The British mysteries of Agatha Christie for foreigners

Picasso25

Hello everyone!

I joined to post something about the Joan Hickson Miss Marple adaptations, and something in one of Griselda's nice answers made me think to post on this subject.

You see, despite being French, I learned English at a young age: Started spending my summers in an English family since I was nine, and later on, even lived there for a couple of years.

I went native enough to have become a serious tea addict, and even to know that I prefer my Marmelade thick cut...Also to have fond memories of M&S shrimp sandwiches, too! (Notice I'm still French at the core: This is all about food.)

Still stumped on some subjects, though. Well, cricket, obviously (but that's not that alarming, not a big sports fan here)... And accents.

I feel this is a very British thing, how social class can be (still) earmarked like this. I know that for me, it's quite a mystery when I watch a TV episode or a film. Oh, I can spot a scottish or Irish  accent (Or an American one, but is it really the same language anyway?), but social class, apart from the very obvious cockney, totally flies by me. I know British viewers catch on that when they comment on it, and I know it is important (I'm told I'm lucky to have a very "posh" way of speaking in English), but I never quite catch on it.

Not that it has ever put me off watching BBC programs (radio or TV) but I feel it's something that adds a layers of mystery for us that are not from the Commonwealth...It may even ADD to the quintessential "Britishness" of, in particular, Agatha Christie's books and adaptation of these.
There's something extremely "British Empire" in those books, especially in the Poirot ones. One of them being that even in Hell or high waters, in the Mesopotamian desert or African jungle, everyone will "dress up" for dinner, and God forbid we ever go out of Sherry!

I, personally, thinks it adds to the charm. Do other people feel this way? Are some of you also finding things in those books that you realize have some other meaning (for British people) than the one you took for granted at first?

Griselda

You raise some very interesting points, Picasso, and the subject has made me think,  over the last few days,since we were discussing, on the forum, why the Joan Hickson episodes are more satisfying than others. As far as I know about the English class system and Agatha Christie's novels,  what gives AC's characters their class characteristics is the way they speak to others, and the way others speak to them. Other people spoke in a respectful way to the upper classes, but the upper classes just spoke simply what they needed, and what they wanted to say. This language pattern shapes the discourse of upper class characters in the novels of Agatha Christie. They are direct. Their mannerisms project confidence and ease. The upper classes also saw it as their duty to guide the lower classes, so, in certain situations,  their discourse and manners would be tinged with superiority, and a touch of graciousness. Society was fixed, and how to behave in any given situation was laid out and taught at school.  Whilst pre 1960, the upper classes had an unshakeable self-confidence based on their inherited social position, all that came to change, and all social classes began to consciously define who they were in the new social order. The hierarchy was disappearing. Hence the cult of the personality, and, the opportunity to self-actualise your own potential, and almost act out who you are. As people explored alternative life styles and religions, so it became less clear what was the right thing to do for your station in life. The decline of religious worship only heightened the plurality of belief structures, and the importance of individual will, and toleration for personal choice. I think that is why modern adaptions of Agatha Christie novels have tried to establish characters' back stories based around their emotional experiences, because today we see life as a journey of personal discovery. Life is seen as being about personal fulfilment far more than it was in Christie's hey day.In the 1930s, doing your duty and not letting down your class was what mattered, and you wanted to hang on to the privileges of your class, because they opened most doors to you in life. Life was pleasant and comfortable as a member of the gentry, and you didn't expect serious worry to come your way. Somebody would take care of you financially. I think that it was that awareness which determined the way of talking and behaving which typified the upper middle classes whom Christie wrote about.