Course Description

Instructor: Michael Moon

In this course we will consider a range of Agatha Christie’s works (mostly short) from early and late in her career, both in their initial written forms as well as in their adapted forms for film and television. In each case we will focus on such questions as how do we understand the pleasures we derive from a wide variety of Christie’s works: as puzzles-in-prose, as dramatic entertainments, as heightened depictions of aspects of the past, as innovative works in the rich tradition of mystery fiction, as incremental life-studies of the two detective characters who elicited from Christie her most enduring and engaging work?

Course Materials:
Course materials are widely available for purchase (and in some cases for free) on Kindle, Audible, and YouTube and on loan from public libraries. Students are welcome to choose whether to read a given text or view an adaptation of it for television.

Readings/Selections Include:
The following Agatha Christie short stories: ‘The Affair at the Victory Ball,’ ‘Three Blind Mice,’ ‘Witness for the Proseution,’ ‘The Chocolate Box,’ ‘The Tuesday Night Club,’ ‘Harlequin’s Lane,’ ‘The Harlequin Tea Set,’ ‘The Perfect Maid,’ and the Miss Marple novel NEMESIS

Bio: Born and grew up in north-central Oklahoma where parents operated a tree nursery and flower shop. Attended Roman Catholic elementary and public high school. Moved to New York City in 1973; BA from Columbia U School of General Studies 1978. PhD from Johns Hopkins U 1987. Taught American literature and LGBTQ Studies at Duke, Hopkins, Emory until 2019. Since discovery of a copy of The Tuesday Club Murders in the local public library at age twelve, have enjoyed Christie’s work immersively at several points in my life.