. It was probably to much for her and she sort of snapped.
This is very valid. Honestly, the truth is probably some combination of emotional distress and desire to make Archie suffer for it.
Great video! Very informative and fun!
I agree with you on your theory about Mrs. Christie's disappearance, in that I think that she deliberately staged the whole thing. I believe she was really angry, and overwhelmed emotionally by everything happening and wanted to get some revenge on her husband and Nancy, and she also wanted to take a break from her life. By disappearing like she did, Archie's affair comes out, everyone knows that he and Nancy are the "bad guys" and she is the victim. And she had some time to not deal with any of it. I don't think she suspected that the disappearance would become the national event it was, and she probably felt guilty about that, and so would never admit what really happened. I know I wouldn't, if I were her. 🙄
As someone else pointed out, Christie hated publicity and that is a point against this theory. But the thing is, Archie's affair had to come out publicly because of divorce laws at the time. There were no no-fault divorces so couples would often feign infidelity by being "caught" in a public place with someone not their spouse. Archie even proposed this at one point but he refused to do it with Nancy Neele because he wanted to protect her reputation.
It's funny that Christie was so anti-divorce and "dance with the one that brung ya" with her love triangles. On the one hand, the sort of Victorian/Edwardian middle class milieu in which she was raised would have very much ground that opinion into her. On the other, she hated Archie and loved, and was much more successfully married to, Max Malloran. We all contain multitudes.
As for Nemesis, I think one reason why so many people read lesbian subtext into Clothilde is that the Hickson version, at least, practically makes it text that she is, with a very nasty remark from her one sister (whose name I don't recall). But I think you're right that it can be read either way legitimately, and, indeed, it could very well be a combination. There's absolutely no reason a lesbian mother can't over-love their child without any sort of romantic undertone.
Christie loved Max but it seemed she never got over the bitterness of Archie, understandable. There is more evidence for Clotilde that I didn't include in the video because it doesn't make my point but at point Miss Marple thinks Clotilde would absolutely kill her husband but then rejects it because she doesn't think Clotilde would ever have a husband which can be interpreted different ways as well.
@@summationgathering Oh, I get being a petty bitch. It's just that in her writing she usually advocates for the opposite of the course that ended up making her happy and a successful marriage. I find that funny.
I'm pretty sure Clotilde is a lesbian. It just doesn't mean that her suffocating love for Verity was sexual. In a way, I read it more as a mother who overidentifies with her daughter, and when the daughter doesn't
Re: The disappearance... I really dislike any theory that would imply Christie was lying about her amnesia story. I really don't think she was. I think she had totally snapped. We didn't look at or understand mental health hardly at all back then, so it was easy to make accusations that it was a publicity stunt or an act for attention or a way of getting revenge on Archie. But Christie *loathed* attention and I am not convinced she would want the fact that she was being cheated on to be revealed publicly, nor would she want to attract a nation of mostly-negative attention. I think she was so miserable in her own life that she suddenly had to escape, and she became Tressa Neal for awhile.
I apologize for any insensitivity I may have shown with that theory. There are certainly multiple explanations for her disappearance. And you are correct. Christie hated public attention so that is certainly something she wished to avoid. Another comment mentioned that Christie may not have realized how infamous her disappearance would become had she done it intentionally. It is hard for me to wrap my mind around Christie not having full control of herself. She absolutely may have snapped. Christie was also dealing with other things during this time including the death of her mother.
@@summationgatheringWhat in later times received little publicity was that Christie actually gave a detailed account of what had happened to a newspaper - I think The Daily Mail - explaining that she had suffered a total loss of memory and had no recollection of anything that had happened - a real breakdown in fact. She made no reference at that time to her husband having asked her to divorce him, but certainly to the awful loss of her mother (she was clearing her childhood home when her husband told her he wanted her to divorce him) and subsequently there is evidence that she saw a specialist about having had some kind of breakdown. She was so shy that she'd never intentionally have courted such nationwide publicity.
@@alidabaxter5849 I probably should have brought that up in the video that Christie being very shy is a point against her disappearance being intentional.
Re. Sad Cypress, As you say, Mary Gerard would not have inherited if she were not named specifically in the will. The Willkie Collins novel No Name hinged on this same point of law, in great detail.
No Name is a good novel to use discuss this. I wish I had thought of it when I made this video.
@@summationgathering I know they're outside your focus, but one day, it would be interesting to hear your takes on classic early mystery/thrillers, like The Moonstone, The Woman In White and No Name.
@@floraposteschild4184 Willkie Collins is outside the Golden Age but I'm not locked in to that. I'm very open to covering him at some point. I'll probably add him to the poll next time around.
@@summationgathering Splendid. Thank you.
You've mentioned Ellery Queen and his book about same-sex relationships. I haven't read a lot of his novels, but this one I believe I've read. It was many years ago and it was a translation into Russian. I remember liking it, and also I remember a very weird thing about my edition of the novel. In the book, there were mentions of famous gay people (including Tchaikovsky). And THERE WAS A FOOTNOTE from the editor or probably from the translator, in which this person very strongly rejects the idea that those people mentioned in the novel were gay. Sometimes I think about it and still can't believe that this was real.
Oh that's interesting. I checked my edition of the book (it's been a while since I read it) and there is no footnote. But then Ellery goes on to say that there is no definitive proof about any of the men mentioned but someone wrote a book speculating about them with the implication that the suspicions are true or at least Ellery considers it a fact.
Probably to avoid a lawsuit.
One theory I'd like to see investigated is whether Adrian's car crash was actually murder or not in Towards Zero. Battle drops a line that it might be, but is there any evidence?
This is a good suggestion! Towards Zero is coming up on my reread list for reviews later this year so I'll pay special attention to this for the next theory video.
❤ Love your channel. I really appreciated the Amyas and Philip connection in Poirot adaptation. I think it enriches the story and Amyas' self absorption. ❤
Thanks!
Oh, and I think that Agatha blamed Nancy for the affair and the end of her marriage just as much, or more, as she blamed Archie. My theory is that while Agatha wanted to portray herself as the sad but civilized wronged wife, she really hated Archie and Nancy. And in "Death on the Nile," she could, via fiction, stalk and harass a hussy who took another woman's man, and then murder her, even if the husband was a scoundral who conned the hussy with the help of the dumped fiancee. And the "wronged woman" got to kill him too. So it was all good.
Christie's love triangles are almost exclusively (but not entirely) woman-woman-man in which the original man-woman couple was the true couple with the other woman being the interloper or distraction. It can't be a coincidence but at the same time, one does have to be careful of reading too much into things. We should not assume that because an author writes something that it is reflective of his or her personal experience. It's a very easy trap to fall into. I do it all the time.
You’re not alone on noting the tentative link between Bertram’s Hotel and By the Pricking of My Thumbs. At the very least they’re both inspired by a real train robbery in the 1960’s which captured the public’s fascination.
It was certainly on Christie's mind during the 1960s. It would have been fun to see her go all out on the train robbery instead of using it as a side plot.