scripsi

This is a spoiler-free post.

The Hollow was first published in 1946, during Agatha Christie’s Golden Age. It’s not one of her more well-known mysteries, which I always thought was a bit strange, because it’s my favourite Christie. On the surface the plot is typical for her: A murder in a stately home where several guests have gathered for the weekend. Hercule Poirot investigates. Personally I think this book is rather invisible because it belies a very common statement about Christie, that she only writes cardboard stock characters with no depths and complexity. In The Hollow we have plenty of complex characters and I would say the main theme in the book is obsession. Obsessive love, obsession for science, the artist's obsession towards their work, and so on. If you wanted a stock Christie, you may be disappointed. There is also the fact that even if this is a Poirot novel, he doesn’t enter until halfway, and he is actually not the first to figure out who the murderer is. In fact I’ve always felt this book may have been better liked if there had been no Poirot in it at all. Checking the publishing order, this was the first Poirot since 1942, and Christie had written five books in between. I wonder if the publisher put pressure on her to include Poirot in this one… You also get the POV from more characters than usual. I have never read any of Christie's Mary Westmacott novels, but I’ve read that The Hollow is more like them in writing style.

Sir Henry Angkatell and his wife Lucy are having a weekend party with family and friends at their house the Hollow. The “poor” relative Midge Hardcastle who is in love with her cousin Edward Angkatell. Edward, who has inherited Lucy’s childhood home because he is a man, is in love with their cousin Henrietta Savernake. Henrietta, a talented sculptor is in love with, and the lover of the brilliant doctor John Cristow. And John, in turn, is married to plain and rather simple Hilda, who is deeply devoted to him. And to complicate things further, John’s former fiancee, Hollywood star Veronica Cray, is renting a nearby cottage. And of course there is a murder.

This is the very last Agatha Christie novel I read, and also my favourite. I think Christie says some interesting things about obsession, for another person, a place, a career or talent. I really like Midge, and Henrietta is even better. And as there are several POV’s it’s quite interesting to see how different characters feel about the same situation.

There is, unfortunately, one very off-putting part of The Hollow is the portrayal of Midge’s unpleasant Jewish employer. I think this is the most vicious description of aJewish person in the whole of Christie’s production.

The Hollow was filmed for Agatha Christie's Poirot in 2004, but isn’t one of the best. Probably because Poirot felt more like an afterthought in the book, but the TV show was very much David Suchet’s show, so Poirot just had to take center stage. Quite a lot of character nuance was omitted as well as some characters and plot points. I think I had enjoyed it more if I hadn’t read the book.